Giants ace Madison Bumgarner is the No. 3 all-time best World Series pitcher, says The New York Times
The 2014 World Series was Madison Bumgarner's world; the San Francisco Giants and Kansas City Royals just played in it. The Giants pitcher not only started two of the seven games in the series — in Game 5, he pitched a complete game and allowed zero runs — he also shut out the Royals in the last five innings of Game 7, on only two days of rest. Bumgarner is indisputably a great postseason pitcher. But how great?
The number-crunchers at The New York Times' Upshot blog devised a system to rank World Series pitchers, the Matty Score — named after Christy Mathewson, the New York Giants great of the early 1900s — which is calculated "by taking a pitcher's career innings pitched in the Series and subtracting three times his earned runs allowed."
Before Game 7, Bumgarner ranked No. 7 on the index; after it, he jumped up to No. 3, behind Mathewson and Sandy Koufax. "If Bumgarner has another impressive World Series, we’ll consider changing the name to the Maddy Score," says David Leonhardt at The Times. To see where other greats rank on the scale, click over to The New York Times.
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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
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