Ron Guidry's 1978 Season: A Pitching Exhibition that Hasn't Been Duplicated Since

As a general rule I don't believe that pitchers should be voted Most Valuable Player in baseball. For one reason: no batter can ever win the Cy Young. It's just not fair. Generally speaking. But every once in a while an exception must be made. In my opinion the Most Valuable Player in the American League in 1978 was Ron Guidry, starting pitcher for the New York Yankees.

Ron Guidry's 1978 season was one for the ages. Not many were more impressive before it and none have been more impressive since. The 1978 season saw the Yankees coming off their first World Series victory in over a decade and most suspected they would easily be back there again. But the powerhouse all-star team didn't look much like a repeater in early summer. The one bright spot in a season that looked to be disappointing was the young kid from Louisiana, nicknamed Louisiana Lightning because of his fearsome fastball. While the bigger names on that legendary Yankees team faltered at the gate, Guidry shot out like a meteor. He won thirteen straight games before finally losing his first game in July. July! For his eleventh win, he struck out 11 California Angels. He appeared unbeatable. By season's end, Ron Guidry's record was an astounding 25-3. His .893 winning percentage remains the highest ever turned in by a twenty game winner. His ERA was a miniscule 1.74, a figure not posted by a southpaw since the glory days of Sandy Koufax. Perhaps most impressive is that during the 1978 season Guidry's opponents managed only an anemic .193 batting average.

These figures would be enough to earn Guidry a Most Valuable Player Award to go along with his Cy Young, but there's more. The Yankees as a whole finally caught fire during the infamous Boston Massacre in which they began their assault on the division-leading Red Sox who were a full 14 games ahead of the Yankees in late July. The end of season surge forced the two teams to play their legendary one game playoff and Guidry collected the win. But it is the stats that aren't apparent that really make the case for Ron Guidry as not only deserving of winning the MVP award, but deserving of the description. A startling percentage of Guidry's wins that year came on the heels of a Yankees loss. Indeed, on several occasions Guidry's performance put an end to a Yankees losing streak. He seemed capable of lifting the performance of the rest of the team and stemming the tide of a very dangerous hemorrhage. In the 1978 season literally every win was needed. One less dazzling performance by Guidry that year and they could have gone home after the final day of the regular season. Ron Guidry was literally the most valuable Yankee on the 1978 team because without him they would probably not have been in contention, much less have gone on to win the World Series.

So, who did win the American League MVP that year? Boston slugger Jim Rice whose batting stats don't look nearly as impressive thirty years later. Meanwhile, the closest any other pitcher has come to Guidry's 1978 record was Roger Clemens. He won one less game and lost one more game to stand at 24-4. That was the same year he beat out Yankees slugger Don Mattingly to win the MVP.

Go figure.