Mets Player Retrospective - Tom Seaver 1971

With great players, it's tough to seperate the great years from the career years because there's so many seasons that standout. 1971 is one of those seasons. Tom Seaver set career bests in strikeouts (289), complete games (21), ERA (1.76), strikeouts per nine innings (9.08), and strikeout to walk ratio (4.74). His strikeout and ERA total led the league, and his 20 wins was second to Fergunson Jenkins.

In what was somewhat of an injustice, Jenkins walked away with the Cy Young despite being outpitched in most categories by Seaver. Think Johan Santana/Bartolo Colon of 2005. Using Lee Sinin's Sabermetric Baseball Encyclopedia, Seaver set a career mark in support neutral win/loss with a 23-7 record. Jenkins mark was 24-13.

On thirteen different occasions in 1971, Seaver struck out ten batters. It also seemed like he gained strength as the season went on as his two best outings took place in September. On September 6, Seaver threw a two hit shutout and he struck out twelve. In his second to last start of the season, on September 26, Seaver threw a one hit shutout and struck out 10. His season best strikeout total came on August 11 when Seaver threw ten shutout innings and struck out fourteen (and didn't even get a decision).

Here's the numbers:

Wins 20
Losses 10
Games 35
Games Started 35
Complete Games 21
Innings Pitched 286 1/3
Hits 210
Runs 61
Earned Runs 56
Walks 61
Strikeouts 289
ERA 1.76
Runs Saved Above Average 48
Shutouts 4
H/9 6.60
BR/9 8.64
SO/9 9.08
BB/9 1.92
SO/BB 4.74
Neutral Wins 23
Neutral Losses 7