Tag Archives: best Canadian baseball players

H2H 169: Bert Blyleven vs. Ferguson Jenkins – Who was Better?

While it took more than 50 years for the second pitcher in MLB history to reach 3,000 career strikeouts (Bob Gibson in 1974 after Walter Johnson in 1923), eight more pitchers would join that illustrious club in less than a decade between 1978 and 1986.  During an era when pitchers routinely threw more than 300 innings per season, nearly all of these new strikeout kings accumulated close to or more than 5,000 career innings pitched – this included a couple of foreign-born hurlers in Dutchman Bert Blyleven and Canadian Ferguson Jenkins.  As true workhorse starters, each threw over 4,500 career innings and won over 280 career games to go with the 3,000+ strikeouts, thus making for an interesting comparison between these two Hall of Famers:

Who was better – Bert Blyleven or Ferguson Jenkins?

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H2H 39: Carlos Beltran vs. Larry Walker – Who was Better?

Note: Updated for Larry Walker’s 2020 Hall of Fame selection.

Every major league baseball team is constantly on the lookout for the next great five-tool player (speed, power, hitting for average, fielding, arm strength), with the best example in today’s game being Mike Trout.  In recent memory, two of the best five-tool talents of the 1990s and 2000s were Carlos Beltran and Larry Walker, who between the two of them, had nearly 5,000 hits, 800 home runs, 3,000 runs scored, 3,000 runs batted in, and 500 stolen bases, and were honored with All-Star selections, Gold Gloves, Silver Sluggers, batting titles, and MVPs.  Though each player’s respective Hall of Fame credentials have been (and in Beltran’s case, will be) debated among Cooperstown voters, between the two of them, the question is:

Who was better – Carlos Beltran or Larry Walker?

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