Tag Archives: decade of dominance

The modern-day closer is a highly-specialized role, with most top-tier closers rarely pitching more than one inning at a time to lock down the victory.  However, if you go back half a century or so to the nascent days of the closer (or firemen, as they were known back then) circa the 1970s, end-of-game relief pitchers at that time would commonly pitch one, two, or even three innings at a time to nail down the victory.  In those early “Wild West” days of relief pitching, two pioneering pitchers who would pave the way for today’s closers were Rollie Fingers and Rich “Goose” Gossage – as the first two players in MLB history to reach 300 career saves (while saving winning and losing 100+ games apiece), they were at the vanguard of baseball’s evolution; thus, between these two contemporaries, it is only natural to ask the question:

Who was better – Rollie Fingers or Goose Gossage?