Apr 30th 2008 10:00AM by Josh Alper
There are few baseball sayings more ridiculous than a pitcher who just knows how to win. You’ll hear it when a guy wins a bunch of games despite being an average pitcher, as if it were only the pitcher, with no help from prodigious run support, responsible for the victories. He pitches to the score, they’ll say, and then denigrate a better pitcher with fewer wins as not having the ability to win games.

Next time you hear such nonsense, bring up Roy Halladay. The Blue Jay ace has thrown four straight complete games with an ERA of 2.86. He’s struck out 22 against four walks in that period and has exactly one win to show for it. That’s because his offense has scored five whole runs for him in that span not because Halladay just doesn’t know how to win.

Sure, he walked David Ortiz and then gave up two hits in the bottom of the ninth of last night’s 1-0 loss but that ignores Vernon Wells’s misplay on Kevin Youkilis’s winning hit. Ortiz, not exactly the swiftest of runners, didn’t have to so much as slide to win the game. Jeez, Roy. Couldn’t you just grit your teeth a little and spontaneously combust a run. That’s what Jack Morris would’ve done. Because he was a winner but you’re a loser!Continue Reading