Cleveland Indians Cy Young Wins 500th Game
By David Hill
Certain major league records are essentially unbreakable, and that includes Cy Young‘s 511 career victories. On this day in 1910, pitching for the Cleveland Indians, then known as the Naps, he won his 500th game.
Cy Young is known for not only having the annual award for pitching excellence named in his honor, but for his impossible to comprehend 511 major league victories. Not only is that the record, but Young is 94 wins ahead of Walter Johnson in second place.
It was on this day in 1910, as Young’s career was winding down, that he became the only member of the 500 win club. Facing off against the Washington Senators, Young pitched an eleven inning complete game as the Naps, as the Cleveland Indians were called then, took a 5-4 victory.
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Young was not the same pitcher he had been that year. At 43 years of age, he was no longer the workhorse he had been, failing to make thirty starts and pitch at least 200 innings for the first time since 1890. Yet, even with that decreased workload, Young still managed a 2.53 ERA and a 1.078 WHiP, and likely would have had a record better than 7-10 if the Naps had anything on offense aside from team namesake Nap Lajoie.
At that point, Young only had a season and a half left in the majors. He struggled the following year, posting a 3-4 record with a 3.88 ERA and a 1.446 WHiP before being released. He would finish out the season, and his Hall of Fame career, with the Boston Rustlers, as the Braves were known during that time.
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One of only two members of the 400 win club, Cy Young created his own exclusive club by winning his 500th game on this day. Chances are, the legendary hurler will remain the only player to ever reach that impressive milestone.