It took five attempts, but Los Angeles Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw finally earned his 100th victory Friday night in downing the Rockies 6-4. Only 27 years old, the two-time Cy Young winner and reigning National League MVP has set a blistering pace over the first seven-plus seasons of his career. He owns a sparkling 2.54 career ERA, best among active pitchers, and a 9.5 K/9 rate. His uncanny ability to rack up strikeouts and keep runners off base has helped him establish himself as perhaps baseball’s best hurler over the past several seasons.
Naturally, the conversation now turns toward Kershaw’s chances of reaching 300 wins. Widely considered the most revered of individual pitching milestones, the last to achieve it was Randy Johnson in 2009. A test in equal parts longevity, effectiveness and luck, entrants into the 300 win club are becoming an increasingly rare breed. Only 24 pitchers have reached the plateau, with just five of them doing so within the past 25 years.
Kershaw has several key factors on his side, but despite his tremendous skill it will still be a long and difficult journey to join those hallowed ranks. He has shown a definite knack for collecting victories throughout his career: his .662 overall win-loss percentage is also tops among active players. A pair of especially pristine campaigns helped boost Kershaw to his current position. In 2011 he managed a 21-5 record, and last year he went 21-3 (MLB-leading .875 W-L%) along with a miniscule 1.77 ERA. Performances like those will certainly land you on the fast-track to history.
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Another element working in Kershaw’s favor is his durability. He has tossed more than 200 innings four of the last five seasons, and only missed the cut last year by 1.2 frames because he spent the first month on the disabled list. It’s almost scary to think his 2014 numbers may have been even better had he made those extra starts. Consistently taking the mound 30+ times a year will be vital to Kershaw’s chances of winning at least 200 more games.
The Dodgers’ quality level will also be something to keep in mind. Fortunately for Kershaw, they have been quite the good club recently, winning the NL West crown four of the last seven seasons. The lefty ace has shown the ability, however, to notch plenty of victories even when his team is not playing particularly well. Sandwiched between those division titles were three less-than-stellar seasons that failed to slow him down much. In 2011, when Kershaw won 21 games, the Dodgers finished only three games over .500. For the immediate future it does not appear Kershaw will lack for run support, but it’s impossible to predict how things will look further down the line.
Kershaw has earned a victory in 46.1% of his 217 starts to date. Spotting him 30 starts a season, he would average about 14 wins a year at that rate. A perennial Cy Young contender as consistently great as Kershaw could very well blow past that number numerous times, but this is a relatively conservative forecast. Maintaining that tempo, he would potentially reach win #300 in approximately 14 seasons’ time, at age 41.
There are more than a few assumptions at play here, and who knows how the landscape will look in a decade or more. Even the best pitchers can be unexpectedly hindered or sidelined. As a recent example, CC Sabathia netted 59 wins in his first three seasons with the Yankees. He appeared a solid candidate to attain 300 victories backed by a potent Yankees offense. Health issues piled up, ineffectiveness set in and the once-flowing supply of runs began to dwindle. Since getting his 200th win in July 2013, Sabathia has won only nine games.
Kershaw has already experienced some uncharacteristic struggles of his own in the early stages of 2015. In eight starts he has collected just two wins. He is sporting an elevated 4.24 ERA, a foreign figure to a pitcher who has enjoyed six straight seasons with a sub-3.00 mark. While it is much too early to panic for a pitcher of Kershaw’s caliber (his 2.72 FIP suggests he hasn’t been as poor as his other numbers indicate), it is a reminder of the difficulty of sustaining such a long stretch of uninterrupted dominance.
Clayton Kershaw has given us little reason to doubt him over the last several years. At the current moment, he and Felix Hernandez (who nabbed his own 100th win at almost the same age two seasons ago) seem the most promising candidates to eventually join the 300 club. But with a growing emphasis placed on pitch counts, relief specialists and other strategic wrinkles, even the game’s foremost starting pitchers find themselves maneuvered out of a win here and there.
Win #200, whenever it occurs, will provide further clarity. For now, Kershaw’s present milestone will spur some compelling and fun speculation.