The most unbreakable records in MLB history: 749 Complete games
They just don’t make em like they used to.
At one point, pitchers prided themselves on going out on the mound for the entirety of the game. They weren’t interested in a mid-game reliever. And they certainly didn’t want to see a closer coming in during the final inning to finish things off. Normally, once a pitcher started, unless they were performing terribly, they finished the game.
During the career of Cy Young, he thoroughly enjoyed playing a complete game. As it currently stands, his 749 complete games are the most all-time.
In today’s day and age, it isn’t that players refuse to pitch for nine innings, but more so, management is mostly against it, teetering on the side of caution in an attempt to preserve a player’s arm.
Picture this, Justin Verlander, an all-time great player, a future first-ballot Hall of Famer, and currently, still one of the best pitchers in the game today, has only 26 complete games in his career. In fact, no active pitcher is ranked in the top 1,000 in complete games. If you believe this record will ever be broken, you’re fooling yourself.