Bob Feller passed away this evening:
Feller died at 9:15 p.m. on Wednesday night of acute leukemia at a hospice, said Bob DiBiasio, the Indians vice president of public relations.
Remarkably fit until late in life, Feller had suffered serious health setbacks in recent months. He was diagnosed with a form of leukemia in August, and while undergoing chemotherapy, he fainted and his heart briefly stopped. Eventually, he underwent surgery to have a pacemaker implanted.
In November, he was hospitalized with pneumonia and Feller was recently released into hospice care.
My thoughts go out to his family and friends.
Feller led the league in wins six times, and might have done it more if he didn’t miss four years to World War II. For his career, he went 266-162, a .621 winning percentage. In his first eight seasons, Feller averaged 7.8 K per 9 and only allowed 0.3 HR per 9. After that, however, his strikeouts dropped, to 4.4 per nine, but he adjusted by dropping his walks a bit. During that time he still allowed less than a hit per inning.
If not for the war, Feller might have won well over 300 games and probably would have stuck out well over 3000 batters. even without that time, it was an impressive career helping Cleveland to it’s last great era until the 1990s.
A true American hero. A combat veteran.
Feller made no secret of the fact that he missed not one minute of his Major League career while in the service.
Godspeed.
You did not have a choice on whether to serve during WW II. It was a legal requirement and you went to jail if you did not register. Not saying Feller would not have enlisted anyways, as we were after all attacked by another country. Last real war we had.
His low HR rate was related to the mammoth park he pitched in. Even when they moved the fences in in 1947 it was 470 ft to CF.
His declining k rate coincided with the falling of the color barrier in 1948. He had a high BB rate most of his career. FIP did not love Feller.
I discount players performance pre-1948 due to the diminished talent pool as a result of the color barrier. In fact, even into the early 50’s the talent pool was diminished due to deaths and injuries of the young in WW II and conscription/Korean War, not to mention that not all teams hired African Americans in the beginning
Great pitcher for his time, but he might have been lucky to be a #3 starter today. Deep down he may have realized that and it bothered him enough to bad mouth todays players.
RIP.
@ptodd, Mr. Feller enlisted right after Pearl Harbor. Not everyone served, there was baseball during the war, not everyone was a teenager or one armed player. And he was in combat, unlike other MLers. Don’t diminish his standing up.
@ptodd : wow, bitter much? Feller was the FIRST to enlist and he was proudest of that fact. I’m curious to know what you surmise his career stats would look like had he pitched in a different era, ballpark etc. Hitting 104 mph in his early 20’s and striking out 15 when he was 17 had nothing to do with his ballpark. Plus, like Walter Johnson decades earlier, he was plagued with some bad teams as well as a few good ones. Walter was also the beneficiary of a large ballpark. If you study the ballparks of those times as a whole, there were maybe one or two that were really neutral. Otherwise, teams played in stadiums that were either extreme pitchers or extreme hitters parks.
I do remember when Feller was venting against modern pitchers and being surprised, but have you listened to Joe Morgan talk? He played only 30 years ago and he has said some of the same things. Players always think their era was the best.
@rbj: Yes, I believe Stan Musial managed to stay in the majors through 1944, so not everyone went right away.
@ptodd: I suspect FIP would have liked him back then. Pitchers didn’t strike out as many batters as they do today, so his numbers would have looked good compared to his peers. As for Feller’s strikeouts, after missing 3 1/2 years and pitching a little bit in 1945, he threw 371 1/3 innings in 1946, with 8.4 K per 9. The 371 1/3 was a career high, and he was throwing hard. No one eased him back into the game, no one watched his pitch counts. He blew out his arm, pure and simple.
As per Feller’s claim in this NYT article, he was, in fact, exempt from WWII military service due to his father’s terminal illness. His father died in 1943.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/sports/baseball/17reflect.html?_r=2
Additionally, as an MLB star he could easily have signed up for a non-combat morale-building touring Army baseball team, as Hank Greenburg did.