Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses, Roger Craig in 1963

This decade is passing quickly, as we are in 2017, without an appearance from the always elusive 20 game loser.  In 2016, for the first time since 2004, there was at least one 19 game loser, both respected pitchers, "Big Game" James Shields and Chris Archer.  Chris Archer was even drafted in the top 65 of my last fantasy draft, so the expectations for repeating his record are not really being considered.

There is one pitcher in the annals of modern (modern= since Topps existed) baseball, that turned convention on its head and excelled at accomplishing this most elusive accomplishment....of sorts.

Roger Craig was a league average pitcher for his career, yet ended up with two of the most spectacularly horrible W-L records back-to-back.  Such is the fate of one who toiled for the Amazins' in those formative years.

The awfulness of the 1963 Mets is never noted because it was only the 3rd worst team of those early Mets years with 111 losses.  The team had one eventual HOFer (Duke Snider), and ended up being outscored by ~250 runs.  Roger Craig pitched a team-leading 236 innings that year with a 92 ERA+ and somehow finished 5-22.  Was there any conceivable way that he could have avoided this fate?

In a word....yes.

How's this for run support?  He had 5 starts, in which he allowed 1 run over 8 innings or more and that resulted in a loss.  He had 4 more  quality starts, allowing 2 runs or less, with greater than 6 innings pitched that also resulted in a loss.  There were five 1-0 losses and two 2-1 losses in total.

On a league average team (that would have scored 117 runs than the 1963 Mets), a 5-22 record definitely would not have happened.    This even didn't happen on the 1963 Colt 45s, who scored even less than the Mets (Ken Johnson had 17 losses with a 119 ERA+).

Based on the evidence, the most likely reason for his record with the Mets is that Roger Craig was cursed by a fortune teller in Queens after losing his luggage and going into the wrong storefront.  Another mystery solved.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses, Art Ditmar in 1956

The first thought that comes to mind when staring at this card is that "how can the 1956 World Series Yankees have a 20 loss pitcher on their team?"  Well, it turns out that he wasn't on the Yankees, but on the Kansas City Athletics, the team that traded the Yankees everybody.

From a time period of 1955-1960, the Athletics sent the Yankees in trade players such as Clete Boyer, Ralph Terry, Bob Cerv, and Roger Maris.  Art Ditmar was traded in the offseason in a massive 5 for 7 trade;  I guess they saw something in the previous season, in which he lost 22 games with a middling (98 ERA+) ERA of 4.42.  (The 1950s were actually quite a high scoring era.)  Let's see if there are any glimpses, which led to the improved performance from 1957-1960, including a league-leading WHIP in 1959?

It looks like Ditmar was partly a victim of overwork.  He had 34 starts, 44 total appearances, 14 complete games, and a save over a career-high 254 innings.   Only one of those relief appearances led to a loss, though there were a couple blown saves (note: not an official stat in 1956) thrown in there.

Ditmar had what would be considered 5 hard-luck losses.  These are classified for this purpose as pitching no less than 7 innings and allowing 2 earned runs or less.  The biggest hard luck loss by far was on August 3 when he pitched 10.1 innings and allowed 2 runs on 9 hits with 8 K......and lost.  There's no record of how many pitches were thrown, but with 41 batters faced, it probably bordered on 150 pitches, not that anyone kept track of that in 1956.

Ditmar also had a few disaster outings, 8 starts in which he did not surpass the 4th inning and one immemorable start in which he allowed 10 runs over 6.1 innings against Boston.   A couple of those disaster starts seemed like planned pulls though.  There were only 3 runs or less allowed by the 3rd inning and still he was pulled.  This was before the utilization of full bullpens, so it's curious as to what the manager (1948 pennant winner Lou Boudreau) was thinking.

Art Ditmar joined the ranks of this stat anomaly with an eclectic 1956 season.

Stat Anomaly: 20 losses in a Season, Chuck Stobbs in 1957

There are some years where you just don't have your stuff.  You can feel the ball spinning too much upward on the curveball or the sinker's downward gradient has decreased by 2%.  Chuck Stobbs experienced that in 1957.

One of the original bonus babies, signed by the Red Sox in 1947, he had been on a major league roster since the age of 17.  In those days, bonus babies (with signing bonuses greater than $4000) had to stay on the big league roster for 2 years or the teams could potentially forfeit their rights to them.  One prominent example of a bonus baby from that time period was Harmon Killebrew.

He made it through those two seasons and then became a reliable, mostly league average starter for many years starting in 1949.  It was during this internecine period that he threw the pitch that he's most remembered for.  He was the pitcher for the Senators when Mickey Mantle hit the record 565 foot home run (captured on 1961 Topps Baseball Thrills #406) out of Griffith Stadium in 1953.

His luck and ability turned for the worse in 1957.  He started the season 0-11, losing 11 of his first 12 starts, with 8 of those starts allowing more than one run per inning.  He was pulled before the end of the 3rd inning in 5 of those starts.

This streak culminated on June 14th against the White Sox, facing a lineup that included Luis Aparicio, Nellie Fox, Minnie Minoso, and Larry Doby, allowing 4 runs in the 1st and 6 runs in the 5th.  At that point in the season, his ERA was 8.90.

He improved as the season went on, but he still had 20 losses at the end.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses, Art "Hard Luck" Houtteman in 1952

It looked so bucolic in 1952 for Art Houtteman.  The sun gave light to the bright backdrop of the azure sky. He was back from missing the 1951 season due to military service; what could be better than looking forward to a season of baseball after such an experience?  He had his whole career in front of him; he was 24 years old, his previous season in the bigs in 1950 resulted in a 19-12 record with a league leading 4 shutouts, what could happen?

But this sunny optimism belies the almost tragedy that had already befallen Art "Hard Luck" Houtteman in his career to that point.  He started his career as a 17 year old in 1945 and did not pitch well enough to make the postseason roster of the World Series winning Tigers.  He never won a World Series in his career; though he did pitch in one for the 1954 Indians.  In 1947, he began the season in the minors, but he began starting ballgames in August, finishing with 8 starts, 6 wins, 7 complete games, and 3 shutouts.

The next year is when he earned his nickname; he was 2-16 with a 4.66 ERA, with the two wins sandwiched  around two 8 game losing streaks.  His teammates chalked up to a series of bad luck and seeing eye singles given his pedigree as a top ranked prospect.

The beginning of 1949 had a nearly tragic accident occur to him.  He nearly died in a car accident during spring training, fracturing his skull.  He was back in the rotation by the end of May and ended up earning MVP votes in an impressive season.  He also had a noteworthy season in 1950.

1951 was spent drafted into the military, but probably because of his skull fracture from 1949, he could not be on the field.  He spent nearly 11 months in a military hospital before being discharged.

His stuff was still there when 1952 dawned; he had his lucky uniform number on.....and nothing worked.  He pitched a one hitter in April, unluckily allowing the hit in the 9th inning, but otherwise his performance was not up to his previous standards, allowing 4 runs or more in 12 of his 17 starts, going 3-11 with a 5.13 ERA.

At this point, he was pulled from the regular rotation and became a spot starter, getting irregular work.  He did not excel in general, though he pitched 3 complete game victories (including one shutout).  He finished 8-20 with a 4.36 ERA, 109 K in 221 innings and 10 complete games.  Ironically, his WHIP was a career low 1.28, so maybe it was hard luck that year after all.

Tricked Out on Halloween: Pitcher Losses

Sometimes pitcher losses aren't always what they seem.  Are they treats for a game not as well pitched as you had hoped or are they tricks for doing well in previous years or for being a good team except when they don't give you run support.  Here are the tricked out categories.

MVPs that led the league in losses
Hal Newhouser
Denny McLain
Vida Blue
Justin Verlander

HOFers that led the league in losses
Amos Rusie:
Vic Willis
Cy Young
Ed Walsh
Eppa Rixey
Rube Marquard
Burleigh Grimes
Red Ruffing
Ted Lyons
Early Wynn
Hal Newhouser
Bob Lemon
Robin Roberts
Steve Carlton
Nolan Ryan
Phil Niekro
Bert Blyleven

Pitchers that led the league in losses and won a pennant and/or world series

Tim Lincecum (2012)
Jason Marquis (2006)
Livan Hernandez (2002)

Leading the league in losses and wins in the same year
Phil Niekro

And most horrifying of all, here are all the years where a Phillies pitcher led the league in losses since 1900.
1911, 1917, 1918, 1920, 1921, 1927, 1936, 1937, 1938, 1939, 1940, 1944, 1945, 1948, 1954, 1956, 1957, 1961, 1973, 1989, 1997

Happy Halloween!

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses in a Season: Al Jackson, 1962

Al Jackson was on the 1962 Mets.  The 1962 Mets had 120 losses.  Ipso facto, there were a lot of losses to go around.   In two previous seasons with the Pirates, he had only made 5 starts, but flashed some promise. Al Jackson was a 26 year old rookie just looking for an opportunity after 7 years in the minors; he got that opportunity and then some.

Jackson started 33 games, completing 12 of them with 4 shutouts.  Superficially, that line looks good through  the prism of today's game.    The rest of the stats tell a different story. He finished 8-20 with a team leading 4.40 ERA (94 ERA+, 6% below league average) and a 1.39 WHIP.  He struck out 118 and walked 78 and was a pretty good fielding pitcher for what's it worth.

Let's see how much was by his own hand and how much was being a product of the modern team with the most losses ever.  I give him a tally of four hard luck losses.  There were a lot of games (8) where he went less than 5 innings and allowed 4 or more runs.

Check out this line from August 14th against the Phillies in which he got the loss:

15 !! innings pitched, 6 hits, 3 runs (2 earned),5 BB, 6 K with a 96 game score.  They did not have number of pitches listed, but the estimate was over 200 pitches!!  His other hard luck losses all had him pitching at least 7 innings and giving up 3 runs or less, including one other game in which he went 10 innings.

Al Jackson did not have a very good season in 1962, but he wasn't as bad as his record indicates.  He was wildly inconsistent as a rookie on an expansion team is expected to be.

Did you know he held the franchise mark for the Mets in wins and shutouts until Tom Seaver came along? He;s also been a part of the Mets organization up until this year.

My favorite part of this card is that he was an all-star rookie with this record.  It's just a striking juxtaposition and a measure of respect that he had for toiling away on the 1962 Mets half a century ago.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses, Harry Byrd, 1953

Harry Byrd is pictured as a New York Yankee here on his 1954 Bowman card, but the feat of achieving 20 losses in a season in 1953 occurred when he was a member of the Philadelphia Athletics.   The AL rookie of the year award winner in 1952, can this be attributed to something more than the dreaded sophomore slump?

1952 was a great year for the rookie pitcher, finishing 9th in the AL in WAR with a 15-15 record with a 3.31 ERA (119 ERA+) with 3 shutouts in 228 innings.  Unfortunately, it seemed that everything that could go wrong, did, on the surface in 1953.    He led the league in batters hit (14) and earned runs allowed (145), though he finished 8th in the league in K/9 (4.6) and did face the 5th most batters.

It seems the regretful fate of 20 losses was unavoidable for Byrd in 1953.  There were 4 losses in which he pitched 7 innings or more and allowed 2 or fewer runs over the course of the season.  Conversely, there was a game where he walked 10 batters and got the win.  It seems his performance dropped severely after the all-star break.   As of July 18,  he was 10-10 with a 4.13 ERA. He finished 11-20 with a 5.51 ERA with only 3 of his 11 complete games after that point.  There were also 7 starts after that point in which he did not make it through the 5th inning.  The interspersed relief appearances did not help his apparent fatigue since he allowed 8 runs in 3 innings in 3 appearances between starts.  Left handed hitters had a 120 OPS+ hitting against him, suggesting a platoon split and Connie Mack Stadium, especially, did not agree with him, pitching to a 6.88 ERA in 18 starts.  He also had 6 starts with only 2 days of rest (instead of the normal 3) and was 0-5 with a 7.20 ERA.

At the end of the season, he left the penultimate Philadelphia Athletic team to join the Yankees in a massive 6 for 5 trade with the most recognizable name for me being Vic Power....just in time to join the Yankees for 1 of 2 years in the '50s for which they were not in the World Series.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses, 1957 Robin Roberts

Sometimes great pitchers have a year that they don't want to remember.   Sometimes it means that it was an off year where the pitches don't go where they think they're going.  Sometimes it means that sore arm syndrome has struck you down.  Or sometimes it means that the best years are gone, and there will only be glimpses for the rest of your career.  

It is debatable what had happened to Roberts in 1957.  He was coming off 7 straight seasons of 297 or more innings per season, with the last five years leading the NL in complete games.  His hit rate and home run rate increased to career highs in 1956, and he had a full record of 19-18.   It was his first non-dominant full season of his career.  Let's see what happened in 1957.

On the aggregate, 1957 may have been the worst season of his career to that point.  He finished with a 10-22 record with a 4.07 ERA (93 ERA+) and led the league in earned runs allowed and home runs allowed, even though he pitched an 8 year low of 249 innings (note: he also led the league in these categories the previous two seasons).  His K/BB ratio also dropped below 3.0 for the first time since 1951 (though it was still 2.98 and 2nd in the league, his control must have been incredible).  On the positive side, he finished 2nd in the league in WHIP, 2nd in BB/9, 5th in innings, and 8th in K.  He just may have been more....hittable.... for lack of a better word. 

His first start may have been a contributing factor to the poor season in the modern view of pitching usage....check out this line....12 IP, 12 H, 7 R, 4 BB, 8 K, 190 pitches...now that's how you conserve your ace through the duration of the season.   He also had another 12 inning start in May.

I count only 4 hard luck losses to his ledger....when he didn't have it, he really allowed a lot of runs (4 or more). In wins and no decisions, he had approximately 2.00 ERA and in losses, he had a 5.61 ERA. 

It looked like the years of 300+ innings had begun to caught up with him at the age of 30, but it wasn't even close to the end for the ace of the first half of the '50s.

Stat Anomaly: 20 losses: 1973 Wilbur Wood

Here is the first 20 game loss accumulator that can be said that is based on volume rather than dearth of quality.  Let's take losses out of the equation for a minute and look at his other stats from that year of 1973.

Wilbur Wood, knuckleballer extraoadinaire of the year had a record of 24-20 in 48 games started in 359 innings with a 3.46 ERA (116 ERA+), 1.31 WHIP, 199 K, 91 BB and a league leading number of batters faced, hits allowed, etc.  You get the picture....he started nearly 1/3 of the White Sox's games that year, which is an incredible ratio.  It's amazing that he only had 20 losses during the season.  This year was also a step down from his similar, but better 1971-1972 seasons.

Let's see if he was a victim or an instigator of his 20 losses.    His season started off incredibly over the 1st two months through Memorial Day, going 13-3 with a 1.71 ERA.  All four of his shutouts were during this time period, and all starts except two went 8 innings or more.    Somehow, he pitched in 32 games in the first half of the season and matched that with 32 decisions, going 18-14....before the all-star break.  He clearly was injured or just got tired from the workload since he went 1-8 in June with a 4.43 ERA and 1.46 WHIP; the rest of the months of the year also followed a similar pattern in WHIP in ERA.  

Over the course of the season, there were 6 starts in which he allowed 3 earned runs or fewer with 8 or more innings pitched and lost the game.  This is not an obscenely high total for the era (just my guess), but it would have made his won-loss record a little better.  This was his 3rd straight season of greater than 330 innings, and it may be the toll came upon him in June 1973.

Interestingly, he allowed what seemed to be a high amount of unearned runs (28) or the season, this is probably due to the 33 passed balls committed by the White Sox catchers that year. 

His workload continued unabated for awhile, so expect to see him again in this series at some point.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses in a Season: Clyde Wright

Clyde Wright was a pitcher for the Angels from 1966-1973.  They may have seen the writing on the wall for the end of his career since in 1973, at the age of 32 he was 11-19, though still with a respectable 3.68 ERA. The portent for what was to come came in the figures of his WHIP rising from 1.23 to 1.36. His K:BB ratio falling below 1 at 0.87 and his K/9 falling to an incredibly low 2.3 K/9 (65 K in 257 innings). He seemed to succeed because he didn't allow many HRs, suggesting he was a sinkerball type pitcher (I have never seem him pitch).

In 1974, he left for greener pastures in Milwaukee to be a part of the cult of the yellow "M" under the young Bud Selig and suffered a fate that all pitchers strive to avoid, a 20 loss season.

In retrospect, 1974 was a better season than 1973 with an improved K/9 and BB/9. However, he did allow 264 hits in 232 innings, keeping his WHIP at an unsustainable 1.37. Let's examine which games pushed him through the veil of 19.

On closer examination, he was a hard-luck loser in terms of which games he earned losses. There were 7 starts in which he pitched 8 or more innings and allowed 3 runs or less and received a loss. He had 15 complete games, 4 of which ended with his offense being shut out.

On the other hand, there were also 4 losses in which he did not make it out of the third inning without being chased from the mound. Like many pitchers of the time period, unless he had been stung unusually hard at the onset of a start, he pitched as many innings as he could until his tendons were screaming for ice. Clyde Wright was a gamer and some days he had his stuff and some days he didn't. But, his record for the days in question didn't always match how well he pitched.

Stat Anomaly: 20 game loser Glen Hobbie

There is an irony inherent in this card. Glen Hobbie is presented as "Batter Baffler" after a year in which he went 16-20 with a 3.97 ERA (95 ERA+), leading the league in earned runs allowed. However, he was the ace of that Cubs staff, having been conferred the honors of starting Opening Day.

On the text on the back of the card, it mentions his 16 wins in both 1959 and 1960 (while neglecting the 20 losses aspect). In addition, it mentions carrying a no-hitter into the 7th inning of a game against the Cardinals before it was broken up by that notorious hitmaker, Stan Musial.

Let's find out about that game a little bit more. According to the game logs for Hobbie's 1960 season.....I was unable to find it. So, there's a mystery. I wonder which year this start mentioned on this card occurred?

The real question with the entrants in this series is did he deserve this fate of ignominy for a starting pitcher?

I would classify only four of his losses as hard-luck losses (pitching a greater than 7 innings and allowing three runs or less). Surprisingly, three of his losses came as a relief pitcher (including two games he entered before the 7th inning). There were 9 losses in which he started the game and did not make it through the 5th inning.

His 2nd half was much better than his 1st half (3.09 ERA vs. 4.93 ERA) and he had a 1.41 ERA in his 16 wins vs. 6.05 ERA in his 20 losses.

I would say, on the whole, Hobbie had a season (high volume of starts and innings) on a losing team (the Cubs finished in 7th place) with an uneven performance which led to his plight.

Stat Anomaly, 20 Losses in a Season, Jack Fisher, 1965

This entry will not be the last that depicts a player from the Amazin' Mets of the '60s. In 1965, Jack Fisher didn't just reach 20 losses,he blew past the mark with an 8-24 W/L record. How did he do it? First, he had remarkable durabilility. He started 36 games and had 10 CG. In addition, he was a reliever in 7 additional games. His WHIP wasn't too bad (1.26) and he had a 3.89 ERA (89 ERA+). There have been pitchers with much worse stats who have not lost so many games. How did he end up with a league-leading 24 losses and 111 earned runs allowed?

Fisher was not an overpowering pitcher, averaging 4.1 K/9 in 1965 and 4.9 K/9 for his career. I can't give credence to his stuff as a pitcher. However, in 1965, with the poor run support of the newly minted Mets and strangely, two losses in relief, Fisher managed to tie for the most losses in a season since 1935.

He had 9 starts in which he went 8 innings or more and allowed 3 runs or less and got the loss. This included allowing 3 runs in 13 innings in the season finale and .....getting the loss.

Unfortunately, the other feats that Fisher are recognized for are allowing Roger Maris's 60th HR in 1961, allowing Ted William's last HR in his last AB in 1960, and giving up the first HR in Shea Stadium history to Willie Stargell in 1964. The strange part is he really didn't allow many HRs for the context of the times over the course of his career.

Somehow, they just kept scoring more than his team could.

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses in a Season: Steve Carlton, 1973

The surprising thing about the list of those that have compiled 20 losses in a season, is that many of them were not bad pitchers over the whole of their career. It's just that for one season sometimes your arm is tired from 30 complete games and 346 innings the previous year. Is that a viable explanation? Or you start, 40 games and get a decision in 33 of them. How many pitchers have 33 decisions in a season anymore? Suffice to say, Steve Carlton followed his 1972 ( I would put forth this is one of the ten greatest pitching seasons of the past 40 years) with a not so stellar performance in 1973. He had 20 losses, 3.90 ERA (97 ERA+), 113 BB, and league leading totals 127 ER allowed (and a league-leading 293 IP and 1262 batters faced), 293 Hits allowed, and 18 complete games.

Something was not quite the same. His K rate declined from 8.1 to 6.8 K/9 and his BB rate climbed from 2.3 to 3.5 BB/9. Was he unlucky? Well, not especially. He had seven losses from quality starts. Only 3 or 4, I would characterize as extremely unlucky. In the majority of his losses, he just did not seem to have the proverbial it. The league average was 4.15 runs/game and he allowed 4 or more runs in losses 12 times.

Welcome to the list, 1974 Topps Steve Carlton.

Stat Anomaly, 20 Losses in a Season List

Here is the list of base cards that would showcase the 20 losses in a season statline. I will trade for any of these. I realize this will be a difficult path, but there's only 40 cards. The goal is to get them all by the end of 2010. Any suggestions on how to go about searching for them?

2004 Topps Mike Maroth #513
1981 Topps Brian Kingman #284
1980 Topps Phil Niekro #245
1978 Topps Jerry Koosman #565
1978 Topps Phil Niekro #10
1976 Topps Wilbur Wood #368
1975 Topps Bill Bonham #85
1975 Topps Randy Jones #248
1975 Topps Steve Rogers #173
1975 Topps Mickey Lolich #245
1975 Topps Clyde Wright #408
1974 Topps Steve Carlton
1974 Topps Stan Bahnsen #254
1974 Topps Wilbur Wood
1973 Topps Steve Arlin #294
1972 Topps Denny McLain #210
1970 Topps Clay Kirby #79
1970 Topps Luis Tiant #231
1967 Topps Dick Ellsworth #359
1967 Topps Mel Stottlemyre #225
1966 Topps Jack Fisher #316
1966 Topps Al Jackson #206
1966 Topps Larry Jackson #595
1965 Topps Tracy Stallard #491
1964 Topps Roger Craig #295
1964 Topps Orlando Pena #124
1963 Topps Roger Craig #197
1963 Topps Al Jackson #111
1963 Topps Turk Farrell #277
1963 Topps Dick Ellsworth #399
1962 Topps Pedro Ramos #485
1961 Topps Glen Hobbie #264/393
1958 Topps Robin Roberts #90
1958 Topps Chuck Stobbs #239
1957 Topps Art Ditmar #132
1956 Topps Sam Jones #259
1955 Bowman Murry Dickson #236
1955 Bowman Don Larsen #67
1954 Bowman Harry Byrd #49
1953 Murry Dickson: none (substitute with 1957 Topps #71 which shows career stats)
1953 Bowman Art Houtteman #4

Stat Anomaly: 20 Losses in a Season, Brian Kingman

When I was a child, my favorite writer in the Philadelphia Inquirer was Jayson Stark (which everynoe no knows of from ESPN). Every Sunday, he would write his baseball week in review column and expand my exposure to the game with such categories as Kinerism of the Week or the now ubiquitous ESPN column title, Rumblings and Grumblings. It was an insight into the game beyond the box score that I was not able to normally receive.

He tended to hone in on certain feats and fumblings and follow these every year. One of these was the quest of Brian Kingman to prevent the next pitcher from obtaining what is a forgettable milestone, 20 losses in a season for a pitcher.

It is a rare feat now because pitchers now do not receive as many decisions or starts as they did before because the number of pitchers in the rotation has increased by one.

Brian Kingman's year of infamy was in 1980. He was 8-20 with a 3.83 ERA (98 ERA+), talk about no run support. A nearly league average pitcher on a pretty decent Bill Martin run Athletic team, he lost 9 quality starts and one relief appearance. He even lost games in which he gave up one run in a complete game, one run in 7.1 innings, and three runs in 8.1 innings.

His claim to fame really came later when he tried to hex whomever came close to his inglorious record, the last post-1979 20 loss obtainer. His hex worked on Omar Daal, Mike Moore, Scott Erickson, Matt Young, Tim Leary, Kirk McCaskill, Bobby Jones, and Jose Deleon (twice). His hex was finally broken by Mike Maroth of the truly terrible 2003 Detroit Tigers.

To document this achievement, I would like to collect one card from the year that documents all 20 loss seasons since the advent of baseball cards. I want the card with the stat line on it. You almost have to be a good enough pitcher to pitch so many games and lose so many times.

Here's my first entry into the list, a 1981 Fleer Brian Kingman.