NORMAN — Here’s the football number I remember.
2,003.
Do you know it?
O.J. Simpson’s rushing yards in 1973. He averaged 6 yards per carry. On the nose.
But it’s the only one.
Baseball is different.
Baseball has 714, 755, 61, 56, 44 and 118. It has lots of others, too, but off the top of my head, I can always spit out Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron’s home run totals, Roger Maris single-season home run record, the length of both Joe Dimaggio’s and Pete Rose’s hitting streaks and Lou Brock’s stolen bases record before Rickey Henderson came along.
I wonder if there’s something wrong with me that other numbers require looking up. I should know without thinking about it that Cal Ripken played in 2,632 consecutive games, Rose finished with 4,256 hits, even that Barry Bonds hit 73 home runs in 2001 and 762 total.
Even though he cheated.
I never wonder if there’s something wrong with me about the lack of football stats I’ve committed to memory. Or the lack of basketball stats, of which I also know only one — 100 — the number of points Wilt Chamberlain notched March 2, 1962 in, of all places, Hershey, Penn.
Also, I’ve had no need or want to commit any additional numbers to memory. Only, Wednesday, something made me reconsider — made me want to know more.
The announcement that Bert Blyleven had been inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, if it doesn’t make me want to peel over boxscores as I did from toddlerhood well into my teenage years, still has me nostalgic for the way I once followed sports.
Everything seems bigger than life when you’re growing up. From Oscar Gamble’s afro to Kent Tekulve’s submarining relieving, to Rick Barry’s underhanded free throws, to the way Guy Lafleur appeared to fly — not skate — across the ice.
Before ESPN, you saw less of everything, yet it meant more. Maybe that’s why it meant more. But knowing more required self-immersion. That meant boxscores and baseball cards.
It meant numbers.
Blyleven’s induction was all about the numbers.
It was his 14th year of eligibility. Had he not made it this year or next, he would have been left to wait on the veterans committee, rather than the writers, to induct him. Had it come to that, he might have died waiting. Like Ron Santo died waiting.
Blyleven never got the bigger than life treatment of his contemporaries: Tom Seaver, Steve Carlton, Nolan Ryan, Gaylord Perry. And he didn’t have the pizzazz of others: Dwight Gooden, Fernando Valenzuela, Dave Stewart, Ron Guidry, Orel Hershiser or Brett Saberhagen. He had a curve ball.
Why wait for Cooperstown?
Well, he won 20 games only once. Eight times, he compiled a losing record. Once, he led the league in the losses. But those aren’t the only numbers.
In the history of baseball, only Ryan, Randy Johnson, Clemens and Carlton struck out more batters. Blyleven struck out 3,701, 61 more than Seaver.
He threw 60 shutouts. Since World War II, only Warren Spahn, Ryan and Seaver threw more. He won 15 of them 1-0. In the last 90 years, nobody’s won more 1-0 games.
In the history of baseball, 27 pitchers have thrown at least 4,000 innings. Blyleven pitched 4,970. He pitched 242 complete games.
He won 287 games on teams with a combined .496 winning percentage. Ten times he was among the top 10 in American League earned run average. He didn’t get to the postseason much, but he went 5-1 with a 2.47 earned run average, throwing 471⁄3 postseason innings.
And he pitched 242 complete games!
Everybody wants Jack Morris in the Hall of Fame.
Morris won 254 games with a lifetime 3.90 earned run average. Blyleven won 33 more with a lifetime 3.31 earned run average.
It’s all there in the numbers.
The numbers are good.
Clay Horning 366-3526 cfhorning@normantranscript.com
