Bartolo Colon, Juan Marichal and How Baseball Has Changed

by  |  May 25, 2018

There’s a heartwarming video of Bartolo Colon celebrating his 45th birthday in the Texas Rangers clubhouse. I could say more about what’s on the video, but let’s say it’s about as unique as Colon himself.

The player known as Big Sexy has been my primary writing muse so far this season, and why not? Simply put, there’s an element of fun around him that nobody else in the game seems to have. But there’s a lesson to be learned from his longevity, as well. And the lesson comes into focus when contrasting his career with that of his countryman Juan Marichal.

When Marichal called it a career back in 1975, he had 243 wins to his credit—the record for Dominican-born pitchers. He was also just 37 years old—while Colon is still taking the mound at a far more advanced age. So, as Colon searches for his Dominican-record-tying 243rd win later this week, it’s worth reflecting on the different eras that the two Dominican pitchers inhabited.

The first and most glaring difference is that Marichal played his entire career in the Reserve Clause era. Colon has known nothing but free agency since the end of the 2003 season. Marichal never had the chance to sell his services to the highest bidder, because they effectively belonged to the San Francisco Giants. They decided whether he could return to them on a yearly basis (which was a given, especially in his heyday of the 1960s). And they could afford to lowball him on salary, because he literally had no place else to go. He had a low six-figure annual salary, when a pitcher of his caliber could easily command eight digits annually in today’s game. In fact, Colon has done so many times over the course of his career.

The Giants exploited their position by overworking Marichal, and all starting pitchers, to an alarming degree. Four-man pitching rotations were the norm in those days; and Marichal’s 38 starts in 1968 just wouldn’t happen today. Colon has made 34 starts in a season a few times, but never 38 starts. Marichal started 24 games on three days rest in 1968. What we consider to be “short rest” today was merely par for the course for Marichal and his contemporaries.

An increase in the use of bullpen pitchers has also given Colon opportunities that Marichal never had. Since I’m focusing on 1968 with Marichal, here’s a statistic that will blow any modern fan’s mind: Marichal tossed thirty complete games in that season. That’s right, thirty. By comparison, Colon has tossed 29 complete games in this century, and another eight in the 20th century, giving him 37 for his career.

To put this into some kind of perspective, consider that Marichal pitched back-to-back complete games in the middle of May, 1968, and then threw “only” eight innings in Atlanta on May 20. From there, Marichal rattled off nineteen straight complete games, including one 10-inning effort and another 11-inning outing where he faced 47 batters at home against the Dodgers in late June. 47 batters, in a single game. My arm hurts just thinking about it.

And pitch counts? What are those? The mind reels at how many times Marichal had to deliver a pitch to get through nine innings (or more) back in 1968, or ’69, or ’70. Pitchers today can get to 100 pitches in the fourth inning and then it’s time for the bullpen. But this was a luxury that Marichal never had.

By the time Marichal reached his 16th and final career season in 1975, he almost surely had what was called a “dead arm.” Another starting pitcher at that time named Tommy John had a similar condition and a radical surgical technique he underwent in 1974 had not yet proven to be a success. Could Tommy John surgery have prolonged Marichal’s career, the way it did for Tommy John? We’ll never know the answer to that question.

Colon had a similar issue with his arm back in 2010, but rather than having Tommy John surgery he underwent a stem cell therapy treatment in his native Dominican Republic. He was the first to go this route and his willingness to try something unproven has since been rewarded in ways that Marichal never knew.

Colon has racked up 89 wins since his return to the mound in 2011. He now stands on the verge of matching and—barring something really extraordinary—passing Marichal as the Dominican’s all-time wins leader.

Four-man rotations, free agency, pitch counts, medical breakthroughs and even some dabbling in performance enhancing drugs, have all made it possible for Colon to get a faceful of cake on his 45th birthday—and a chance to make history in the coming days or weeks.  The game has changed dramatically over the past half-century. And Colon has been both a beneficiary and an instigator in this regard.

As somebody who is closer to Colon’s age than I care to admit, I’m hoping he beats Marichal’s record sooner, rather than later. Either way, with Colon involved it’s sure to be entertaining.