When I started this blog in 2012, Clayton Kershaw had already won his first Cy Young award at the age of 23. When I figured out my favorite post-Cold War baseball players in 2012, Clayton Kershaw was number 2 on the list. I said, “He’s going to be the Dodgers’ second best pitcher ever.” He was 24 years old at the time and that’s how confident I was in him. Now that he’s retiring, you can make the case that he’s number 1. I would still go with Koufax because of his World Series dominance, but Kershaw’s peak compares favorably to Koufax and he did it for longer. I said that he had a good chance to take over the number one spot on my list of favorite post-Cold War baseball players (Orel Hershiser was number 1 at the time). Kershaw probably took that spot by 2014. He is now clearly my favorite athlete of all time. Five years ago, I figured out my favorite athlete for every year of this century. Clayton Kershaw has been my favorite athlete for every year for the last 15 years except for 2012 (Manti Te’o). I knew he didn’t have much longer left, but I’m sad that his retirement is coming at the end of this season. He goes into his final start on Sunday 11 wins away from Don Sutton’s Dodger record for wins. One more season would have given him a chance so I was hoping for at least one more. But he didn’t owe the Dodgers anything. And he will go out as a pitcher who was still good at the end. Hopefully he will go out as a World Series champion.
I love this picture. I want this one more time.
I have written a lot of blog posts about Clayton Kershaw. Here are some blog posts that weren’t about games that I attended:
When he was about to win his MVP award in 2014
My post when he was having possibly the best month of his career in May 2016
One of my favorite blog posts of all time was my post celebrating the Dodgers winning the World Series in 2020. Some people will denigrate that World Series because it came in a drastically shortened season (which I think is absurd for reasons covered in the post). People will criticize Kershaw for his performance in the playoffs. And there’s no question he didn’t come close to his regular season success in the playoffs. But he did have plenty of excellent starts. Of the bad starts, some of them were completely on him, but there are a good number where his numbers ended up looking much worse than they should have because the manager left him in too long and/or the bullpen gave him no help. If you go season by season, he was excellent in 2013 until the last game, he was excellent in his only two starts in 2015 (he pitched a great game to keep the Dodgers alive against the Mets in Game 4, but then they lost Game 5), he was excellent in 2017 except for the game in Houston when the Astros were cheating, and he was excellent in 2020. And there were some really good moments in other years too (for example, closing out the series against the Nationals in the first round in 2016 and two great starts in the first two rounds in 2018 and then closing out Game 7 of the NLCS against the Brewers). And like people discount the 2020 World Series, they might discount Kershaw’s performance in it. If he had been bad, it would have been used against him. So if he was good, he should get credit for it. He won both of his starts in that World Series. He was excellent in Game 1 and he was very good in Game 5. And Game 5 was absolutely huge. The series was tied and the Dodgers had lost Game 4 in the most ridiculous way possible. If they lost Game 5, they probably would have lost the World Series. He gave them 5 ⅔ and only allowed two runs. If not for Corey Seager’s ridiculous World Series, Clayton Kershaw probably would have been the MVP (Mookie Betts would have been the other candidate). In his World Series career, he was 3-2 and he would have been 4-2 with another World Series championship if the Astros weren’t cheating. His World Series ERA in games where the Astros weren’t cheating was 3.48.
There are more Kershaw posts on the blog than the ones I’ve included in this post so if those weren’t enough for you, just search for Kershaw on the blog and you’ll find more. There were lots of posts about games that I attended. I got to see Clayton Kershaw pitch in person 12 times and pinch hit twice. I have been to 16 games at Dodger Stadium. They have all been during Clayton Kershaw’s career. I only got to see him pitch at Dodger Stadium once, but it was an all time classic. The first two times I saw him were before the blog, but I included links for the blog posts for the other games. Let’s run through the games:
July 7, 2009 against the Mets at Citi Field: 6 innings, 3 hits, 0 runs, 2 walks, 7 strikeouts, win (0-1, 2 sacrifices)
April 24, 2010 against the Nationals at Nationals Park: 6 innings, 8 hits, 2 runs, 3 walks, 6 strikeouts, no decision (the Dodgers won in 13 innings) (0-2)
July 22, 2012 against the Mets at Citi Field: sacrifice bunt in the 11th inning (the Dodgers won in 12 innings)
April 1, 2013 against the Giants at Dodger Stadium on Opening Day: complete game, 4 hits, 0 runs, 0 walks, 7 strikeouts, solo home run leading off the bottom of the eighth to give the Dodgers a 1-0 lead, win (1-3, home run)
April 23, 2013 against the Mets at Citi Field: 5 innings, 3 hits, 2 runs, 4 walks, 5 strikeouts, no decision (the Dodgers won 7-2) (0-2)
August 17, 2013 against the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park: 8 innings, 3 hits, 0 runs, 1 walk, 8 strikeouts, win (1-3 with an RBI double)
July 23, 2015 against the Mets at Citi Field: complete game, 3 hits, 0 runs, 0 walks, 11 strikeouts, win (1-3)
May 29, 2016 against the Mets at Citi Field: 7 ⅔ innings, 4 hits, 2 runs, 0 walks, 10 strikeouts, no decision (the Dodgers won 4-2) (0-3)
September 14, 2016 against the Yankees at Yankee Stadium: 5 innings, 1 hit, 0 runs, 0 walks, 5 strikeouts, no decision (the Dodgers won 2-0)
April 7, 2018 against the Giants at AT&T Park: struck out as a pinch hitter in the 14th inning (the Dodgers lost 7-5 in 14 innings)
June 23, 2018 against the Mets at Citi Field: 3 innings, 5 hits, 2 runs, 1 walk, 4 strikeouts, no decision (the Dodgers won 8-3) (0-1)
September 13, 2019 against the Mets at Citi Field: 6 ⅓ innings 4 hits, 2 runs, 3 walks, 5 strikeouts, win (0-3)
September 1, 2022 against the Mets at Citi Field: 5 innings, 1 hit, 1 run, 3 walks, 6 strikeouts, no decision (he left in position to win, but the Dodgers lost 5-3)
May 23, 2025 against the Mets at Citi Field: 2 innings, 0 hits, 0 runs, 1 walk, 1 strikeout, no decision (the Dodgers won 7-5 in 13 innings)
Final stats as a pitcher: 12 starts, 72 innings, 1.25 ERA, 75 strikeouts, 39 hits, 18 walks, 0.79 WHIP, 2 complete game shutouts, 5-0, 7 no decisions (the Dodgers were 11-1)
Final stats as a hitter: 3-22, 1 home run, 1 double, 3 sacrifices, 2 RBIs
So I won’t get to see Clayton Kershaw in person again, but it was a pleasure following his career. I remember getting MLB.tv (on a really old computer) late in the season of 2004 to follow the Dodgers at the end of the season. I first had access to MLB Extra Innings in 2008. I don’t remember if I had it for the whole season or if it was like the second half of the season, but that was Clayton Kershaw’s rookie year. So I’ve been able to closely follow his whole career. Of course the Dodgers play more than half of their games out west. That means a lot of late starts on the east coast. During the summer, I pretty much watch every game. During the school year, I can’t do every regular season game. I need sleep. So my policy for many years has been to watch Kershaw’s starts no matter what and watch September games if they’re meaningful (it’s been a common occurrence that the Dodgers have things locked up at some point in September, but it was a fairly tight race this year so there have been a lot of late nights). I think from now on I’ll be staying up for Shohei Ohtani’s starts. During the early days of the pandemic when we had no sports, I made a whole long YouTube playlist of great Clayton Kershaw starts. I rewatched many of them before the 2020 season started. So I think it’s safe to say that I’ve watched him more than any other pitcher ever.
With the way pitching is going, there probably won’t be a pitcher who has as good of a career as Clayton Kershaw ever again. Paul Skenes has the talent, but is he going to last long enough to do what Kershaw did? It would be great for baseball if he did, but I’m not optimistic that he will. And even if he does, it’s almost a certainty that he won’t spend his whole career with the Pirates. If Kershaw had signed with the Rangers late in his career, I definitely would have rooted for him and I think I would have continued to watch all of his starts, but spending his whole career with the Dodgers has made it even more special.
Clayton Kershaw’s career is not over yet. We’ll see how the Dodgers will use him in the playoffs. He was a valuable starter for them this year. He was really good in August (5-0 with a 1.88 ERA). But he’s tailed off late in the season to the point where he’s their sixth best starter right now (but it should be pointed out that the Dodgers’ starting pitching has been ridiculously good lately so being their sixth best starter doesn’t mean that he’s been bad). He’s going to be on the postseason roster. I hope he’ll be able to pitch well and contribute at some point in the playoffs. My ideal scenario is the Dodgers winning a blowout in the final game of the World Series (unlike their final game in 2020 and 2024) with Clayton Kershaw pitching the final three innings to get a save.
Here are some crazy Clayton Kershaw stats/facts (these start to sound like Chuck Norris facts):
Since he last won the Cy Young award, he is 124-47 with a 2.59 ERA and 0.98 WHIP
Yoshinobu Yamamoto had a great year this year. He had a 2.49 ERA and a 0.99 WHIP. Clayton Kershaw had a 2.41 ERA and a 0.97 WHIP over his last 15 seasons.
He lost 21% of his starts. The next best for any starting pitcher with at least 200 starts is Whitey Ford at 23%.
He is the first pitcher since Bob Caruthers to finish with more than 200 wins and fewer than 100 losses. Bob Caruthers pitched before they moved the pitching distance back to 60 feet 6 inches and before they pitched off a mound.
He was the only pitcher without 150 starts to have more scoreless starts than losses (101 scoreless starts, 96 losses).
He has the most games in Major League history with at least 7 strikeouts and 0 walks with 65 (Curt Schilling had 64).
He has 110 more starts than any other pitcher with fewer than 100 losses.
In the live ball era, the only pitchers with more games of at least 6 innings, 1 earned run or less, and 1 walk or less than Kershaw (119) are Greg Maddux (166) and Don Sutton (131). Kershaw has made 450 starts. Maddux made 740. Sutton made 756.
From 2022 to the present (well after his prime), he has the fourth best ERA of any pitcher with at least 375 innings (behind only Tarik Skubal, Blake Snell, and Max Fried).
He put over 60% of his bunt attempts into play. That’s the highest rate of the 60 batters who attempted 160 or more bunts in the pitch tracking era.
Let’s do some comparisons of Kershaw to other pitchers:
I’ll start by comparing Clayton Kershaw to the other two greatest left handed pitchers of all time. Here’s the peak for each pitcher. Kershaw was 2011-2017. Randy Johnson was 1997-2002. Koufax was 1961-1966.
Kershaw’s career was probably most similar to Pedro Martinez.
 |
| Here’s the peak for Kershaw and Pedro Martinez (1997-2003). Like their whole careers, their peaks were very similar also. |
 |
| Here’s Kershaw and his peers. |
 |
| Here’s Kershaw and RA Dickey in 2012. Kershaw should have won the Cy Young. |
 |
| If not for Jake Arrieta having one of the most random ridiculously great season of all time and a Hall of Famer having a career year, Kershaw would have won the Cy Young in 2015. There was still a case to be made for Kershaw, but I would have given it to Greinke. |
 |
| If Kershaw didn’t get hurt in 2016, he would have won the Cy Young over Scherzer. |
 |
| There is a case to be made for Kershaw getting the Cy Young in 2017, but Scherzer did have a pretty solid advantage in innings pitched. |
I’ll finish by updating the All-Jim Team.(Kershaw was on the original team in 2012 and he was still there when I updated it in 2022). Here’s the starting lineup:
Jackie Robinson 2B
Ken Griffey Jr. CF
Babe Ruth RF
Ted Williams LF
Roy Campanella C
Freddie Freeman 1B
Corey Seager SS
Justin Turner 3B
Clayton Kershaw P
Here’s the full 25-man active roster:
Starting Pitchers (5): Clayton Kershaw, Sandy Koufax, Walter Johnson, Orel Hershiser, Shohei Ohtani
Relief Pitchers (6): Roy Halladay, Johnny Podres, Walker Buehler, Jeff Samardzija, Mariano Rivera, Kenley Jansen
Catchers (2): Roy Campanella, Yogi Berra
Infielders (6): Jackie Robinson, Corey Seager, Freddie Freeman, Justin Turner, Derek Jeter, Lou Gehrig
Outfielders (6): Ted Williams, Ken Griffey Jr., Babe Ruth, Stan Musial, Duke Snider, Hank Aaron
Manager: Tommy Lasorda
There were three changes from the previous version:
In: Shohei Ohtani, Walker Buehler, Freddie Freeman
Out: Grover Cleveland Alexander, Don Drysdale, Keith Hernandez
Walker Buehler was my toughest omission last time. After what he did for the Dodgers last year, he had to make it. Shohei Ohtani had to make it since he’s closing in on being the greatest hitting pitcher of all time. The All-Jim Team does not use the DH so Ohtani is making it as a pitcher. As a pitcher, Ohtani is hitting .276/.385/.507 with 11 home runs and 36 RBIs in 221 at bats. Babe Ruth hit .309/.373/.524 as a pitcher with 14 home runs and 69 RBIs in 437 at bats. Grover Cleveland Alexander was a great pitcher with a great name, but it was easy to take him off the team. It was harder to take Don Drysdale off the team. He’s the third greatest pitcher in Dodgers’ history. It was between him and Johnny Podres. Johnny Podres won the most important game in Dodgers’ history so he keeps his spot. And as a New Yorker and a Seinfeld fan, I love Keith Hernandez, but when you’re responsible for my favorite sports moment of all time and you win the World Series MVP for the Dodgers, you get a spot on the team.
But we have another 15 spots on the 40 man roster so here’s who gets those spots: Grover Cleveland Alexander, Don Drysdale, Keith Hernandez, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Jesse Orosco, Fernando Valenzuela, Don Newcombe, Joe Torre, Pee Wee Reese, Mookie Betts., Tony Gwynn Sr., Andre Ethier, A.J. Pollock, Chris Taylor, and Kiké Hernandez.
I didn’t have Mookie Betts on the 40 man last time. That was a mistake. I think he's the toughest omission from the 25 man roster now (he could easily be on it, but I didn’t want to go with 25 Dodgers). Hopefully the Dodgers will win another World Series championship this year and some new heroes will earn their way onto the All-Jim Team. Whatever happens, I’m pretty confident that Clayton Kershaw will never be replaced as the number 1 starter on my team.
Thank you for a great career, Clayton. I’ll see you in Cooperstown.
