Justin Verlander’s final scheduled start on Saturday closes a major league run that began on July 4, 2005, when he was 22 years and 134 days old. He will take the ball at 43 years and 218 days old, carrying 3,554 strikeouts, 3,571 1/3 innings and 556 starts into the last outing of a career that has filled both the record book and the October stage.
Key takeaways
- Verlander stands eighth on MLB’s all-time strikeout list with 3,554.
- His final regular-season appearance will be his 557th, all of them starts.
- He threw three no-hitters, including two against Toronto on the road.
- Verlander won Rookie of the Year, an MVP Award, three Cy Young Awards and two World Series titles.
- His 1.75 ERA in 2022 made him the oldest pitcher to post a sub-1.80 ERA over at least 100 innings.
A starter’s workload and a power arm
For all the changes around him over more than two decades, Verlander’s job description hardly moved. His lone relief appearance came in the 2017 postseason; every regular-season game of his career came as a starter. At 557 career regular-season outings, he will trail only Tom Glavine’s 682 for the most appearances by a pitcher used exclusively as a starter. Nobody else retired with as many as 350 games under that condition.
The strikeout total places Verlander in rare company. Major League Baseball history reaches back to 1876, and only seven pitchers have finished above his 3,554 punchouts. He also produced nine seasons of 200 or more strikeouts, joining Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens, Tom Seaver, Max Scherzer, Chris Sale, Pedro Martínez and Bob Gibson.
His 300-strikeout season in 2019 remains the latest such season by a pitcher, although Gerrit Cole also reached the threshold that year with 326. Verlander is one of 19 pitchers since 1900 to record a 300-strikeout campaign.
That 2019 line carried more than strikeouts. Verlander’s 0.80 WHIP was the second-best in a qualifying season of the live-ball era, which began in 1920, behind Martínez’s 0.74 mark in 2000. Verlander also posted a 0.90 WHIP in 2018 and 0.83 in 2022. No other pitcher has put together three seasons of at least 150 innings with a WHIP below 0.91.
The 2022 comeback added another layer. After missing all of 2021 while rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, Verlander returned to win his third Cy Young Award with a 1.75 ERA in 175 innings. At age 39, he became the oldest pitcher to finish with an ERA below 1.80 while working at least 100 innings, in the earned-run era dating to 1913. He was also the first pitcher to win a Cy Young after throwing no MLB innings the previous year. Before him, Fernando Valenzuela had the fewest prior-year innings among such winners, pitching 17 2/3 innings in 1980 before taking the 1981 award as a rookie.
Velocity was part of Verlander’s calling card long before triple-digit readings became common conversation. From 2008 through 2011, including postseason games, he threw 225 pitches measured at 100 mph or better. Ubaldo Jiménez, with 95, was the only other starting pitcher to reach even 30 in that span.
No-hitters and an awards case already built
Verlander’s three no-hitters came against the Brewers on June 12, 2007, then against the Blue Jays in Toronto on May 7, 2011, and Sept. 1, 2019. Only Larry Corcoran, Cy Young, Bob Feller, Sandy Koufax, Ryan and Verlander have thrown at least three.
The wait between his second and third was eight years, three months and 26 days, the second-longest interval among the 35 pitchers with multiple no-hitters. Johnson’s gap of 13 years, 11 months and 17 days is the record.
There is a peculiar Toronto stamp on the list, too. Verlander, Addie Joss and Tim Lincecum are the only pitchers with two no-hitters against the same club. Joss did it against the White Sox in 1908 and 1910, while Lincecum blanked the Padres in 2013 and 2014. Verlander alone accomplished the feat twice on the road against the same opponent.
The awards shelf is just as narrow a neighborhood. Verlander won Rookie of the Year, MVP and Cy Young honors, a career combination matched only by Don Newcombe. His five BBWAA awards — one Rookie of the Year, one MVP and three Cy Youngs — place him alongside Clemens, Barry Bonds, Johnson and Shohei Ohtani as the only players with at least five such honors.
His 2011 season delivered both MVP and Cy Young recognition, a double achieved by 11 players. Clayton Kershaw in 2014 is the only pitcher to pull it off since Verlander; the earlier names include Dennis Eckersley, Clemens, Willie Hernandez, Rollie Fingers, Vida Blue, Gibson, Denny McLain, Koufax and Newcombe.
Three Cy Young Awards put Verlander in an 11-man group with Clemens, Johnson, Steve Carlton, Greg Maddux, Kershaw, Koufax, Martínez, Jim Palmer, Scherzer and Seaver. Two of Verlander’s wins, in 2011 and 2022, were unanimous. Only Koufax, Maddux, Clemens, Martínez and Johan Santana have collected multiple unanimous Cy Youngs.
The numbers will be recited for years: the innings, the strikeouts, the no-hitters, the trophies. But Saturday’s start is also a final look at the durable ace who kept taking the ball, generation after generation, and made a starter’s workload feel like a personal standard.
