Quote:
Originally Posted by mth123
I'd take the '75 Reds over the nasty boys. Eastwick, McEnaney, Carroll and Borbon was a deeper unit and all provided over 90 innings with ERAs below 3.00. People forget that Charlton spent half the season in the rotation. After that, the pen wasn't nearly so deep and they didn't give as many dominant innings that the '75 team did.
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I agree the BRM pen was underrated, but the game was so different back then it's hard to compare the two pens. Sparky was one of the first managers to rely heavily on his pen, with multiple relievers in specific roles. Still the roles were not as nearly as defined as they are now, and more relievers were needed to finish games. The difference in quality between the end of the game relievers and middle relievers wasn't that great for any team. Very few teams has a single dominant closer back then.
By 1990, you had a closer and a set up guy who got nearly all the key outs late in the game. Middle relievers were mostly used in mop up situations, so they didn't have to be as dominant. Most teams by then would only have one dominant reliever, so the Reds having three (four if you count the underrated Tim Layana) was a rarity, and a seperated their pen from everyone else's in the league.