Every major league pitcher dreams of winning 300 ball games in his career. It is almost impossible to achieve such a feat. In the history of baseball only 13 pitchers have reached that mark.
One of baseball’s all-time greatest pitchers was Robert Moses “Lefty” Grove. He had a blazing fastball, and many batters swore they couldn’t even see his pitches, let alone hit them. He pitched in the majors for 17 years, and in 8 of those years he won 20 or more games. One year he won 31.
Lefty had his share of arm trouble. On one occasion his pitching arm suddenly went numb; there was almost no pulse in the arm. But, after a while, his “dead” arm suddenly came back to life.
By 1941 Lefty had achieved 293 victories. But now he was 41 years old. His fastball had lost its hop and he had to rely on curves and control. Lefty saw his goal of 300 within reach, and he pitched his heart out trying to reach that magic number. By July he had a record of 6 wins and 4 losses.
His next victory, number 300, seemed to elude him. He lost a couple of tough games. Bobo Newsom beat him in a squeaker, 2-0. The Chicago White Sox defeated Lefty by a score of 4-3 in ten innings. And his cause seemed hopeless when he faced Cleveland in his next start. The Indians pounded him for a run in the second inning and three more in the fourth.
But Lefty hung in there, and his teammates, the Boston Red Sox, kept pecking away. At last the mighty Jimmy Foxx smashed a triple to score two runs, and then a home run put the Red Sox far ahead. Boston won, 10-5. Grove had made it!
Afterward, in the dressing room, Lefty was jubilant. When asked how much longer he would keep pitching, the old southpaw declared, “I’m going to win another 300. They couldn’t be any harder than the first 300.”
However, that was Lefty’s final great moment. He never won another game, and at the end of the season he retired.
From The Giant Book of Strange But True Sports Stories by Howard Liss. Illustrations by Joe Mathieu.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lefty_Grove
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/300_win_club
I watched Phil Niekro win his 300th against the 1985 Jays (who already won the AL East pennant.) He threw everything but a knuckleball till the last few batters. Beat a bunch of very hungover and tired scrubs 8-0.