He might just be the most over-rated pitcher of all time. He only had a .526 winning percentage, third all time in losses, averaged 13-12 records for his career, and he surrendered 2795 walks and 277 wild pitches during his career, far more than any other pitcher in baseball history. He had little success in leading teams to the postseason.
Over-rated -agree?

Sure he has positive numbers with strikeouts and no-hitters - but he also has a lot of bad numbers too. When I see those, I think he is over-rated.

Nolan Ryan may be both the most overrated AND the most underrated pitcher of all time!

When Ryan was young, he played for extremely bad teams, and walked many, many batters (over 200 walks twice), so he had poor W-L records (although he did win 20 twice) and a lot of runners on base, causing many to underrate his abilities.

As he aged, he walked fewer people, and got into incredible shape, allowing him to last 27 seasons and amass amazing career strikeout totals. This caused some to inflate his overall value and overrate him.

He was, at the end of the day, a very, very good pitcher and a no-questions-asked Hall of Famer. But he's not the best ever, not in the top ten, not in the top twenty. He was larger than life, and people tend to exaggerate both his good and bad points.

And how many strike-outs did he have? And how many no-hitters did he have? Your question is one-sided, if you're going to post stats, post them all.

Definately not over rated.

Ks, No-nos, and playing on horrible teams for years. Also, the best Nolan Ryan moment, when he pounded Robin Ventura in the face when he charged the mound. Defnietly not over-rated.

People like Ryan because of his personality and the fact that he could throw a ball really frickin fast. Stats aren't the only thing and as far as win to loses record look where he played.

Sure he threw fast, and had a long career - but he was not a control expert, and his numbers are AVERAGE at best.

O V E R R A T E D !!!!

Nolan was wild early in his career and was much better as he got older. Keep in Mind, He spent most of his career pitching on non contending teams and his situation reminds me a lot of Steve Charlton and all the years he pitched on the last place Phillies. With that being said, you can not deny the achievements of Nolan Ryan, seven no hitters and all those strikeouts. I wouldn't say he is overrated but he definitely ran the gamete from above average to great during his long career.

You make a strong case. However, Nolan was a reliever early in his career. And much wilder. That didn't help him much in his stats. But the fact that the man had 7 no-hitters is amazing. He has 5714 career strikeouts, which is also amazing. He was durable enough to pitch 27 seasons, though at the end, he was not quite as effective, and allowed more runs and won less games. Also, keep in mind that Nolan played for the Mets to begin his career, and are known for their "lovable losers." He never received much run support there. Many people can't name nay other player on the team other than Tom Seaver, and he didn't halp score runs. He then went to the California Angels, again a losing team with little run support and no one else truly of mention. He then joined the Astros to come close to home in Texas. Again, same situation. He then went to the Rangers, where he finally got some run support. However, he was already toward the end of his career, and it was too little too late. His ERA during the time that he played is better than most players, and don't forget, Cy Young has more career losses, and he has an award given to the best pitcher each year named after him. When you can throw 100 mph, some are bound to go astray. Sandy Koufax was with a perennial World Series contender, so that goes to his credit as well. He surely had the run support. And while your at it, does that mean Reggie Jackson's 3 HR's in a World Series game, 563 HR's, and a .357 World Series batting average should have been denied from the Hall do to his bad attitude as a player to go with a major league record 2,597 strikeouts and meager .262 career average? Sometimes, you just take the good with the bad, and with all things considered, and even though the negatives are not as publicized, the positives that have been shown far outweigh the bad. And that is why Nolan Ryan is not overrated.

Before you go bashing one of the greatest pitchers to play the game for his winning percentage and his average wins-per-season, take a look at the teams he played for: the Angels, the Astros, and the Rangers (he wasn't with the Mets long enough to really make much of a contribution). This isn't exactly a group of stellar teams or prennial contenders. I don't care how good you pitch, if you're not getting any run support, you're not going to win a lot of games - take a look at what happened to Roger Clemens the last two years in Houston (or take a look at the lack of run support for the entire Astros' staff this year). The Rocket was probably the most dominant pitcher in the NL the last couple of years and the lack of run support cost him a bunch of ball games. And one pitcher alone will not lead a team to the post season! Especially when nobody's hitting! One starting pitcher might see 40 starts- at the most. Even if he wins all 40 games, which has never happened, it still leaves 122 games for someone else to win! Nolan Ryan can't help he played on sh***y teams with no hitting, no bullpens, and nobody else decent in the starting rotation.

Over-rated players don't have 26-year careers.

Truth of the matter is...you are overrated. Thats a dumb question. Lets look at his posititves. 5,700+ strikeouts, 100 MPH fastball, 7 no-hitters, (only 1 other pitcher has more than 2) 9 one-hitters, 300+ wins, pitched well until his retirement at age 47. Even today, he pitches batting practice for the Minor league teams he owns.

Unfortunately, he played on bad teams almost every year. The only really good team he was on was the 69 Mets which was his first year and he pitched from the bullpen that year. Had he played on better teams he would have easily won over 400 games and lost less than 200. He kept his team in most games he pitched and usually pitched at least until the 8th inning. A good deal of his losses came from 3-2, 2-1, 2-0 type scores.

He never claimed to be a control pitcher, but as he got older his control improved.

wrong, fool! who else at age 45 throws a no hitter? has over 5,700 strikouts? you fail to take into account, that when he was young, he only! threw fastballs and that is why he walked a lot of batters! he developed better pitches as he got older! the fact is, he is in top 5 of all time pitchers, idiot.

I actually consider Ryan to be one of the most underrated pitcher's of all time. Most people know he had all those Ks, but then also know that he didn't have a good winning pct. I think people basically tell themselves he's overrated when you take those two stats into consideration. But is that really fair? I can't believe someone actually said his numbers are AVERAGE AT BEST! Please! Learn to read fool.

3.19 career ERA. Only his first year (which was only 3 IP) and his last (66.1 IP) were higher than the 3's (drop those two seasons and he drops to 3.17 ERA career). He had an ERA below a 2.00 (1.69) in 81 with the Astros. He had 7 other seasons below a 3.00 in addition to that (including his 3rd to last year in 91 with the Rangers when he had a 2.91). 10 more seasons less than a 3.50. He reach 20 wins only twice, but had 19 wins two other seasons. He ranks 7th all time, with 61 shutouts. Yeah, he issued 2795 BB, but that's still good for a 2.04 K/BB ratio, and a K/9 of 9.55 career. His WHIP was only a 1.25 career. Opposing hitters batted .204 against him. He gave up 990 less hits than Walter Johnson over 107 more starts.

It's sorta like the people who say Cy Young was overrated, because he had so many losses. Yeah, he had losses. He also had a ton of wins. As a matter of fact, he had 94 wins more than the next closest pitcher, but only 6 more losses than the next closes. He actually only had 37 more losses than Walter Johnson, who is considered possibly the greatest pitcher of all time, despite starting 149 more games than the Big Train. By the way, that's a .752 winning pct over those extra 149 starts.

I think it's just sorta become popular to say Nolan Ryan is overrated. It's sorta like his feats are so much greater than everyone else, that we have to try and discredit what he did.

I would like the guy who said Ryan isn't one of the top 20 pitchers of all time to name the 20 guys who are absolutely, without a doubt, better than Nolan Ryan. I would be surprised if you can find more than 5 who you can't find something to knock them for, that Ryan is better at.

***Response to chipmaker

You are right. Of the pitching stats we keep track of, there isn't an edge like that. Carlton only had 66% the number of Ks Ryan has. Carlton is also one of 3 others with over 4000 Ks, so you know he's basically the same kind of pitcher. They both have a 1.25 WHIP, so despite having almost TWICE as many BBs as Carlton, Ryan still has the same WHIP (actually, Carlton's is better by approximate .0005023). Now, I don't know about you, but I'd rather a pitcher let a guy on with a BB and let him have one base, than let a guy on with a hit, where he could get more bases. Actually, Ryan is first in fewest hits per 9 innings pittched, with a 6.56 H/9 (Carlton had 8.06 H/9). Carlton gave up 414 HR to Ryan's 321. I can't seem to find anything that shows the TBA, especially if it included BBs. I'd like to see a stat (I can't find the info to calculate it) that shows [BB+1B+(2B*2)+(3B*3)+(HR*4)]/IP, which is to say the total bases allowed including walks, per inning pitched. If I could find the number of doubles and triples they gave up, I could figure it out. As it is, the best I can say is that if every hit given up by Ryan or Carlton that wasn't a HR was instead a single (never a double or triple), then Ryan would give up a REAL total bases per IP of 1.43 and Carlton would have a 1.48. If anyone knows where I can find the stats I need to figure out the doubles and triples they both gave up, that would be great. Ryan also has a better ERA, 3.19-3.22

'73 and '74 he had 20 win seasons with the angels. both seasons he lost 16. lifetime era of 3.19. his strike outs were amazing though. no one will ever touch that. but over all yeah he is a little overrated. probably the most exciting pitcher to watch though.

Worthy of his Hall plaque.

Exceptional durability, excellent mechanics, and utterly brilliant at some key aspects of pitching, particularly strikeouts and not allowing hits.

Utterly wretched at control in the first half of his career, leading his league in bases on balls allowed eight times in 11 seasons, and finishing second twice and third once in that same span, which greatly contributed to his major league record walks total (he also led his league in wild pitches four times during those 11 seasons). He did improve on this (a lot) but those walks are baserunners, and for the pitcher, baserunners are bad. And consider that walks have nothing to do with the quality of his team -- those are his alone, can't even blame his catchers. Ryan walked bunches of hitters, which is not to his credit, and when we're trying to evaluate players across history to find the best -- THE BEST -- ever, any shortcoming in his game has to be considered a serious detriment.

Ryan's wildness easily prevents him from serious consideration as the best pitcher ever.

He was still great, and great fun to watch, but that monster walks total doesn't go away just because it isn't nice.

Career walks leaders
1. Ryan 2795
2. Carlton 1833

Try finding that huge an edge by the leader in any other counting stat.

And the no-hitters, while impressive, represent only seven games of his career; he pitched in 800 others. Evaluating Ryan on the basis of these seven games alone is like evaluating Joe Carter on the basis of his 3-homer games. Anyone looks good when that tight a filter is used.

Well he certainly wasn't the greatest of all time, but he DID play for sub par teams. For instance in the 70's with the Angels

1972- Angels Last in AL Runs/Game
1973 - Next to Last
1974 - Last
1975 - Next to Last
1976 - Last
1977 - 9th (the two expansion teams finished worse)
1978 - 6th (Ryan did have a bad year this year)
1979 - 1st (and Ryan helped the Angels finish in 1st place)

In 1980 Ryan was traded and the Angels plummeted to 6th in the AL west.

I think you could argue that Ryan's teams would be even worse than if he hadn't been on them. His wild pitch total is higher, but part of that is length of his career. In any particular year he was only 5 or so wild pitches ahead of any other top notch pitcher. The walks were excessive, but he also allowed the fewest hits/9 Innings in history, so these balanced out somewhat.

I would rate Ryan somewhere around 40th -50th best all time. Which sounds bad but is quite high actually.

Baseball = rounders = girls sport