In 1987,
Catfish Hunter became the
199th inductee of the Baseball Hall of Fame, garnering 76.27 % of voters approval.
The right-hander was signed to his first baseball contract by the Kansas City A's in 1964, and made his major league debut on May 13, 1965 at the age of 19.
As with most young pitchers, it took Catfish, at this time still known to the baseball world as Jim, some time to develop into a winner. During his first five years he failed to post a winning record in any single season, his tally for that stretch of his career being 55-64.
In his 6th year, however, he realized the potential which brought him to eight All-Star games, and placed him as the ace on no fewer than six world series teams.
Over the course of his career, Hunter garnered many honors including: one Cy Young Award and three other top five finishes for the honor, one ERA crown, twice leading the league in wins and finishing in the top 10 seven times in total, also completing seven seasons in which he ranked in the top 10 in strikeouts.
Catfish finished his career with five World Series rings, three with the A's and two with the Yankees who acquired him via Free Agency in 1976, as the first ever high profile free agent signing of the Free Agency Era of Major League Baseball.
His career numbers are as follows:
224 wins against 166 losses, with an ear of 3.26. He made an even 500 career starts and finished the game in 181 of them, registering 42 shutouts. In 3349.1 innings pitched he recorded 2012 strikeouts, pitching conservatively recording a career WHIP of 1.134.
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19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. 20 There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.
Ezekiel 23:19-20