Ex-MLB star laments limitations on starting pitching, involvement of 'stat nerds' in today's baseball

Six-time MLB All-Star Will Clark is frustrated with some of the trends he sees in today's baseball game. 

The 60-year-old spoke about some of his frustrations during a recent appearance on OutKick’s "The Ricky Cobb Show."

"You talk about 100 pitches (for starting pitchers), it’s like, 'Come on, dude,' you know if I got a no-hitter going, I’m going to go as long as I can go. How many times have you seen guys in the sixth, seventh inning get taken out of a game with a no-hitter going because they supposedly would reach the pitch threshold? Dude, you know how hard it is to get a no-hitter in the major leagues. Let the guy go, let him do his thing," Clark said. 

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"Put it this way, the guys who are making these decisions, the guys who are these stat guys never played it before, alright? They have no absolute gut instinct; they are going straight numbers. I told somebody the other day I’m like, ‘let’s say you’re facing a guy 70 percent fastballs, but that day he can’t get his fastball over for a strike. Well, am I going to look fastball? No, because he can’t throw it for a strike, I’m going to look something else,’" Clark said.

"And so, these are the kind of things you have to go with your gut instinct, and you got to observe those kind of things. You can’t do it on straight numbers, and that’s where the guys who are these stat gurus, they want to go on straight numbers, and it’s not pertaining to that game," Clark added. 

Clark also believes that the Houston Astros forced former manager Dusty Baker out as they were trying to force his hand with decision-making. 

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"(Baker) is unbelievably knowledged in the game of baseball, and I’m sorry that he had to resign from (the Houston Astros). But the reason he did it was 'cause of the stat nerds; they kept trying to force his hand instead of letting a guy with that much experience run the team. They wanted to run the team so hey, look, that’s where they are now, they went back home yesterday, because they don’t have the leadership of Dusty Baker," Clark continued.

Baker was most recently the manager of the Astros, and retired after the 2023 season. Baker was 320-226 over four seasons as the Astros' manager, including leading them to a World Series in 2022. 

The Astros were swept 2-0 at home by the Detroit Tigers in the AL Wild Card round on Wednesday after winning the American League West in the regular season.

Following Baker’s retirement from managing, he took a position as a special assistant with the San Francisco Giants. The Astros promoted bench coach Joe Espada to replace Baker as manager. 

Clark played under Dusty Baker for five seasons when Baker was the hitting coach, and one season when Baker was the manager during his time with the Giants.

Over 15 seasons in the big leagues, Clark had a career batting average of .303 with 284 career home runs and 1,205 RBIs. In addition to being named to six All-Star teams, Clark was a two-time Silver Slugger award winner and won a Gold Glove. 

Clark played for four different teams in his career: the San Francisco Giants, Texas Rangers, Baltimore Orioles and retired in 2000 after playing for the St. Louis Cardinals.

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