Dodgers: Five best pitchers over the past decade

Which pitchers contributed the most to the Los Angeles Dodgers franchise over the past decade?

Few teams have a history of pitching like the Dodgers. From Sandy Koufax to Clayton Kershaw, some of the best hurlers in the sport have made their living wearing Dodger blue—a tradition that continued throughout the 2010s.

After looking at the best positional players of the past decade, this article focuses on the best pitchers since 2010.

In coming up with the list, I considered both superlative seasons and longevity. Who provided consistency on the mound over the past decade? Who reached the highest peaks? Were there a few pitchers who did both?

It turns out there are four clear-cut hurlers who belong on this list, and then it gets tricky deciding who should be the fifth. There are several candidates who share similar profiles as starters who had strong seasons, but through either injury or something else, couldn’t continue their performance over the long run. There are also a few who just didn’t pitch long enough to be included on a list for best of the decade.

Honorable mentions: Walker Buehler, a great start but not enough time to qualify for best of the decade; Kenta Maeda, fairly consistent over four seasons but never quite rising to the level to be considered a top pitcher; Rich Hill, again close to making the cut, but not quite enough time to qualify; and Chad Billingsley entered the decade seeming like a sure thing to make a list like this one, but injuries slowed him down.

Without further ado, here are the five best Dodger pitchers of the past decade.

5) Alex Wood

After being traded to Cincinnati in the Matt Kemp deal, Alex Wood missed most of the 2019 season due to a back injury. The left-hander signed with the Dodgers this past offseason to try to rekindle the magic he had in Los Angeles before the injury. While he is clearly a cut below the top four pitchers ranked in this article, his contributions to the Dodgers since 2010 still merit him to land fifth overall.

Alex Wood’s 2017 season was one for the history books. Replacing an injured Rich Hill in the rotation, he was nearly unbeatable that season, and especially over his first 15 starts. He became the first Dodgers starting pitcher since Don Newcombe in 1955 to begin a season with a 10-0 record. An impressive stretch that included a 28-inning scoreless streak.

Wood finished his 2017 campaign with a 16-3 record, the best winning percentage among pitchers in the National League, along with a 2.72 ERA and 3.97 strikeout to walk ratio.

While the left-hander regressed in his second full season as a Dodger starter, he was still 9-7 with a 3.68 ERA and similar underlying statistics to what he showed in 2017. Over four years with the Dodgers before being traded to the Reds, Wood went 31-20 with a 3.46 ERA. His 52.1 percent ground ball rate is the best among qualified Dodger starters over the past decade.

The Dodgers are hoping they can get anything close to his 2017 form again whenever baseball returns in 2020.

4) Hyun-Jin Ryu

I always think of Hyun-Jin Ryu as the best Dodger pitcher that everyone forgets about. Normally, when you lose a starter to free agency who led the National League in suppressing runs and finished second in Cy Young Award voting, it’s a pretty big deal. I don’t know if the Mookie Betts trade distracted everyone, or if the presence of Clayton Kershaw and Walker Buehler makes up for it, but it seemed like Ryu signing with the Blue Jays is an after-thought in thinking about major news from the offseason.

Ryu might not be the sexiest name in baseball, but he has proven to be a top-flight pitcher when he is healthy. The caveat of health obviously a big consideration. The left-hander has pitched for the Dodgers since 2013, but only once reached 30 starts, and only three times started at least 25 games.

Still, when you consider Ryu’s 2013 and 2014 seasons, along with his injury-shortened 2018 campaign and breakout 2019 performance, there’s enough work to put him among the best Dodger pitchers of the past decade.

He is 54-33 with a 2.98 ERA since winning 14 games during his rookie season. His 665 strikeouts rank third among Dodger pitchers over the past decade. His 54 wins rank second to Clayton Kershaw. Had Ryu remained healthy, he would have easily been the second best pitcher on this list. He still belongs fourth.

3) Zack Greinke

Having pitched only three seasons, 92 starts, in a Dodger uniform since 2010, Zack Greinke makes the cut-off for best pitchers of the past decade due to his pure dominance in those few seasons.

From 2013-2015, he was 51-15 as a starter. Think about that. During a stretch when the Dodgers team hovered around a .560 winning percentage, Greinke was winning over 75 percent of his decisions.

An argument could be made that Greinke should have won the Cy Young Award during his final season with the Dodgers in 2015. He finished a close second to Jake Arrieta. During that magical season, he went 19-3 with a league-leading 1.66 ERA. In over 220 innings, he allowed the lowest number of walks plus hits per inning (0.844 WHIP).

The right-hander appeared in two All-Star games as a Dodger. He won two Gold Glove Awards as the best defensive player at his position. In 2013, he won the Silver Slugger Award as the best hitting pitcher. Whether he was getting opposing hitters out with his nasty stuff or amazing fielding, or helping his own cause at the plate, Greinke knew how to beat his competition in a variety of ways.

He is the Dodgers third best pitcher of the past decade.

2) Kenley Jansen

Kenley Jansen‘s major league career conveniently spans the entire past decade. Signed as an undrafted free agent catcher in 2004, he has developed into one of the elite closers in baseball. In 2019, he recorded his 300th save. Only Craig Kimbrel (346) ended the decade with more saves than Jansen (301).

While Jansen has regressed over the past few seasons, from 2012-2017 he was one of the most dominant relievers in the majors. Over those six seasons, his ERA finished below two runs three times, and never higher than 2.76. Overall, he finished that impressive stretch with a 2.07 ERA in nearly 400 innings of work (396.1), striking out 604 batters, while walking only 85 in that time. That equates to an insane seven strikeouts per walk ratio (7.11).

Closers are judged by their performance in the biggest games. Jansen has had so many opportunities in the postseason, he is bound to have a few bad ones mixed in with the good, but over 41 playoff appearances, his ERA is 2.01, having allowed just 11 earned runs in 49.1 innings of work.

Few players crossover from the disappointing final years under owner Frank McCourt to the success of new ownership like Jansen does. He was the last man on the mound for countless Dodger wins in a decade they won an awful lot of games. He is the second best pitcher of the past decade.