#539 Vern Ruhle
Entering 1982, Vern Ruhle was seen as an important piece of the Houston Astros pitching staff, posting a 2.75 ERA in more than 70 apparances that included 57 starts.
He was originally a Tigers prospect who just wasn’t working out for Detroit. So after 4 years with the Tiggers, they outright released him on March 27, 1978. They really should’ve tried to trade him though, ’cause the Astros were obviously interested as Houston signed Vern as a free agent the very next day.
Once he was pitching in the National League, his ERA dropped almost 4 runs from the previous season. In fact, from 1978-1981, Vern had a 121 ERA+. Things looked rosey as he ruhled over NL batters. The Astros were yearly contenders for the NL West crown at the time too. They won the division in ’80 and made the playoffs again in ’81.
1982 would be different though, for both the Astros and Vern Ruhle. The Astros started the season on a bad note when their star pitcher Nolan Ryan lost a 14-3 game. A few days later when Vern took the mound, he was pulled after allowing 5 runs in just 3 innings. Vern was rocked again for 5 more runs in 5 2/3 IP in his next start.
His best stretch of the season was from April 27 – June 27 when he posted a sparkling 1.92 ERA over 12 appearances. The rest of his season after that, he went 4-8 with a 4.78 ERA. For the season, he went 9-13 with a 3.93 ERA, while his team couldn’t even win half their games.
Unfortunately this season was the start of the downside of his career. This means we can neatly divide his career into 4-5 season sections where he was a different pitcher in each one—
| W-L | ERA | ERA+ | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4 seasons | 25-29 | 4.12 | 95 |
| 4 seasons | 21-19 | 2.75 | 121 |
| 5 seasons | 21-40 | 4.10 | 88 |
What I find even more fascinating here though, is that for 3 of those last 5 seasons, he was still pitching a lot of games in the Astrodome. I think everybody knows the the Astrodome was a great pitchers park. So what happened?
| Astrodome | Away | |
|---|---|---|
| 1978-1981 | 2.83 | 2.68 |
| 1982-1984 | 3.86 | 4.05 |
His home/road split shows that he just suddenly couldn’t pitch anywhere anymore. A near 4.00 ERA in the Astrodome is awful worse than a 4.00 ERA on the road. Besides that, I find it fascinating that his first few years in Houston, his ERA was actually lower on the road.
After his playing career finished, he went on to become a pitching coach until he lost his battle with cancer in January 2007. Goodnight Vern.
Random Vern Ruhle career facts and stats—
- A nice candid shot of Vern as a Tiger in ’75
- Posted a 1.97 ERA in save situations (59 1/3 IP)
- …and went 57-73, 3.90 ERA, as a starter.
- Gary Carter slugged .826 & smacked 4 HR’s against Vern
- …but Keith Hernandez only slugged .150 against him.
First, I saw you commenting on another site, and found your blog through that – Cool stuff, man! It reminds me that I have to write something about baseball cards at some point, since I collected them a lot as a kid. I think I’m a bit younger than you though – My first set was a 1990 Topps, which had Frank Thomas’ rookie.
With Ruhle, I wonder if he got hurt at some point. When I see a collapse like that from a pre-1990s pitcher, it always makes me think of someone trying to pitch through “arm fatigue”, or something like that, which is actually a misdiagnosed, more serious injury.
Hey there, just took a look at your pictures from old Tiger Stadium. Excellent pictures, man, they took me back in time. You see my First baseball game was at that stadium. In 1974, Al Kalines last season, Lolich was still there. I’ve loved the sport since then, thanks for the blast from the past.