Knuckling notables
left, and Wilbur Wood were teammates with White Sox.
DUTCH LEONARD
Winner of 191 games in a 20-year career, Leonard may be best known as the ace of the 1944 Washington Senators, who featured four knuckleball pitchers in their starting rotation.
HOYT WILHELM
A major league rookie at 29, Wilhelm just kept getting better with age. Despite a brief stint as a starter, when he led the American League in ERA in 1959, he made his name pitching long innings out of the bullpen, posting ERAs of 1.91, 1.81, 1.66, 1.31 and 1.73 over a five-year stretch in the 1960s. His last pitch was thrown at age 49 for the Dodgers in 1972, in his 1,070th game.
WILBUR WOOD
A journeyman who honed his knuckleball skills while Wilhelm’s teammate on the White Sox, Wood led the American League in relief appearances in each of three seasons from 1968-70, then started 224 games over the next five seasons, winning 20 or more four times.
PHIL NIEKRO
A Hall of Famer and a 318-game winner, Niekro was one of baseball’s leading workhorses in the second half of the 20th century, making 30 or more starts in 18 of his 24 years in the majors, including 129 starts from 1977-79.
CHARLIE HOUGH
Despite working primarily out of the bullpen for the first 12 years of his 25-year career, he finished with 440 starts and won 216 games. In 1993, at 45, he beat Orel Hershiser and the Dodgers as the starting pitcher in the Florida Marlins’ first game.
TIM WAKEFIELD
A workhorse for the Red Sox, he never made fewer than 15 starts in each of his 17 seasons with Boston, including 23 in 2011, his final season. He had 200 victories in his career.