Phil Niekro (born April 1, 1939, Blaine, Ohio, U.S.—died December 26, 2020) was arguably the greatest knuckleball pitcher in the history of Major League Baseball (MLB). He employed the pitch—which has become a rarity and is difficult to master but is less taxing on a pitcher’s arm than other pitches—in a 24-year MLB career that took him to the All-Star Games five times and landed him in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Pitching mostly for the Atlanta Braves, he recorded a career total of 318 wins and threw 5,404 innings, the fourth highest total in MLB history.
Niekro was one of three children of Joseph Niekro, a coal miner, and Henrietta (née Klinkoski) Niekro. (His younger brother, Joe Niekro, would also become an outstanding MLB knuckleballer.) He grew up in Lansing, Ohio, across the Ohio River from Wheeling, West Virginia. There, his father, a onetime semiprofessional baseball player, taught Niekro to throw the knuckleball, a pitch that is intended to have no spin, permitting its flight to be altered by air currents that cause it to float in or out or to break up or down at the last moment. It is as difficult to catch as it is to throw and can confound catchers as much as it does batters. Niekro played basketball and baseball in high school. After graduation he turned down a college baseball scholarship and signed a contract with the Milwaukee (now Atlanta) Braves.
Between 1959 and 1966 Niekro played six seasons in the Braves’ minor league organization, taking a break in 1963 to serve in the U.S. Army. He was called up for stints with the Braves in 1964 and 1965 but did not stick with the big league club until 1966. For the next 17 seasons (1967–83) the seemingly indefatigable Niekro, a starter, was the Braves’ star pitcher. In 1967 he had an earned run average (ERA) of 1.87, the best in the National League (NL). Two years later he won 23 games and led the Braves to the division title and the NL Championship Series (NLCS), which they lost to the New York Mets. On August 5, 1973, he threw a no-hitter against the San Diego Padres. The following year he led the NL with 20 wins, 18 complete games, and 302.1 innings pitched.
Because the Braves were only an average team during most of Niekro’s tenure with the club, he never played in a World Series, but, because his pitching arm never seemed to tire, few pitchers could compete with his endurance and longevity. From 1977 through 1979 he led the NL in games started, games completed, and innings pitched. His work for Atlanta charities brought him the Lou Gehrig award in 1979, when he led the NL in both games won (21) and games lost (20). That year Joe Niekro, pitching for the Houston Astros, also won 21 games. (Together, the Niekro brothers notched 539 career wins, an MLB record for sibling pitchers, besting Jim and Gaylord Perry, who recorded 529 wins between them.) In 1982 Phil Niekro won 17 games and lost only 4, during a year in which the Braves played in another NLCS, losing this time to the St. Louis Cardinals. After the prematurely gray-haired 44-year-old Niekro won only 11 games in 1983, the Braves released him, and he signed a two-year contract with the New York Yankees. His shutout against the Toronto Blue Jays on October 6, 1985, was his 300th win in the major leagues. He played the next two years for the Cleveland Indians (now Guardians), closing his career with a symbolic three-inning curtain call with the Braves after a brief stopover with the Blue Jays.
When he retired after the 1987 season at the age of 48, Phil Niekro was the oldest pitcher in the major leagues. Over his career he recorded 3,342 strikeouts. Niekro finished with a 318–274 win-loss record and a lifetime ERA of 3.35. In addition to being a five-time All-Star, he won five Gold Gloves. Niekro was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1997.