Nolan Ryan he ever win a Cy Young Award. Ryan is one of only 29 players in baseball history to have appeared in Major League baseball games in four decades and the only MLB pitcher to strike out seven pairs of fathers and sons. Ryan was born in Refugio, south of Victoria in south Texas, the youngest of six children, to Lynn Nolan Ryan Sr. (1907–1970), and the former Martha Lee Hancock (1913–1990). The senior Ryan operated a newspaper delivery service for the "Houston Post" that required him to rise in the early morning hours to prepare 1,500 newspapers for delivery over
Luis Tiant was a response to a drop in his velocity due to a shoulder blade injury. Twisting and turning his body into unthinkable positions, Tiant would spend more time looking at second base than he did the plate as he prepared to throw. In that season, he led the league in ERA (1.60), shutouts (nine, including four consecutive), hits per nine innings (a still-standing franchise record 5.30, which broke Herb Score's 5.85 in and would be a Major-League record low until Nolan Ryan gave up 5.26 hits/9 innings in ), strikeouts per nine innings (9.22), while finishing with a 21–9 mark.