STL SEASONS: 1930; 1932-37

CREDENTIALS: Had a line drive by Earl Averill in the 1937 All-Star Game not fractured his big toe (“Fractured, hell. The damn thing’s broken,” Dean was quoted as saying), Jay Hanna "Dizzy" Dean might have had another five years like his five between 1932-36. He won 120 games in that span, including 30 in 1934 when he was the last National League pitcher to win that many. He hurt his arm trying to favor the foot and was never the same.

At the end of the 1947 season, he briefly came out of the broadcast booth to pitch four scoreless innings at age 37 for the St. Louis Browns, whose staff he had criticized on the air. But he suffered a hamstring pull running the bases after a single, and afterward said he was thankful the pulled muscle he suffered wasn’t in his mouth.