July 31, 2007 was destined to become an historic date in baseball history. Barry Bonds was poised to tie the all-time career home run record. Alex Rodriguez was about to become the 22nd member of the 500-home run club. It would be just the fourth time in baseball history that two men hit their 500th in the same year (Frank Thomas did it earlier this season). Finally, Tom Glavine would reach the 300th win milestone, becoming the 23rd man to do so and would simultaneously win ten games for the 18th time, a feat only eight other pitchers have done (see below).

It's three days later and what have got? Nothin'! Bubkis! Nada. Zip. Zilch. The big goose egg.

Even the reinvigorated Bud Selig has given up on Bonds. The Yankees have hit fifteen homers in three games but none by A-Rod. Glavine came the closest to reaching his milestones, but the Mets bullpen lost his lead and then the game in the thirteenth. Maybe Bonds and A-Rod are waiting for Glavine's next start (Sunday) to try the trifecta again.

Anyway, the day of the big non-event I heard Rick Stutcliffe (or was it John Kruk—I think all of the ESPN non-personalities share one brain, albeit a reptilian one) opining that Glavine when he reaches 300 wins will become the last man to ever do so. This is the same speech that we have heard each time Clemens, Maddux, et al reached three hundred. Heck, they probably said it when Cy Young hit 300 wins, and he had 211 left in the tank.

I thought I would take a look at the previous 300-game winners to see whether any current players are on track for 300. Some may be right on pace with the legends and we don't even know it.

The only problem is that even with Glavine thrown in the nineteenth-century guys predominate. Even Glavine lags behind when we use the overall average for all 300-game winners. Here are the only players that match the pace for future 300-game winners at their age (through 2006). Two have already accomplished the feat:

Ignoring the players who started pitching in the nineteenth century, you get an even dozen on track for 300 wins:

That seems like quite enough to rebuke Mssr. Sutcliffe, but I'll go one better. What if we look at those players that exceed the minimum wins that any 300-game winner amassed at the same age?

Well, then 259 including the likes of Dustin Nippert, who had one win by age 25. I list here just the ones with 100 or more wins (through 2006):

My point is that if you take a look around, there are plenty of candidates for 300 wins. Most probably very few of them will reach the magical number, but they seem as likely as most of the 300-game winners at various stages in their careers.

For the record, average by age for all 300-game winners (plus Glavine):

Age	Tot W	Num Players	W by Age	W by Age Since 1900	Min W by Age
18	4	1	4.00	0.00	4
19	5	4	1.25	1.25	0
20	103	7	14.71	10.25	0
21	221	12	18.42	10.90	0
22	466	14	33.29	25.30	9
23	796	17	46.82	39.64	3
24	1191	18	66.17	54.25	4
25	1580	22	71.82	56.73	0
26	2142	23	93.13	73.19	2
27	2729	23	118.65	94.63	6
28	3240	23	140.87	113.19	17
29	3784	23	164.52	132.25	31
30	4272	23	185.74	152.31	54
31	4698	23	204.26	169.56	66
32	4765	22	216.59	187.50	81
33	4475	20	223.75	205.63	97
34	5149	21	245.19	221.38	110
35	5522	21	262.95	238.50	130
36	5096	19	268.21	247.00	145
37	4340	16	271.25	262.33	162
38	4572	16	285.75	276.60	178
39	4814	16	300.88	291.87	197
40	4616	15	307.73	297.07	218
41	4154	13	319.54	306.33	233
42	3336	10	333.60	315.44	240
43	3400	10	340.00	321.78	257
44	1770	5	354.00	314.75	268
45	603	2	301.50	301.50	284
46	624	2	312.00	312.00	300
47	311	1	311.00	311.00	311
48	318	1	318.00	318.00	318

And here are the pitchers with at least 18 years of ten or more wins: