If you had a pitcher with these stats in the regular season:
28 G, 2.80 ERA, 176.2 IP, 165 H, 43 BB, 116 K
You’d say the guy was pretty damn good, especially these days, especially if ALL his starts were big games against playoff teams. If I told you that he went 11-12 (with 1 save) in those 28 games, you’d probably recognize that he’d just had some hard luck.
That’s Greg Maddux’s playoff record since coming to Atlanta (he did get clobbered in his first playoff series with the Cubs in 1989 at age 23, but the overall ERA is still 3.23). He’s been consistent, too – even in samples as small as 6 innings, Maddux has had an ERA of 3.00 or better in 14 of his last 16 playoff serieses. Granted, Maddux’s overall record in Atlanta is better than that – in fact, his overall record since 1988 is 265-134 (.664 winning %) with a 2.68 ERA – but that’s nothing to be ashamed of. Somehow, though, people seem to think of him as a playoff underachiever.