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In baseball, a strikeout occurs when the batter receives three strikes during his time at bat. Strikeouts are associated with dominance on the part of the pitcher and failure on the part of the batter.

The pitcher with the most career strikeouts in Major League Baseball, and the only pitcher to strike out over 5,000 batters, is Nolan Ryan with 5,714 career strikeouts.

The ListEdit

All statistics are current as of July 20, 2009.
bold-faced pitchers are still active.

Rank	Player (2009 Strikeouts)	K
1	Nolan Ryan	5,714
2	Randy Johnson (80)	4,869
3	Roger Clemens	4,672
4	Steve Carlton	4,136
5	Bert Blyleven	3,701
6	Tom Seaver	3,640
7	Don Sutton	3,574
8	Gaylord Perry	3,534
9	Walter Johnson	3,509
10	Greg Maddux	3,371
11	Phil Niekro	3,342
12	Fergie Jenkins	3,192
13	Bob Gibson	3,117
	Pedro Martínez	3,117
15	Curt Schilling	3,116
16	John Smoltz (22)	3,033
17	Jim Bunning	2,855
18	Mickey Lolich	2,832
19	Mike Mussina	2,813
20	Cy Young	2,803
21	Frank Tanana	2,773
22	David Cone	2,668
23	Chuck Finley	2,610
24	Tom Glavine	2,607
25	Warren Spahn	2,583
26	Bob Feller	2,581
27	Tim Keefe	2,584
28	Jerry Koosman	2,556
29	Christy Mathewson	2,502
30	Don Drysdale	2,486
31	Jack Morris	2,478
32	Mark Langston	2,464
33	Jim Kaat	2,461

Rank	Player (2009 Strikeouts)	K
34	Sam McDowell	2,453
35	Luis Tiant	2,416
36	Dennis Eckersley	2,401
37	Kevin Brown	2,397
38	Sandy Koufax	2,396
39	Charlie Hough	2,362
40	Robin Roberts	2,357
41	Early Wynn	2,334
42	Rube Waddell	2,316
43	Jamie Moyer (57)	2,305
44	Juan Marichal	2,303
45	Dwight Gooden	2,293
46	Lefty Grove	2,266
47	Eddie Plank	2,246
48	Tommy John	2,245
49	Jim Palmer	2,212
50	David Wells	2,201
51	Pete Alexander	2,198
52	Vida Blue	2,175
53	Camilo Pascual	2,167
54	Javier Vazquez (138)	2,151
55	Dennis Martinez	2,149
56	Bobo Newsom	2,082
57	Andy Pettitte (77)	2,079
58	Fernando Valenzuela	2,074
59	Dazzy Vance	2,045
60	Rick Reuschel	2,015
61	Orel Hershiser	2,014
62	Catfish Hunter	2,012
63	Andy Benes	2,000
64	Billy Pierce	1,999
65	Kevin Appier	1,994
66	Red Ruffing	1,987

Rank	Player (2009 Strikeouts)	K
67	John Clarkson	1,978
68	Al Leiter	1,974
69	Bob Welch	1,969
70	Kenny Rogers	1,968
	Tim Wakefield (61)	1,968
72	Whitey Ford	1,956
73	Bobby Witt	1,955
74	Amos Rusie	1,950
75	Danny Darwin	1,942
76	Tom Gordon	1,928
77	Hideo Nomo	1,918
78	Jerry Reuss	1,907
79	Kid Nichols	1,873
80	Mickey Welch	1,850
81	Frank Viola	1,844
82	Charley Radbourn	1,830
83	Pud Galvin	1,807
84	Tony Mullane	1,803
85	Hal Newhouser	1,796
86	Ron Guidry	1,778
87	Kevin Millwood (82)	1,767
88	John Burkett	1,766
89	Rudy May	1,760
89	Jason Schmidt (2)	1,752
91	Joe Niekro	1,747
92	Sid Fernandez	1,743
93	Dave Stewart	1,741
94	Ed Walsh	1,736
95	Tom Candiotti	1,735
96	Bob Friend	1,734
97	Joe Coleman	1,728
	Milt Pappas	1,728
99	Kevin Gross	1,727
100	Floyd Bannister	1,723

Top 5 active pitchers closest to the top 100Edit

All statistics are current as of July 20, 2009.

Johan Santana (1,704)
Livan Hernandez (1,668)
Chan Ho Park (1,642)
Bartolo Colon (1,605)
CC Sabathia (1,492)

Wikia

Top 100 Major League Baseball strikeout pitchers

Contents

The ListEdit

Top 5 active pitchers closest to the top 100Edit

See also related listsEdit

ReferencesEdit

Photos

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