Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver, who spent three seasons with the White Sox at the end of his legendary career, died earlier this week.
The National Baseball Hall of Fame announced Wednesday that Seaver died in his sleep Monday of complications of Lewy body dementia and COVID-19.
Seaver established himself as one of baseball's all-time great hurlers over a dozen years with the New York Mets, and his major league career lasted a whopping 20 seasons. In more than 4,700 innings, he posted a career ERA of 2.86, struck out 3,640 batters and won 311 games. He was a 12-time All Star, won three National League Cy Young Awards, led the NL in strikeouts five times and led the Senior Circuit in ERA thrice. He was a part of the 1969 Mets team that won the World Series.
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Seaver ranks sixth all time in strikeouts and 18th all time in wins. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1992.
He earned Win No. 300 in a White Sox uniform, beating the New York Yankees on Aug. 4, 1985, at age 40. He threw nine innings of one-run baseball in that game.
That 1985 campaign was Seaver's best of his three seasons with the White Sox. He won 16 games with a 3.17 ERA that year. All told, from 1984 to 1986, Seaver won 33 games with a 3.67 ERA and 296 strikeouts in his 81 games on the South Side.
"Tom Seaver joined the White Sox in 1984, and his class and character immediately impressed all who encountered him," White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement. "Tom was respected by everyone in the game, and that respect was so well deserved. He was the consummate professional in everything he did, and at the same time, he had a fantastic sense of humor that reverberated around the clubhouse.
MLB
"Tom was an artist on the mound, who loved and respected the game of baseball with an unmatched passion. Tom won his 300th game on Aug. 4, 1985, appropriately in New York, and we were all so happy for him. While his time in Chicago was relatively brief given his long Hall of Fame career, the friendships and impressions he left have lasted a lifetime.
"Our thoughts go out to Nancy (Seaver), their daughters and all of their many friends and family."
Ozzie Guillen, who was a teammate of Seaver's in 1985 and 1986, tweeted a remembrance Wednesday evening.