The Astros Years (1980-88)

Associated Press
Ryan pitches against the Mets in July 1983.
Record: 106-94, 3.13 ERA. In 282 starts, had 796 walks and 1,866 strikeouts in 1,855 innings

Achievements: Signed first free-agent contract worth $1 million per season; broke Sandy Koufax's major league record with his fifth no-hitter (vs. Los Angeles on Sept. 26, 1981); broke Walter Johnson's major league career strikeout record of 3,508 on April 27, 1983; won his 200th and 250th career games; became Astros' career strikeout leader; in 1987, became first pitcher to lead his league in ERA and strikeouts but not win the Cy Young Award.

Reflections:

"To go to Houston as a free agent, to what was considered a competitive ballclub, that was the best group of guys I ever played with. That nucleus stayed together the whole time I was there, about 15 of us, and that's real unusual.

"In our division, the Dodgers really were the premier club with that infield and the pitching staffs they had. After the Koufax-Drysdale era, that was really the next great era of the Dodgers. It was kind of like people going up against Atlanta now these last few years.

"Those Astro years, that gave me nine years at home. That probably affected my longevity as much as anything. The year I left Anaheim, one of the deciding factors was that we were going to have to make a decision on the kids. Reid was going into the first or second grade and we were taking him back and forth from California to Texas, and Reese was going to be starting soon. We knew that, school-wise, we were going to have to get a stable situation and live somewhere year-round. So when I had the chance to be a free agent and Houston showed interest, I told [agent] Dick Moss, 'Don't talk to anybody else except Houston, because I want to make a deal with them.'

"Those guys wrote down there that [former Astros owner] John McMullen bid against himself and probably paid me $300,000 more a year than he had to. There's some truth to that, except that the day of the draft, [New York Yankees owner] George Steinbrenner told Dick Moss that he didn't have a problem giving me $1 million a year. So the price had been established, and George Steinbrenner did it. So we just told McMullen that's the price, because we already know someone else will give it to us. So, he agreed to it. If he had said $800,000, Nolan would have had a tough decision. But he didn't.

The Rangers Years

The Astros Years

The Angels Years

The Mets Years

"But because of that, I never got a raise. The whole nine years I was there, I made the same money, which was fine with me because I was living at home and felt like that was a benefit to me, and I was happy. But [after the 1988 season], when they offered me the 20 percent pay cut, I didn't think that was fair, because I never asked for a raise during all that time.

"But it gave us, as a family, nine years for the kids to be in a stable home life, not to be disrupted in school because we were moving around or anything. Those nine years worked out really well. I think that if I'd have lived somewhere else, I don't know that I would have played as long. And they were the reason I came up here [to Arlington], because I didn't want to end up the last year on the terms that I left Houston. And the kids and Ruth were encouraging me to play more because they enjoyed it."