Don Sutton, a Hall of Fame pitcher who was a stalwart of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ rotation spanning an era from Sandy Koufax to Fernando Valenzuela, died Tuesday. He was 75.
The Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, said Sutton died at his home in Rancho Mirage, California, after a long struggle with cancer. The Atlanta Braves, for whom Sutton was a long-time broadcaster, and son Daron, said he died in his sleep.
Saddened to share that my dad passed away in his sleep last night. He worked as hard as anyone I’ve ever known and he treated those he encountered with great respect…and he took me to work a lot. For all these things, I am very grateful. Rest In Peace. pic.twitter.com/cvlDRRdVXa
— Daron Sutton (@lifeisgreatsut) January 19, 2021
A four-time All-Star, Sutton had a career record of 324-256 and an ERA of 3.26 while pitching for the Dodgers, Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers, Oakland Athletics, California Angels, and the Dodgers again in 1988, his final season. Sutton is tied with Nolan Ryan for 14th in wins and ranks seventh in innings pitched (5,282), having piled up more than 200 frames in nineteen highly consistent seasons.
Sutton’s passing comes on the heels of seven Hall of Famers dying in 2020, the most sitting members of Cooperstown to pass away in a calendar year. They were Lou Brock, Whitey Ford, Bob Gibson, Al Kaline, Joe Morgan, Phil Niekro and Tom Seaver.
Sutton was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1998.
Along with Skip Caray and Pete Van Wieren, he was one of the faces of the Braves’ TV broadcasts in the 1990’s and early 2000’s and, alongside Jim Powell, his voice went hand in hand with Braves baseball on the Braves Radio Network.
He had one of his kidneys removed in 2002 after being diagnosed with kidney cancer, he had a procedure to remove part of his lung in 2003, and he broke his leg which kept him off the airwaves in 2019.
