Forty years ago tonight, at the Houston Astrodome, Fernando Valenzuela took the mound and did something no Mexican-born pitcher had ever done: he won his 20th game of the season. A two-hit complete game, a 9-2 final, and a place in history — all on the same September evening.
Today, September 22, 2026, that milestone turns 40. And it lands with a weight that nobody in 1986 could have anticipated: Valenzuela is gone, and Cooperstown still hasn’t opened its doors for him.
What Happened That Night at the Astrodome
The final score was 9-2, but the number everyone was watching was 20. Valenzuela retired the last nine batters he faced, allowing two runs — only one earned — while walking three and striking out five. Two hits allowed over nine full innings. He even chipped in with an RBI single himself.
It wasn’t a perfect game on paper. But it was more than enough to write history.
What made the moment even more poetic: the Astrodome was the same stadium where Valenzuela had made his major-league debut six years earlier. The circle closed right where it had opened.
The Best Season of His Career
Win No. 20 turned out to be a preview. Valenzuela finished 1986 at 21-11 with a 3.14 ERA, leading the National League in wins, complete games, and innings pitched.
The number that best captures what kind of year it was: his 20 complete games in 1986 are still the MLB record. No pitcher has come close since. He also struck out 242 batters that season — the all-time record for a Mexican pitcher in a single MLB campaign, and one that remains untouched.
That fall, he finished second in the NL Cy Young vote behind Houston’s Mike Scott — a close race that the numbers almost won for him, but the ballots didn’t quite deliver.
Just three days later, on September 25, 1986, Teddy Higuera became the second Mexican-born pitcher to win 20 games in a season. Fernando wasn’t the only one — but he was the first, and that order matters.
The Hall of Fame Still Owes Him an Answer
From 1981 through 1986, Valenzuela posted a 27.1 WAR and a 2.97 ERA — the lowest among starters with at least 100 starts in that span. In 1981, he became the only pitcher in MLB history to win the Cy Young Award and Rookie of the Year in the same season. The Dodgers retired his No. 34 on August 11, 2023; no player had worn it since Fernando left the organization in 1990.
And yet, in 2026, the Contemporary Baseball Era Committee passed on his Hall of Fame candidacy — he received fewer than five of the 16 votes cast. The minimum required was 12.
The debate over whether his career numbers fully reflect what Valenzuela meant to the game — and to the millions of Mexican fans who followed him by radio when the Spanish-language stations carrying Dodgers broadcasts grew from 3 to 17 at his peak — remains officially unresolved.
Fernando Valenzuela passed away on October 22, 2024, at 63 years old, as the Dodgers were preparing for the World Series. This anniversary arrives without him.
His 20 complete games in 1986 are still the record. And Cooperstown is still waiting.
