That Wilbur Wood run in the 70s is one of the great modern runs ever, like you say probably minimized due to the prevailing knuckleball sentiment.
1972:
379 innings, 2.51 ERA in 49 games. That’s not going to be done again unless somebody goes back to the 4 man rotation AND they have a knuckleballer.
Anyhow very cool knuckleball stuff you posted. Have you seen the recent documentary ‘Knuckleball!’? It’s a got a cool part where Wakefield, RA Dickey, Niekro, and Hough sit around and just talk throwing the flutter ball.
And here’s RA Dickey throwing something that looks like it came out of looney tunes. Supposedly Wilhelm could throw the corkscrew knuckleball at will. I’ll always try to watch a game where a knuckler is going, you never know what it is going to be. With today’s hitting approaches you would think there would be more than one in a regular rotation.
Freegards
Knuckelballers depend a lot on the elements to make that pitch do its thing. If you remember how Wilhelm was depicted in 61*, there was a pretty stiff wind in Baltimore's Memorial Stadium that night that, presumably, made the Wilhelm pitch swing and sway to the plate without being thrown particularly hard. (I remember watching Wilhelm and thinking his had to be about the most effortless delivery of any relief pitcher in that time. Wilbur Wood looked more like he was throwing a changeup but didn't look particularly taxed in his delivery, either.)
Watch a knuckleball pitcher on particularly windy days and see some real variations in the pitch's travel. And R.A. Dickey has often been described as throwing his knuckleball harder than the typical flutter pitcher throws it. So you never really know.