I never saw Koufax pitch, as it was before my time, but I do think he is the greatest pitcher of all time.
I do respect and appreciate the history of baseball, especially some of the great stories you hear. One story I remember hearing was about him pitching from time to time for the Dodgers at spring training, until they had to ask him to stop because he didn't want to let the batters get hits. It's a better story than how I'm telling it.
Searching for the details of the above story, I did just find this interesting piece from SI about Koufax:
The Left Arm of God
Some facts about Koufax:
He was 11-3 in his career in 1-0 games. In 1965 and '66 he was 53-17 for the club that scored fewer runs than all but two National League teams.
In the last 26 days of his career, including a loss in the 1966 World Series, Koufax started seven times, threw five complete-game wins and had a 1.07 ERA. He clinched the pennant for Los Angeles for the second straight year with a complete game on two days rest.
He was named the
National League's (NL) Most Valuable Player in 1963 and won the 1963, 1965, and 1966 Cy Young Awards by unanimous votes. In all three seasons, he won the pitcher's triple crown by leading the National League (as well as the American League) in wins, strikeouts, and earned-run average (ERA).
Koufax became the youngest player ever elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
He was the first major leaguer to pitch more than three no-hitters (including the first perfect game by a left-hander since 1880), to average fewer than seven hits allowed per nine innings pitched in his career (6.79; batters hit .205 against him), and to strike out more than nine batters (9.28) per nine innings pitched in his career.
He also became the second pitcher in baseball history to have two games with 18 or more strikeouts, and the first to have eight games with 15 or more strikeouts. He is also on the very short list of pitchers who retired with more career strikeouts than innings pitched.
In his 12-season career, Koufax had a 165-87 record with a 2.76 ERA, 2,396 strikeouts, 137 complete games, and 40 shutouts.
He and Juan Marichal are the only two major-league pitchers in the post-war era (1946 to date) to have more than one season of 25 or more wins; each posted three such seasons.
His World-Series ERA was an amazing 0.95.