Fun With Stolen Bases
Posted: November 22nd, 2008 | Filed under: Baseball | 48 Comments »
OK, so brilliant reader David (in Toledo) offered up a great statistic that I did not know — he says that the aforementioned Richie Scheinblum is the only All-Star outfielder in baseball history to not steal a single base in his career. Actually David says he BELIEVES this to be true but, in brilliant reader fashion, would not swear to it. On this blog, we don’t swear to anything.
Well, best I can tell, David is exactly right. And the comment is such a fun little piece of trivia that it has inspired me to look up a few other stolen base facts:
TIDBIT: Russ Nixon played 906 major league games and never stole a base. He was zero-for-7 in a lengthy career.
Here are the Top 12 — down to Richie Scheinblum — for most big league plate appearances without a stolen base:
1. Russ Nixon, 2,714 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
2. Adrian Gonzalez, 2,257 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
Comment: Gonzalez, you might remember, was the first pick in the 2000 draft — out of Eastlake HS in Chula Vista — and from the start scouts realized that he could not run at all. Even so, I’m not sure that anyone expected he would not steal a single base in his first 2,200 or so plate appearances. Frank Thomas stole 11 bases by this point of his career, David Ortiz stole a base LAST YEAR, and he’s basically a glacier. Bengie Molina IS a glacier, no basically about it, and he has three stolen bases in his career. So this is an admirable lack-of-speed career Gonzalez is having.
Here’s an amazing little stat for you: Adrian Gonzalez has NEVER ATTEMPTED a stolen base. Never. True, he is officially listed for one stolen attempt, but it wasn’t an attempt — that was July 9, 2006 in Washington. He got picked off second base by Mike Stanton.
3. Johnny Estrada, 2244 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
Comment: Scheinblum is the only All Star OUTFIELDER to never steal a base, but Johnny Estrada has to be the slowest All-Star in baseball history. He made the All-Star team in 2004, and he has never stolen or even tried to steal a base. Not only that, Estrada has exactly zero triples. That’s one slow guy.
4. Aaron Robinson, 2,189 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
5. Javier Valentin, 1,663 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
6. Al “The Bull†Ferrara, 1,573 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
Comment: He had quite a lot of power, and he got on base quite a bit — The Bull had a career OPS+ of 119. But he might go down as the slowest outfielder in baseball history. Not only did he never steal a base (one attempt), he got to almost nothing in the outfield. They say The Bull* had muscles on top of muscles, and all those muscles can slow a guy down.
But while he “might†be the slowest outfielder ever, he’s almost certainly the only outfielder to ever play piano at Carnegie Hall. And he is DEFINITELY the only man to play piano at Carnegie Hall AND play a headhunter on “Gilligan’s Island.†You don’t even need to throw in the qualifier that Ferrara also had a recurring role as a henchman on Batman. Anyway, I suspect in today’s game Ferrara would DH and make a lot of money.
*There have been, best I can tell, 10 big league players nicknamed “Bull†but only two other players nicknamed THE Bull:
– George “The Bull†Uhle, A pitcher, which makes him an odd “Bull.†He Probably invented the slider, and he probably was named “The Bull†because it semi-rhymed with his last name.
– Greg “The Bull†Luzinski. Hit 307 homers and stole 37 bases.
Leon Durham was called Bull, probably for his last name, but he was quick as a young player — he stole 25 and 28 bases his first two full seasons with the Cubs. Bob Watson apparently was called Bull by some — though I don’t recall that — and he only stole 27 bases in his career. Bulls
7. Matt LeCroy, 1,539 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
Comment: i’m certain there have been numerous players who were slower than Matt LeCroy — the Molina brothers to start, LeCroy could probably outsprint Estrada while running backward — but I don’t think I ever saw a player who LOOKED slower than Matt LeCroy. I’ve seen clothes dryers that looked faster that Matt LeCroy.
8. Jason Phillips, 1,537 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
Comment: Zero triples too.
9. Chris Snyder, 1,480 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
10. Jose Morales, 1,428 PAs, 0 stolen bases.
11. Bob Schmidt, 1,426 PAs, 0 stolen bases
12. Richie Scheinblum, 1,392 PAs, 0 stolen bases
* * *
TIDBIT : Oscar Robles has the most career caught stealing without ever being successful. He was 0-for-8.
All of those stolen base attempts came the same year — 2005 — when Robles played for the Dodgers. I’m not entirely certain why they kept giving Robles the green light. I guess they assumed because he was 5-foot-11 and weighed 15 pounds that he HAD to be fast. But I’m not entirely certain where they got the information — he had not played in the minor leagues in seven years, and when he did play in the minor leagues he was extremely slow.
It’s funny, I think that for all the research and scouting and detailed analysis baseball people do, so much of it STILL comes down to how a player looks. For instance, I remember talking with Jermaine Dye once about how pitchers ALWAYS threw over to first base when he got on. They did this even though Jermaine — as he readily admitted — was quite slow. They had, for their own reasons, assumed Jermaine was fast despite all evidence to the contrary. Jermaine got a kick out of this.
* * *
TIDBIT: Pete Runnels in 1952 set the record for most stolen base attempts without being successful. He as 0-for-10.
Here is the list:
1. Pete Runnels, 1952: 0-for-10.
2. Oscar Robles, 2005: 0-for-8.
(tie) Jose Offerman, 2000, 0-for-8.
Eight players are tied at 0-for-7 including: Chet Lemon (1983), Manny Trillo (1978), Mike Vail (1977), John Milner (1976), Ted Simmons (1976), Ron Theobald (1972), Denis Menke (1966) and Dick Gernert (1953). … You will note the mid-1970s was the heyday for the “players who LOOKED fast but were not fast.â€
And that leads me to perhaps the most inappropriate nickname in baseball history — Chet “The Jet†Lemon. Yeah, it rhymed. But Chet the Jet indicates that Lemon was extremely fast and, frankly, he’s one of the worst base stealers in baseball history.
He looked fast, I suppose, because he was an excellent centerfielder (mostly because of his instincts) and because he would often take the extra base (again, on instinct and aggressiveness). And maybe, first to third or whatever, he was fast. But Chet Lemon simply could not steal a base. In his long career, he stole only 58 bases and he was caught 76 times. His first season he stole 13 bases and was caught seven times — a pretty dreadful ratio — but it would be BY FAR his best stolen base year.
Chet Lemon was an excellent player. He hit a lot of doubles, he excelled at getting on base especially in his Chicago years (in part because he got hit with pitches a lot). He had good power — he hit 20 or more home runs three times in his career, and 19 homers a couple more. His 120 career OPS+ is outstanding. But man, he could not steal a bas despite the nickname.
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Gonzalez was picked off in 1996 but was drafted out of HS in 2000? huh?
Where’s the love for Royals great Danny Tartabull?
37 SB
30 CS
133 OPS+ (!)
Jim–
Joe is very thorough in his research. When he said Gonzalez had never stolen a base, he meant EVER.
I’m pretty sure it was just a spring training game, but Matthew LeCroy once pinch-ran for Doug Mientkiewicz. Dougie gave a quote something to the tune of “watching him come in was the longest 3 minutes of my life”
I always wondered how slow a slow major leaguer is. In football or basketball, slow is a relative term. They are all quite quick, but they are slow compared to some extraordinary athletes.
Could I outrun Jason Philips? Not that I am that fast mind you.
Cecil Fielder began his MLB career on July 20, 1985 vs. the Oakland Athletics.
Cecil Fielder stole his first base on April 2, 1996 vs. the Minnesota Twins.
That is a whopping 3794 AB and 4355 PA before he ever stole a base.
A few of the things that happened between the time Fielder began his career and achieved his first stolen base:
- the Cold War ends
- three different presidents in office
- the First Gulf War begins and ends
- Yugoslavia is broken up
- Etc. (I can’t think of anything else right now)
It should be mentioned that Fielder did have six triples to his name when he finally stole his first base.
Hello, I was once in the Peanut Gallery… as about a 5 or 6 year old. Don’t remember much but they did give us each a mini-loaf of Wonder Bread and a white Wonder Bread balloon. I guess the Howdy Doody Show was shot at night and as we were leaving what was probably Rockefeller Center I remember seeing some of the balloons flying off into the night, illuminated by all the lights around the building.
LeCroy stole a base for the Lancaster Barnstormers of the Atlantic League this year, his first since a pair in 2002. And even though it isn’t an o-fer, I’ve always loved Will Clark’s 1988 when he was 5 for 22 stealing.
That WAS fun. I remembered Chet Lemon being a lot faster, but you have once again used statistics to trash my memory.
I have another kids t.v. experience for you: going over to a friend’s house to watch The Mickey Mouse Club on even-then-ancient reruns in the 1970’s. Black and white t.v., but we lived for the “Mystery of the Applegate Treasure” (which I only knew as the “Pieces of Eight” show).
I saw Sal Fasano steal second base straight up last year at a AAA game in Scranton. Sal hadn’t stolen a base since 2002, and none at the MLB level since 1998.
Nearly as fun was watching 320 lb. Walter Young leg out a triple in 2005.
From the time Cecil Fielder broke in to the time he stole his first base, Major League Baseball had three work stoppages:
1) a two-day strike in 1985;
2) a lockout in 1990;
3) the Great Strike of 1994-1995.
We went from NBC and four more years of the Game of the Week with Vin and Joe and Bob Costas and Tony Kubek; through four years of intermittent coverage on CBS; and into the first season of baseball on Fox.
And we went from the Commodore 64 to the Pentium 1 and the first year when more email was sent than postal mail.
Sometimes nicknames such as “The Jet” for a slow guy or something like “Tiny” for a giant man are coined for the irony. That would make them appropriately (and intentionally) inappropriate.
There are at least 2 Hall of Famers who never successfully stole a base in their careers. One went 0 for 2, the other 0 for 1, his only attempt coming in his first major league season.
They are, respectively, Don Drysdale and Hoyt Wilhelm who had 1169 and 1070 ABs each.
Thought that my favorite player Mackey Sasser had a shot to make the list until I recalled that he finally swiped a base after signing with Seattle. Not that he had enough PA, mind you. Who doesn’t want a slow-footed catcher with a mental block when it comes to throwing and an aversion toward taking walks?
Amazingly, Ernie Lombardi had 8 stolen bases in his career. He was notoriously slow.
Chet Lemon was indeed a laughably bad base-stealer (and baserunner in general), but what I remember him best for was that when he came up with the White Sox, his one-handed catches used to drive Jimmy Pearsall even more nuts than he was.
Off topic, but Joe, if you are looking for Fulham material, the boys in white had a stellar performance today, scoring a 0-0 draw at Anfield, Liverpool’s barn (Laugh away at the score jokesters, the grin is pretty big on my face). Liverpool was top of the league and I think they will win the league title this year, their first since 1990. Mark Schwartzer, Fulham’s Aussie goalkeeper, was fantastic, with two larcenous saves one-on-one with the striker. Our defense is actually looking pretty danged good, only 11 goals allowed in 13 games, 4th best in the league. Scoring them hasn’t gone to plan, but we should be coming around on that score. We are putting more space in between us and the relegation places, without meaning to jinx us, I’ll take our chances to avoid last year’s need for a miracle finish.Come on Fulham!
Lemon was also a pioneer of the head-first dive into first base. Fine player, very good outfielder but baserunning … no.
What about Harold Reynolds? His 1988 season (35SB, 29CS) was something special
Cecil Fielder’s streak of 1087 games without a stolen base is certainly impressive, and the longest such streak since the ’50s (thanks to baseball-reference.com’s Play Index).
Interestingly enough, the second-longest streak since the ’50s is an active streak — Tony Clark . Since then, he’s gone 975 games and nearly 3000 PAs without a stolen base.
It’ll be interesting to see how much Clark plays in 2009. He has pretty much no chance of catching Fielder in PAs, but one more season, even as a bench player, could give him the record for games, and the Diamondbacks clearly like him as a player.
Meant to say that Clark last stole a base on May 18, 1999 while still a member of the Detroit Tigers.
Best Stolen Base Futility Stat (Team Effort Division):
For the 22 and a half years from June 24, 1979 (Rickey Henderson’s debut) until Opening Day 2002, when Henderson played his first game with the Boston Red Sox, their respective base totals were:
Rickey Henderson— 1,395
The Boston Red Sox— 1,382
Let’s not also forget that Tony Clark replaced Cecil Fielder as first baseman of the Tigers.
That’s ten years of a ball and chain around first base.
Ever notice that a nickname like “Bull” implies a guy who’s strong but slow, yet one of the most famous yearly rituals (and challenges) in the world involves people desperately trying to outrun them at top speed?
And why does the name New York Red Bulls sound ridiculous, but Durham Bulls sound natural? They’re both named after a product with Bull in the name. Is it just me on this one?
LeCroy hit a game winning, pinch-hit (I think) grand slam a few years ago in a day game at Toronto and his trip around the bases literally looked like a sundial in real time.
Calvin Pickering is a perfect 1-for-1 in stolen base attempts at the major league level – that one SB coming in his rookie season in 1998 with the O’s. That’s one I wish I could have seen.
Wasn’t Chet Lemon called “The Jet” just because the real Jet, Chet the Jet Walker, was playing for the Bulls around the same time? I think it was just a Chicago thing.
Maybe players in the 1970’s looked fast because they were wearing tight-fitting double-knit polyester uniforms, but they weren’t fast because they were loaded down with sweat from the damn things.
Seriously, though. Over at Dugout Central, in the Grich/Carew discussion, Rod Carew is lauded for having stolen 49 bases in 1976. But he was caught 22 times. Some of the analysts say the value of all that running around is slight (49-2[22]=5 bases).
I figure the value having a good runner on base is hard to quantify. How much of the pitcher’s concentration on job 1 is lost? Is the pitcher’s repertoire now limited? (Should we give credit to the batter for hitting better with men on base, or to the baserunner who is reducing the pitcher’s effectiveness?)
In any case, BRD (me, the legal change will be made when the courthouse opens on Monday) was surprised to see that, before lead-foot Adrian, the San Diego Padres had twinkle-toes Klesko on first base, swiping 46 and being caught a mere 11 times in 2000-01.
Also, don’t you figure that an occasional “stolen base” by a slow guy often represents a swinging strike on a hit-and-run gone bad, but the catcher fumbled the ball and couldn’t make a throw?
Okay, Cecil Fielder’s “stolen bases.”
#1, April 2, 1996. Cecil may have caught Minnesota napping in the season’s second game. 9th inning, Detroit up 9-6 with a 96% chance of winning. Right-hander Dan Naulty (run on 17 times, 4 runners caught) on the mound, Greg Myers (31% over 18 years) behind the plate. With one out, the Bopper “runs” to 2nd as Melvin Nieves is striking out. Hit-and-run to prevent a double play lucks out.
#2, July 3, 1996. 6th inning at Tiger Stadium, Detroit up 7-2, 97% chance of winning. Left-hander Mike Potts (7 of 9 steal attempts successful) pitching in relief, Jesse Levis (26%) catching. Potts has just walked two, including Fielder with the bases loaded. Then a long sacrifice fly opens 2nd base, moving Fryman to 3rd. With two out and Nieves up once again (in a stretch of 9-for-60), Fielder heads north, presumably on the hope that the Brewers will throw the ball away and Fryman can score. They don’t, but Fielder makes it safely to 2nd. Cecil’s first sb was in a dome. This time, the wind was blowing in from right field at 15 mph, and Fielder would have pushed right through it, but the gale could have caused a throw from Levis (if there was one) to tail toward short and be late. Potts then walks Nieves. The Tigers win.
Clearly rattled and humiliated, Potts pitched in just three more major-league games, allowing 12 hits in 2.2 innings. His final appearance was again against Detroit. Facing Cecil after a double steal had put Tigers on 2nd and 3rd, Potts gave Fielder him an intentional pass to first base. And held him there.
My wife says I have to go outside and rake leaves.
Mudpout, with age comes respectability. In forty years, the New York Red Bulls will sound nearly as revered as the Mud Hens.
Eric Karros was another guy who looked slow. In fact, when Karros was really going all out – pumping his arms and legs and trying to leg out a double – he actually looked like he was going SLOWER. The harder he tried, the slower he looked.
How was Bob “The Hammer” Hamelin as far as stolen bases? As far as I can remember he had two speeds- slow and stop.
When talking once with a Sheriff at County Stadium, he was saying that when they were going to games back in the 80’s they used to heckle Chet Lemon by calling him Chet The Lemon. This was divulged while we were loudly inquiring as to why Rich Becker’s butt was sweating profusely through his pants and why he was ignoring the darker two-thirds of the Tigers’ outfield.
I can’t believe Jose Offerman wasn’t nicknamed “Major Offense”. Anytime you can scramble the letters of your name and come up with a great nickname it should be used.
He did have a nickname Jose Awful, man.
Matthew LeCroy is commencing a career as a minor league manager in 2009. I’m sure he’ll have them running.
Does anybody track advances on defensive indifference? I’m curious if somebody like Adrian Gonzalez has failed to EVER advance a base without an error or ball in play.
David in Toledo:
I read it so long ago that I can’t run it down right now… but I do recall seeing that having a very good base stealer on first actually depresses the batter’s statistics. Ostensibly this is because the hitter is taking pitches in order to help create opportunities for the runner.
How about Mike Sweeney’s straight steal of home??? That was out of the blue.
[...] a 15-year career in the majors. Instead he’ll have to settle for the ninth-most plate appearances in baseball history among players with zero career stolen bases, the knowledge that he once made his 70-year-old, [...]
@Snuckles – that stat with Rickey and the Red Sox is fantastic. And now they have Ellsbury and Pedroia – heh – not quite the “Go Go Sox” but it’s kind of funny how things come around.
I don’t suppose there’s any chance that Al “The Bull” Ferrara, athlete/actor, is related to Frank Ferrara Jr., athlete (former NY Giants defensive end)/movie stuntman, and his father Frank Ferrara Sr., actor/movie stuntman, is there?
My perception based on watching games is that Pat Burrell is the slowest player in the NL (I watch mostly NL games and I swear he looks slower then any Molina). For S&G I looked up Pat the Bat’s stats and my opinion was somewhat validated. Pat hasn’t stolen a base in 4 seasons but surprisingly is 5-6 in his career.
Living in SD I was surprised to learn that A.Gonzalez has never stolen a base. He doesn’t ‘look’ that slow.
A few weeks ago I heard Adrian Gonzalez say that he’s never stolen a base because he doesn’t want to, that pitcher’s don’t even look to the base to try a pickoff attempt.
He proceeded to say that he could steal 5 bases a season if he wanted to just because pitchers don’t focus on him and said that he once stole 3 bases off Yadier Molina in the minor leagues. And whilst I don’t know where (or if it’s possible) to find that exact information, BR says that he had a 58 SB% in the minor leagues.
Growing up, I thought Willie M. Aikens was the slowest player ever. I was surprised to find that he had 3 stolen bases and 2 triples in his career. I always thought that given how slow Aikens was, that the Say Hey Kid ought to sue him for false advertising and force him to give up his middle name.
I have always thought that Paul Konerko was one of the slowest players I have ever seen, so I was surprised that he wasn’t on the list. So I looked him up. Hell, he’s got 7 SB (and only 2 CS)…and it only took him 6100+ plate appearances.
Back in the late 80’s there was a huge boxer named “Bald Bull”. I would spar with him quite frequently. I remember that, for some reason, his signature move was to bound across the ring in about 4 hops and uncork a hellacious uppercut. All you had to do to stop him was bop him in the forhead , but man, if you didn’t time it right he could send you flying. He knocked me on my butt more than a few times.
I never raced him or saw him run outside of the ring so I couldn’t really attest to how fast he was. He had reasonably quick feet, though.
My gut tells me he would not have been a very good base stealer.
This also brings up the inverse, which is something I’ve wondered about for a while.
Is there some sort of bylaw the requires players to steal 1 base a year? You mention Ortiz…who steals like 1 a year. Sean Casey, who was so slow by last year that he wouldn’t have hit any doubles if he didn’t picked up by Boston and been able to hit balls off the backboard….stole 1 last year. Is this like a macho thing or something?
Why is the number of players who actually NEVER steal so low? It just seems like a bizarre injury risk most of the time.