In 1974-75, Herb Washington of the Oakland Athletics played his entire big league career, He scored 33 runs and stole 31 bases without ever making a single plate appearance.
The current Atlantic Independent Baseball League experimentation with rules changes that could help pick up the pace of the game has great merit. We can’t wait to hear a report on their end-of-season finding, conclusions, and recommendations to all of baseball too, but there is one change they’ve made that we reject per se – or out of hand – or however else one might express total rejection for what it does to the long view of comparative statistical records in the game. And that change in the ATL experiment is the one that includes the installation of a designated pinch runner for the catcher to save time lost to catchers who have to change their defensive equipment at the end of innings in which they are stranded as base runners when the third out occurs.
Say what? How much time does that really save? In big league games, at least, any catcher who cannot get “dressed” again within the time of an inning change and commercial break probably is only some guy who can’t tie his own shoes, anyway. This change simply isn’t worth the additional distortion it brings to comparative record keeping over the change in eras. Some of us are still unhappy over the prospect that we could have some terrific power hitter someday use the “DH” opening to break the records of Ruth, Aaron, and then Bonds without ever so much as catching a “can of corn” pop fly as a member of a defense that he has never played. The addition of a Designated Runner (“DR”) leaves the door open for some other track star of the future to come along and multiply distort the career runs scored and stolen bases totals for another runner-only guy who is able to stick on a roster over time. We say “other” because Herb Washington of the Oakland A’s already has given us a glimpse of what a “DR” could do in the 105 games he “played” back in 1974-75.
Hired as a “DH” because there was no other position he matched, Washington never batted or played an inning in the field. The young respected sprinter, however, did establish himself as Oakland’s unofficial “DR” by entering games as a pinch runner specialist. He ended up scoring 33 runs on the heels of stealing 31 bases in 48 attempts without ever making a single plate appearance or playing any field position during a single pitch in any game.
Washington’s stats average out to 51 runs scored and 48 stolen bases over the course of a 162-game full season schedule. Had Washington been playing full-time (162 games without injury) for 10 seasons as a legalized “DR”, he might have been good for a career total of 510 runs scored and 480 stolen bases, at worst. Our guess is -that Washington’s numbers would have been higher as an official “PR” addition to the roster because he would have been best used as the runner for good hitters who could barely walk, let alone run – perhaps serving as the “DR” for his partner in baseball opportunity crime, the wobbly legged “DH”.
It wouldn’t matter to us if the catcher’s “DR” proves out in the ATL study to save ten minutes a game (We don’t think it will. How often do most catchers get on base, anyway, in a single game?). We don’t need to see some running phenom who couldn’t take a single HBP without crying – or locate a watermelon as it floated through the strike zone – or survive a crash into the center fielder on a misplayed fly ball behind second base play long enough to become eligible for the Hall of Fame as the first player in history to score 2,000 runs without ever making a single plate appearance.
If you like visuals, check out the stats in Baseball Reference.Com for Herb Washington and let your heart, mind, and soul tell you how this kind of data settles into your craw over a 10-20 year career expanse. It’s a simple job of extrapolation that is ugly enough.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/w/washihe01.shtml
Of course, maybe some of us are just too old-fashioned to appreciate the fact that baseball may need to do anything it can to speed up the tempo of today’s game to hold on to the fading attention spans of today’s distracted fans.
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UPON FURTHER REVIEW …
The following update from Tal Smith came to me at 10:18 AM this same Monday – exactly eleven minutes after today’s column was posted. Thanks, Tal. I am very happy to be corrected in my mistaken impression and glad to learn that the designated runner for the catcher trial was overruled and never implemented as part of this worthwhile effort by the Atlantic League to experiment with legitimate ways to pick up the pace of the game this season. – Regards, Bill McCurdy
Here’s exactly the way it was explained to me:
The Pecan Park Eagle 
September 15, 2014 at 5:36 pm |
I agree with you 100% on this issue. As a trivia buff, I wonder if Herb Washington ever entered a game as a pinch-runner for Claudell Washington for the ’74 Oakland A’s (Washington the DR for Washington the DH?). Still love those old Oakland A’s uniforms, too (as well as their current ones; now that the Astros have returned to orange and blue, they – along with the A’s have far better unis than the ol’ drab-and-borings that most teams wear).
September 16, 2014 at 4:00 am |
I don’t think there’s anything to worry about here. The 13-man pitching staff has made the offensive specialist a thing of the past. After the DH and backup catcher, there’s only room on the bench for a utility infielder and a utility outfielder. In a sense, the LOOGY has negated the possibility of the DR unless rosters are expanded.
June 7, 2015 at 5:05 pm |
Great post! Thanks for sharing.