The strange little details of the game Options

[AaronSmith]

As baseball season approaches, I was just pondering how many different things can happen in the game and it occured to me how, even after more than a century and a half of the game, surprises can still occur and certain events can still be very rare.

For example, I was just reading an online obituary of a pitcher named Bob Rush who died this past week. Rush pitched in the 40s and 50s. According to the article I read, he pitched a game against Warren Spahn in 1950 and both Rush and Spahn stole a base. Amazingly, there has been only one other time in the whole history of baseball when both starting pitchers in a game have had a stolen base! The other pair was Greg Maddux and Jason Marquis in 2004.

Something else I learned recently. There are 27 players in the exclusive 3000 hit club, but of those 27, 25 had either singles or doubles for that 3000th hit. Only Paul Molitor reached the milestone with a triple and only Wade Boggs (who hit very few home runs) had a homer for #3000.

I'm sure I could find many more examples of rare things like that. It just amazes me that out of over 17,000 players in major league history, it's still possible to do things no one, or very few, have ever done before. I can't wait till the season starts.

This post has been edited by AaronSmith: Mar 24 2011, 09:40 AM

[Ron Fortier]

We are so on the same page here. The old time pitchers were real ball players. We need to toughen these kids up in the minors exactly as you said.
Not babysit them.