Image
Cubs history
Sam Fuld, the Hitless Cubs Club, and "Law & Order"
In the Comments last week, loyal TCR reader The Joe asked which Major Leaguer had the most at-bats without ever getting a hit. (The question stemmed from the fact that Cubs CF candidate Sam Fuld currently has the roundest of lifetime batting averages, .000, after his 0-for-6 showing last season.)
According to the Baseball-Reference.com Play Index, the answer is Mets pitcher Randy Tate, who had 41 at-bats in 1975 without once hitting his way on base. Among non-pitchers, the more interesting record, I think, Mike Potter ('76-'77) and Larry Littleton ('81) share the mark with 23 hitless at-bats for the Cards and Indians, respectively.
But what about the Cubs? I figured that an organization which has fielded so many craptacular teams with roster spots filled by so many never-developed young players and over-the-hill old players would have some worthy entries in a category like this one.
So I waded back into the B-R Play Index and changed the original search parameters a bit to find the 10 non-pitchers who accumulated the most AB's for the Cubs without getting a hit. Note: the players listed may have hit safely before or after they wore the Cub uniform; the point is, they were hitless while they were ours.
Anyway, here are the Top Ten Members of the Hitless Cubs Club:
Pie and (Corey) Patterson: A Plethora of Prognosticators' Projections
While it's no Arizona-Phil-from-two-days-ago-live-scouting-update , John Sickles has a post up at his website concerning Felix Pie. For the most part, it's a vanilla run through Pie's minor league credentials, but a couple of things came up from the post that are worth re-emphasizing.
Close Encounters With Mr. Cub
Happy 77th Birthday Mr. Cub. My close encounter with Ernie was well after his hall of fame career was over. Take the "wayback machine" with me to May 19th, 1979. A group of my University of Chicago Med School classmates went with me to see a Cubs game that crisp May afternoon.
- Read more about Close Encounters With Mr. Cub
- Log in or register to post comments
Criminal Baseball: The Chicago Colts and the Sunday Observance League
Every Day Is Like Sunday
Readers of the Chicago Daily Tribune woke up on the morning of June 23rd, 1895, to discover that the day’s baseball game between the Chicago Colts (fore-runners to the Cubs) and the Cleveland Spiders was likely to be delayed. On account of police raid. As the paper reported, the Rev. W.W. Clark of the Sunday Observance League had demanded warrants for the arrest of team captain Cap Anson and the rest of the Chicago starting nine, for breaking the Sabbath laws.
Today in Cubs History: Thirty Years of Monday
DC Tom alerted me to the 30th anniversary of the Monday game, and I in turn asked him to share his memories and thoughts on the game. My remarks come first, and his remarks follow. I hope you enjoy these two perspectives. Or, at least, his!
Readers of this site, historically, have expressed the full range of opinions about whether and how baseball and politics mix, and how they ought to mix, if at all. My own opinion is that politics is the process of publicly contesting the proper ordering of society ñ its distribution of resources, its expression of values and priorities, and the extent and nature of persons' obligations to each other. Far from being a dirty word, or something done only in designated locations, like city hall, I see politics as virtually synonymous with social living. Baseball, which in a thousand different ways rests within a social context, is inextricably linked to politics; To me, those connections often are as subtle and intriguing as the game itself.
Most of the time, however, most people donít notice these connections, and donít particularly care. It is, after all, the game itself that matters the most to the baseball fan. But occasionally, a particular connection between baseball and the wider political climate becomes the thing that truly matters. Jackie Robinson's debut with the Dodgers. Jack Buck, trembling from physical infirmity and the emotion of the moment, on September 17th, 2001. ìI have never used steroids. Period.î And thirty years ago, today, on what was the 100th anniversary of the first game the Chicago Cubs ever played, Rick Monday, Chicago Cubs center-fielder, grabbing an American flag from a man who had run onto the field in order to set the flag on fire.
Cub Power!
So itís October 1968, and the Cubsí season is over. The Cubs finish 3rd in the National League (for the second consecutive season, both times behind the Cardinals and the Giants), and have played over .500 ball for two years in a row, the first time theyíve done that since 1945-46. 1969 looks like it might be The Year of the Cub.
Today in Cubs History: 12-23
Not too much happens, generally, the closer we get to Christmas. But here's one gem:
12-23-1997 - Traded Doug Glanville to the Philadelphia Phillies. Received Mickey Morandini.
I believe there will be at least one detailed article, perhaps more, posted today and tomorrow. So feel free to use this as an open-thread, while the articles stay more on-topic.
Today in Cubs History: 12-19
12-19-2003 - Traded Wilton Chavez to the Montreal Expos. Received Jose Macias.
12-19-2000 - Signed Todd Hundley as a free agent.
Think this is bad? Tomorrow isn't any better.
Today in Cubs History: 12-16
12-16-1992 - The Giants name Dusty Baker as manager to replace Roger Craig. (taken from Baseball Library)
12-16-1985 - Traded Billy Hatcher and a PTBNL (Steve Engel) to the Houston Astros. Received Jerry Mumphrey.
Today in Cubs History: 12-15
12-15-2003 - Traded Damian Miller and cash to the Oakland Athletics. Received Michael Barrett.
12-15-1997 - Drafted Roosevelt Brown from the Florida Marlins in the 1997 minor league draft.
12-15-1912 - Traded Joe Tinker, Harry Chapman and Grover Lowdermilk to the Cincinnati Reds. Received Bert Humphries, Red Corriden, Pete Knisely, Art Phelan and Mike Mitchell.
Recent comments
videographer (view)
An excellent Earl Weaver chain smoking reference.
Dolorous Jon Lester (view)
I think it’s a bit of a chicken or egg scenario. Did they make these trades because they saw what was coming and weren’t impressed and knew to keep up with the demand for constant winning thru had to acquire impact players? Or did those additions cause a failure of resource allocation elsewhere.
In addition, the whole they traded to acquire a star, that’s precisely what organizations should do if they feel they’re a piece away. Keep developing talent, but sometimes you need to supplement that talent. It’s what the best run organizations do. Atlanta does it. Houston in their prime run did it. Nationals during their prime run did it. Of course dodgers did it. Boston and Philadelphia too. Hell, the Cubs did it when they won. There’s no team that has had sustained success that has solely relied on their own internal development. It just doesn’t happen. I wouldn’t fault St Louis for that. What I suspect happened is in that 2020 season, in an effort to save money, they cut budget from developing and scouting. Or maybe the wrong guys got poached by other orgs. Regardless, blaming the acquisition of two of the best players of their generation for peanuts, seems off base to me.
I do agree that we’ve more or less come to the same conclusion, but our paths to that conclusion contain almost no crossover. I think we can also agree that seeing the cardinals struggle brings a warmth to our hearts.
CubbyBlue (view)
(LAUGH EMOJI)
Arizona Phil (view)
azbobbop: Yes.
Mike Wellman (view)
I’ve got Tim’s The Last Out too, along with some other prints of his work.
TarzanJoeWallis (view)
Very well played game all around tonight.
crunch (view)
best starter and 2 top hitters from the team gone...and they keep on winning.
little ahead of myself here, but the RSox got 9 outs to find 6+ runs.
TarzanJoeWallis (view)
Richard Gallardo just left the Smokies game with an arm injury after going to the ground following a pitch. Doesn’t sound good at all.
azbobbop (view)
Phil, do you think Wiggins will start out in ACL?
azbobbop (view)
The level of conversation on this site is intelligent, reasoned and informative. Miles ahead of other Cub sites.