The Other Dude That's Retiring

Today, I’m doing a quick blog that will hopefully distract you from the Jeter love-fest that’s been going on.  Don’t forget, there is another dude retiring – Paul Konerko.  Konerko has been a solid, consistent player for the past 15 years with the Chicago White Sox.  While I don’t really have time to go into a full on examination of his career, I wanted to find out if Paul Konerko was a Hall of Famer.  I really wanted it to be closer, but when you compare against a few other players, the answer is a solid probably not.

Comparing him against fellow White Sox' teammate and Hall of Famer Frank Thomas, Hall of Fame hopeful but probably not Fred McGriff, another fellow White Sox' teammate Jim Thome, and Hall of Famer Johnny Mize, you can see that Konerko doesn't really stack up against those guys.

Konerko just didn't have the combination of things that really puts some of these other guys over the top.  He didn't hit 500 home runs.  That's not necessarily an automatic entry into the hall nowadays, but it certainly would have helped.  He didn't strike out an excessive amount - his career high was 117 in 2004 - but that being the case, the voters probably would want a higher batting average.

Mize didn't get into the hall through regular voting.  He was elected by the Veteran's Committee.  You have to remember that Mize lost three full seasons to military service though.  And look at that strikeout to walk ratio.

In 1998, the Cincinnati Reds traded Konerko to the White Sox for Mike Cameron.  What if instead the Reds had traded him to the Yankees?  Maybe for Ricky Ledee?  Come on Reds fans, doesn't that sound like a trade they would make?  Or maybe for Paul O'Neill.  Bring him back to Cincinnati to finish his career and provide some veteran leadership.

So, if Konerko went to the Yankees, would he be a Hall of Famer?  The Tino Martinez era was pretty brief in New York.  He would be gone by the end of 2001.  The Yankees then wouldn't have had to sign Jason Giambi.  Konerko would have just been able to hit in the best lineup in the first half of the 2000's.  He almost certainly would have had better numbers, and the shine associated with playing in New York and the number of World Series rings would had definitely bolstered his cause (Don Mattingly would like to point out that BOTH of those things are necessary).

No, Paul Konerko isn't a Hall of Famer.  But let's not just sit back and watch #2 get all the glory these last few days of the season.

The Day Mark Whiten and Lonnie Maclin Set Career Highs

Being a St. Louis Cardinals fan, there’s not much that I care to remember from the early 1990’s.  But there’s one thing that I’ll never forget, and that’s Mark Whiten’s four home run game on September 7th, 1993.
This was actually the second game of the day.  The Cardinals lost the first game 14-13 to the Cincinnati Reds.  In the top of the eighth, the Cardinals exploded for seven runs, turning a 9-6 deficit into a 13-9 lead.  They actually had runners at second and third base with one out with seven runs in, but for some reason, Stan Royer didn’t attempt to score on Tripp Cromer’s groundout to second, and then Luis Alicea struck out looking to end the inning.  Actually, I think I remember that exact scenario unfolding watching the Louisville Redbirds in 1989.  Anyway, Mark Whiten had a small part in the eighth inning action, drawing a bases loaded walk off of Scott Ruskin, scoring Gregg Jefferies, earning his first RBI on the day.

The Reds would score three runs in the bottom of the eighth off of a Dan Wilson bases loaded single and a Jack Daugherty sac fly.  Jefferies would single, steal a base, and advance to third on a sac fly in the top of the ninth, but he was stranded there after Jeff Reardon got Bernard Gilkey to pop out to second base to end the inning.  In the top of the ninth, Jacob Brumfield doubled with one out, and Hal Morris followed that with a walk.  Reggie Sanders then finished it off of Todd Burns with a triple to end the game.  Whiten quickly put his learnings from Pensacola Junior College to work, deducing that the Cardinals would need to score more than 14 runs if they were to win the nightcap.  He sat down between games with Lonnie Maclin and quickly went to work on a plan to do just that.

This is beautiful.  You can
see all four levels of seats
in old Cardinal Stadium.

WHOA THERE, HOSS.  Who the hell is Lonnie Maclin?  If you have to ask that, you’re not a true Cardinals fan.  At least a true Cardinals fan that doesn’t have the last name “Maclin”.  Maclin made his major league debut in the first game that day, getting his first career hit off of John Roper to lead off the sixth inning.  Unfortunately, his .333 average at that time would fall to .077 by the end of the season.  That’s what happens when you don’t get another hit in 10 more at bats.  September 7th, 1994 was the only day that he would ever start a major league game, and he got two starts that day.  But if there was ever a day to be on the field, it was this day.

In game two that day, Maclin would be inserted second in the lineup, between Geronimo Pena and Gilkey.  Whiten would hit down in the six hole between Gerald Perry and Tom Pagnozzi.  After Pena walked to lead off the game, he was thrown out at second off of Maclin’s grounder to short.  Maclin then proceeded to steal second, looking into the dugout and giving Whiten two thumbs up.  After a Todd Zeile walk and a Perry single, Whiten went to work.  He hit a grand slam to open things up that day.  Pagnozzi, still in awe of how beautifully the plan was working, could only muster a fly out to left to end the top half of the inning.  Cardinals 4, Reds 0.

The Reds would keep the momentum from the first game going in the bottom of the first.  Thomas Howard led off with a walk, followed by a double from Brumfield.  Morris then hit a sac fly, scoring Howard, and then Brumfield scored after stealing third and an error on the throw from Pagnozzi.  After that point, though, Bob Tewksbury was pretty much lights out.  He went the distance, allowing no more walks or runs, and only six more hits.  After the first inning, it was Cardinals 4, Reds 2.

The next three innings were scoreless affairs, with a Maclin strikeout and Whiten pop out sprinkled in, so let’s fast forward to the fifth inning.  In the top half of the frame, Tewksbury would lead off with his second walk of the day.  He advanced to second on a wild pitch, and then Pena bunted him over.  That’s when Maclin summoned his inner Whiten and hit a sac fly to center field, scoring Tewksbury.  Brumfield would single off of Tewksbury in the bottom half of the inning, but that was it for the Reds.  Cardinals 5, Reds 2.

Mike Anderson relieved Reds starter Larry Luebbers to start the sixth inning.  Anderson promptly walked Zeile and Perry to start the inning.  That’s when Whiten decided to get halfway to the home run cycle, hitting a three run shot, giving him seven RBIs on the day to that point.  Rounding the bases, he gave a big salute to Maclin, as they were now over halfway to their goal of scoring more than 14 runs.  With tears in his eyes at the beauty of the unfolding plan, Pagnozzi grounded out to short.  Cromer and Tewksbury went down quietly as well, and the Reds failed to make any noise in the bottom of the frame.  Cardinals 8, Reds 2.

Anderson remained in the game to start the top of the seventh inning for the Reds.  After Pena struck out, Maclin fouled out to third base.  Shamed by this, Maclin hung his head and went back to the dugout.  Whiten, always a glass-two-thirds-of-the-way-full kind of guy, told him to keep his head up, and actually ordered some nachos for him from a vendor close by.  While this was happening, Gilkey and Zeile singled, setting up Perry for an RBI single.  Whiten, batting gloves still slathered in nacho cheese, deposited another ball over the wall, giving him three home runs and 10 RBIs on the day to that point.  While running around the bases, Whiten spelled out M-A-C-L-I-N, YMCA-style.

Surprisingly, Whiten’s third dinger of the day didn’t knock Anderson out of the game.  That came a batter later, when Pagnozzi singled.  Chris Bushing entered the game and retired Cromer to end the top of the inning.  Brian Dorsett would pinch hit and single for Bushing in the bottom of the inning, but that was it for the Reds.  Cardinals 12, Reds 2.

Rob Dibble entered the game in the top of the eighth for Cincinnati.  Tewksbury struck out before Pena swelled up and hit a home run.  Maclin was the next batter, but the only thing that he could do was ground out to second.  Maclin was no Whiten.  He knew it, Whiten knew it, the nacho vendor knew it.  At that point, Whiten autographed his cleats and gave them to Maclin (they weren’t actually his cleats; they were Jim Lindeman’s cleats from 1989 that fell behind the industrial washing machines).  The Reds couldn’t get anything going in the bottom of the eighth.  Cardinals 13, Reds 2.

Dibble remained in the game in the ninth.  Royer struck out to start the frame, but then Perry singled to center field.  Whiten came up and did the only thing he could do.  He hit a home run.  He rounded the bases cleatless, wanting Maclin to believe that he actually gave him his cleats an inning earlier.  Whiten now had four home runs and 12 RBIs on the day, and the plan that he and Maclin sat down and concocted had come to fruition.  They had scored more than 14 runs.  Whiten was the last baserunner of the day for either team.  The Cardinals won 15-2.

Whiten and Maclin both achieved career highs that day for RBIs in a game.  Maclin’s one RBI was the only RBI of his career.  Whiten’s 12 RBIs tied fellow Cardinal Jim Bottomley for most in a game in major league history.  He also tied the Padres’ Nate Colbert for most RBIs in a double header with 13.  His four home runs also tied several players for most in a game.

I would write a long paragraph about Maclin’s career, but I would do so at the risk of being too wordy.  He was actually drafted by the Reds in the 10th round of the amateur draft in January 1986, but didn’t sign.  The Cardinals drafted him in the third round of the June secondary draft that year, and he signed on to play for his hometown team.  It took him seven years to reach the majors.  He was there for a month, then spent the next eight years playing independent ball and in the Mexican league before finally calling it quits in 2003.

Whiten set career highs in 1993 in games played, at bats, runs, hits, home runs and RBIs.  He was also player of the week twice that season.  The first time was the week of July 18th when he hit .385 with three home runs and nine RBIs (this was in four games in the short week of the All Star game).  And of course, the second time was the week of September 12th, when he hit .321 with four home runs and 14 RBIs.

And thaaat was a
70 MPH fastball.

Whiten would only play in 100 or more games one other time in his career – 1996.  After his time ended in St. Louis in 1994, he played for six different teams in six years.  In his final three seasons, he returned to Cleveland, which was the second team he played for, and he went to the post season the only time in his career in 1998.  He also pitched one inning for the Tribe that season.  Throwing the eighth inning of a 12-2 loss to the Oakland A’s on July 31st, he allowed one hit, one run, two walks, and a hit batter, and he also struck out the side.  He allowed a double to Jason Giambi, and struck out Mike Blowers, Miguel Tejada and Mike Neill.

With 105 career home runs, only three other players who have hit four home runs in a game have few than him.  Two of those players (Bobby Lowe and Ed Delahanty) accomplished the feat in the 19th century, and the other one did it in 1948 (Pat Seerey).  Of all of the players with 10 or more RBIs in a game, only Phil Weintraub and Norm Zauchin have fewer RBI’s than Whiten’s career total of 423.

Lastly, I would like to bring up the record for most RBIs in a game where a player accounted for all of his team’s runs.  That feat was accomplished by Mike Greenwell on September 2nd, 1996.  Greenwell knocked in all nine of the Red Sox’ runs in a 9-8, 10 inning victory over the Seattle Mariners.  Manning left field for the Mariners that day?  Mark Whiten.

DONT WALK

Being somewhat of a grammar nazi, I’ve always looked at the “Walk/Don’t Walk” sign with a bit of sadness.  There’s no apostrophe in the “Don’t”, I’m not sure who to tell, and it probably wouldn’t matter anyway.  I get that there’s space consideration there, but couldn’t you just cut out an apostrophe in the black?  Isn’t there just one big red light illuminating a cutout?  I don’t know.  And nowadays, the public schools have gotten so bad, they just go with white and red people.  You don’t even have to read!  But this is a baseball blog (hopefully fairly grammatically correct).  We’re not here to talk about apostrophes.  Today, we’re going to talk about someone who took the DONT WALK sign to heart, Dan Quisenberry.

Quisenberry signed with the Kansas City Royals as a free agent in June of 1975, out of the University of La Verne in La Verne, CA.  The Leopards have produced a total of 10 major league players, but Quisenberry is the last one to have played in the majors.

Upon his signing, the Royals assigned Quisenberry to A ball Waterloo.  It was there where he would make his only professional start, which just happened to also be a complete game.  Overall there, he would go 3-2 with a 2.45 ERA and four saves with 31 strikeouts vs. just six walks (one intentional) across 44 innings in 20 games.  This earned him a promotion to AA Jacksonville to finish the 1975 season.  There, he went 0-1 with a 2.25 ERA and one save with two strikeouts vs. four walks (one intentional) across eight innings in six games.

The Royals would give Quisenberry the same schedule in 1976.  Starting again at Waterloo, he went 2-1 with a 0.64 ERA and 11 saves with 19 strikeouts and nine walks (four intentional) across 42 innings in 34 games.  Those numbers, plus a WHIP of 0.881, earned him another promotion back to Jacksonville.  There, he went 0-1 with a 2.25 ERA and six strikeouts vs. four walks (two intentional) across 12 innings in nine games.

Quisenberry would spend the next two seasons in Jacksonville, where he would combine to go 7-3 with a 1.17 ERA and 21 saves with 62 strikeouts vs. 23 walks (eight intentional) across 138 innings in 81 games.  He would be promoted to AAA Omaha for 1979, where he would go 2-1 with a 3.60 ERA and five saves, with 16 strikeouts vs. 10 walks (one intentional) in 35 innings across 26 games.

The Royals finally came to their senses in early July.  Quisenberry was called up, and he made his Major ^th, 1979.  In a 4-2 loss to the Chicago White Sox, he entered the game in the top of the seventh and induced a ground ball double play off the bat of Lamar Johnson.  In the eighth, he allowed a single to Rusty Torres, who was quickly erased by another ground ball double play off the bat of Greg Pryor.   In the ninth, he allowed a double to Alan Bannister amid three more groundouts.  The Royals tried to put something together in the bottom of the frame, with U.L. Washington hitting a one out single to center field, but a Willie Wilson pop out and George Brett ground out ended the day.

League debut on July 8

Quisenberry would pick up his first major league victory 14 days later in a 7-6 win over the Texas Rangers.  He allowed his first run in the bottom of the eighth, blowing the save, but the Royals scored a run in the top of the ninth, and he shut the door in the bottom of the frame.  The next day, he would get his first career save against the Rangers.  Overall for his first half season in baseball, one probably didn’t see this guy as a future dominant closer.  He finished 3-2 with a 3.15 ERA and five saves with 13 strikeouts vs. seven walks (five intentional) in 40 innings across 32 games.  He also added three holds, but he had five blown saves.  If you look at his outings though, there were two instances where he gave up four runs each in a total of three innings.  If you take those two outings out, his ERA falls to 1.46.  In both of those outings, he allowed two home runs.  He only allowed one other home run in the other 37 innings he pitched.

The 1979 Royals only had a total of 27 saves, and it took six different pitches to achieve that total.  They finished the season 85-77, three games back of the California Angels.  If they were going to get over the hump, they were going to need to do better than 27 saves.  And so they did.

Quisenberry opened the 1980 season as the closer in Kansas City, and never looked back.  At the end of May, he was having a pretty decent season, sitting at 3-2 with a 2.61 ERA and eight saves.  Two months later, at the end of July, he was 7-4 with a 3.12 ERA and 20 saves.  Then came August.  He pitched in 18 games that month, going 4-1 with a 1.03 ERA and 11 saves, with only one blown save.  The Royals were 16-2 in games in which he pitched that month.  He had 10 walks that month, but seven of those were intentional, including three on the day where he had his only blown save.  He gave up a run in the bottom of the ninth, allowing the Toronto Blue Jays to tie it at three.  Quisenberry would pitch FOUR MORE INNINGS that day without allowing a run, before the Jays finally broke through for a run in the bottom of the 14^th inning off of Rawly Eastwick.  Shamed by the outing, Eastwick would never pitch again for the Royals.

Quisenberry had a somewhat rough September, when he went 1-2 with a 5.48 ERA and only two saves.  On September 4^th, he allowed six runs on seven hits and a walk (intentional of course) in a third of an inning in a 9-5 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers.  The Brewers scored eight of those runs in the ninth inning off of nine singles and the intentional walk.  The Royals though accomplished what they set out to do though.  They had a total of 42 saves on their way to a 97-75 record, finishing a full 14 games ahead of the second place Oakland A’s.  They would sweep the Yankees in the ALCS before losing to the Phillies in six games in the World Series.  Quisenberry was excellent in the ALCS, but struggled in the World Series, allowing six runs in 10 1/3 innings, going 1-2 with a 5.23 ERA and one save.  Overall for the season, he was 12-7 with a 3.09 ERA and a league leading 33 saves with 37 strikeouts vs. 27 walks (15 intentional) in 128 1/3 innings across 75 games.  He finished fifth in the AL Cy Young Award voting, and eighth in the AL MVP voting.

1981 wasn’t too bad of a season for Quisenberry.  The strike that year really hurt him putting up elite numbers, but it actually seemed to help him.  Prior to the strike in mid-June, he was 0-3 with a 2.86 ERA and nine saves, with 11 strikeouts and nine walks (five intentional).  One of his losses came in another five inning effort where he scattered nine hits and a walk, allowing three runs in an 8-7 loss to the Boston Red Sox on May 4^th.  Sixteen days later, he lost another game, allowing a hit and issuing THREE intentional walks in a 5-4 loss to the New York Yankees.

After the season resumed in mid-August, Quisenberry only allowed three earned runs the rest of the season.  He went 1-1 with a 0.79 ERA and nine saves, with nine strikeouts and six walks (three intentional).  His post-strike WHIP was 0.882.  The Royals made the playoffs, but they were swept in the ALDS by the A’s.  Overall for the season, he finished 1-4 with a 1.73 ERA, with 20 strikeouts and 15 walks (eight intentional) in 62 1/3 innings across 40 games.  He only allowed one home run all season.

The 1982 season began a four year span where Quisenberry was not only one of the best relievers in the game, but one of the best overall pitchers in the game.  He carried the second half momentum from ’81 right into April, where he pitched in seven games, going 0-1 with six saves.  He pitched a total of 14 innings, and only faced 50 batters.  That’s just eight over the minimum.  By mid-season, he was 4-3 with a 2.35 ERA and 20 saves.  That pace slowed a little, but he still finished 9-7 with a 2.57 ERA and a league leading 35 saves, with 46 strikeouts and 12 walks (two intentional) in 136 2/3 innings across 72 games.  It was the first season of three straight where he walked less than a batter…per nine innings.  He made his first All Star team, finished third in the AL Cy Young voting, and ninth in the AL MVP voting.  The Royals finished 90-72, but that was three games back of the Angels.

1983 was perhaps Quisenberry’s finest season.  At the end of April, he was 1-1 with a 2.04 ERA and four saves vs. three blown saves.  That was the highest his ERA would be the rest of the season, and in the other five months, he would only have four more blown saves.  He was lights out in May, earning a save in all eight opportunities with a 0.46 ERA, allowing one run in 19 2/3 innings.  He had two blown saves in June, but won both of those games, and added seven more saves.  July saw one blown save – a game he won on July 22^nd throwing a season high 5 1/3 innings in relief in the 3-2 victory of the New York Yankees.  He had his last blown save of the season on August 19^th, and four days later, he would have his last loss of the season.  From August 25^th on, he was perfect in his 11 save opportunities.  He allowed four runs in three innings in a non-save situation on September 28^th, but other than that outing, he only allowed one other run in 27 1/3 innings.  In those 15 games, he didn’t walk a batter.  Overall for the season, he went 5-3 with a 1.94 ERA, with 48 strikeouts and 11 walks (two intentional) in 139 innings across 69 games.  His 45 saves destroyed the old single season record of 38 set in 1973 by John Hiller.  He set career highs in saves, innings and K/BB ratio, and career lows in ERA (other than the strike shortened 1981 season), WHIP, hits/9 and BB/9.  He was again an All Star, he finished sixth in the AL MVP voting, and finished second in the AL Cy Young voting to LaMarr Hoyt.  Despite his efforts, the Royals finished 79-83, which was good enough for second place, but still 20 games back of Hoyt’s White Sox.

Quisenberry saw much of the same success in 1984.  At the end of June, he had 20 saves and a 2.09 ERA.  In the second half of the season, he earned 24 more saves and a 3.13 ERA.  The Royals rode him hard down the stretch.  In September, he was 2-0 with eight saves and two blown saves.  In 12 games that month, he pitched 24 1/3 innings.  In five of those games, he went at least two innings.  Overall that season, he went 6-3 with a 2.64 ERA and 44 saves, with 41 strikeouts and 12 walks (four intentional) in 129 1/3 innings across 72 games.  He was an All Star for the third and final time of his career, finished third in the AL MVP voting behind fellow reliever Willie Hernandez and Kent Hrbek, and once again he finished second in the AL Cy Young voting, that award also going to Hernandez.

1985 would be the last year where Quisenberry would be a dominant reliever.  The first half of the season was pretty pedestrian, at least by his standards.  Through the end of June, he was 4-4 with a 2.67 ERA and 14 saves vs. five blown saves.  He gave up 65 hits and nine walks in 57 1/3 innings for a 1.291 WHIP, but some of this may have been fueled by a .302 BAbip, which was far above his .258 BAbip at that point in his career.  The second half of the season went a little better, as he went 4-5 with a 2.13 ERA and 23 saves vs. seven blown saves.  He threw a total of 71 2/3 innings in 46 games in the second half.  Overall, he went 8-9 with a 2.37 ERA and 37 saves, with 54 strikeouts and 16 walks (eight intentional).  The Royals would finish one game ahead of the Angels, and after beating the Blue Jays in the ALCS, they defeated the St. Louis Cardinals in seven games to become World Series champions.  That post season, he went 1-1 with a 3.00 ERA and one save.

Quisenberry then decided to fall off a cliff, as far as production went.  In 1986, he went 3-7 with a 2.77 ERA and only 12 saves.  He walked 24 batters (12 intentionally) and only struck out 36 in 81 1/3 innings across 62 games.  Despite only having 12 saves, he still led the team, as the Royals only had 31 total and finished third in the AL West.  In 1987, he would only pitch in 49 innings across 47 games and earn eight saves.  He went 4-1 with a 2.77 ERA and 17 strikeouts vs. 10 walks (three intentional).

1988 would mark Quisenberry’s last season in Kansas City.  He earned his last save as a Royal on April 28^th, and pitched his last game as a Royal on June 24^th.  On July 4^th, he was released by the Royals.  Ten days later, he took a trip on I-70 east, and signed with the St. Louis Cardinals.  For the Royals, Quisenberry had a 3.55 ERA over 25 1/3 innings to start the season, and for the Cardinals in July, his ERA was actually a bit lower at 3.24 in 8 1/3 innings.  Then August happened.  For that month, he had a 8.49 ERA in 11 2/3 innings, and in September it was 6.00 in 18 innings.  He didn’t earn a single save in the second half of the season with the Cardinals.  Overall for the year, he went 2-1 with a 5.12 ERA and one save, with 28 strikeouts and 11 walks (three intentional) in 63 1/3 innings across 53 games.

Quisenberry somewhat righted the ship for the 1989 season.  He had a rough April where he had a 5.62 ERA in eight innings, but by the time July 6^th rolled around, he had four saves and a 1.99 ERA.  Two days later, he gave up three runs in two innings, but he wouldn’t give up multiple runs again until his last two outings of the season, giving up two runs each in those.  For the season, he went 3-1 with six saves, with 37 strikeouts and 14 walks (nine intentional) in 78 1/3 innings across 63 games.

The Cardinals released Quisenberry at the end of the 1989 season.  For 1990, he signed with the San Francisco Giants.  This did not go well.  He only pitched in five games for the Giants, all in April, before he tore his rotator cuff, which led him to retire.  He gave runs in three of those games; 10 total across 6 2/3 innings.  He would pitch his last game on April 23^rd, giving up three runs in 2 1/3 innings in a 13-3 loss to the San Diego Padres.  Quisenberry did go out in style though.  That day, the last hit, walk, and run he ever gave up was to Joe Carter, Jack Clark and Tony Gwynn respectively.

For his career, Quisenberry was 56-46 with a 2.76 ERA and 244 saves, with 379 strikeouts and 162 walks.  Of those walks, 70 were intentional.  Breaking that out, he unintentionally walked a batter every 11 1/3 innings.  Quisenberry’s first balk in the majors came on April 9^th, 1988 – his 556^th game in the majors.  He would end up with a total of five.  He faced a total of 4247 batters in his career.  He hit SEVEN of them.  He threw four wild pitches in his career, or one every 261 innings.  As a comparison, the best reliever of all time, Mariano Rivera, faced 5103 batters in his career.  He hit 13 of them, and threw 13 wild pitches – one every 98.7 innings.

Quisenberry had a career WHIP of 1.175, which seems a bit high considering his lack of walks.  He was the epitome of “pitch to contact”, allowing 1064 hits in his 1043 1/3 innings.  However, only 59 of those hits left the yard, good for a 0.5 HR/9 inning ratio.  Although his K/9 inning was comically low at 3.3, his low walk rate led to a 2.34 K/BB ratio.  His career BB/9 ratio of 1.397 is the 20^th lowest of all time.  Of the 19 pitchers in front of him, only two pitched in the 20^th century, the last one throwing his final game in 1926.

Now that we’ve reviewed some of these numbers, I’ll let you in on a little secret.  If you know anything at all about Quisenberry, you probably remember the almost-underhanded delivery he had.  You may assume that he always did that, but you would be wrong.  He didn’t develop that style of pitching until spring training in 1980.  His manager suggested the change because he didn’t have a good fastball, and requested that Quisenberry learn the style from Kent Tekulve.  So not only was Quisenberry a master control artist, he did it using a pitching style that was totally foreign to him.

In 1996, in his first year on the Hall of Fame ballot, he only received 3.8% of the votes and dropped off. 

Quisenberry was diagnosed with brain cancer in January 1998, and passed away in September of that year.  That same year, he was elected to the Royals Hall of Fame.

Dan Quisenberry, wherever you are, I’m not sure of your feelings on the DONT WALK sign, but thank you for taking it to heart and championing its cause.