I thought it was an error in the play-by-play, but no -- Texas catcher Mike Napoli really did score from 1st base on a single Sunday, waved home by the 3rd-base coach with 2 out and sliding under a high tag with the winning run.

http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=310529113

In case the Enos Slaughter reference is obscure, it is often written that Slaughter scored from 1st on a single with the deciding run in game 7 of the 1946 World Series. But the hit by Harry Walker that scored Slaughter was officially scored a double.

Of course, it's possible that the official scoring of "Napoli's Mad Dash" will be changed later, which is why I'm going to enjoy it now.

I don't recall seeing Napoli run the bases, so all I can judge by is the statistical record. He seems to have above-average speed for a catcher. He has 22 career SB (with 14 CS, true, but how many catchers would even try 36 times?). His career rate of extra bases taken is 47% (i.e., going 1st to 3rd on a single or scoring from 1st on a double); that's the same as Ivan Rodriguez had through age 30, and Pudge was considered pretty fast for a catcher.

By the way, Napoli went 3 for 4 Sunday and hit his 8th HR in just 99 AB. His BA is just .212, but his OBP is .358 and he's slugging .505. Somewhere, Fiore Gino Tennaci is smiling....

Today's Big League Stew makes note of that fact that on Saturday, in the 2874th game of his career, Omar Vizquel played first base for the first time.  This brings to mind a thread from last season in which it was  noted  that in 2009, Vizquel played 3rd base for the first time in his 2683rd career game.

Click here to see what other players our reader's discovered as having played a new position after a substantial career.

A non-comprehensive look around Saturday's MLB games:

• Hanley Ramirez was caught stealing and grounded into a double play in Florida's win; it's the 4th time in his career that he's done both in the same game. His oWAR is 0 so far this year.
• Zach Attack: In his first game of the year, Zach Duke had his first scoreless start since 2009, blanking the Astros for 7 IP. Duke also hit his first career HR in almost 300 AB, a satisfying 3-run shot against Bud Norris after a 2-out intentional walk to the #8 hitter. Zach Kroenke finished up the blowout win for Arizona in his season debut. (Do you think that a MLB pitcher named Zach Kroenke must have to repeat his last name a lot?)
• David Pauley earned the win for Seattle with 2 scoreless IP, trimming his ERA to 0.84 (3 runs in 32.1 IP) and his WHIP to 0.71, the 4th best in MLB this year (min. 20 IP).
• Jonny Venters had his hitless IP streak snapped at 12 by Joey Votto, but Venters extended his scoreless streak to 14 IP.
• Albert Pujols grounded into a DP for the 16th time this year. Nearing the 1/3 mark of the season, Pujols is on pace for 49 GDP and less than 2 oWAR. His worst oWAR mark was 5.8 in 2007.
• Jaime Garcia went into his start in Colorado with a 1.93 ERA through 10 starts. He left the mound with a 3.28 ERA and his first loss of the year. Garcia allowed 12 runs (11 ER) in 3.1 IP, the most runs allowed by a starter in so few IP since 2008.
• For the Rockies, Juan Nicasio won his MLB debut, allowing 1 unearned run in 7 IP. Nicasio was called up from the AA Texas League, where he had a 2.22 ERA and 6.30 K/BB ratio in 9 starts; his K/BB ratio has been at least 5 in each of his last 3 minor-league seasons. Nicasio is the first Rockies pitcher since 2001 to debut with 7 IP and no ER. (Jason Jennings threw a CG shutout in his 2001 debut. The other Colorado pitcher to debut with a shutout was Mark Brownson (who?) in 1998; Brownson appeared in just 10 more MLB games and allowed at least 1 run each time, with a combined 8.54 ERA. His shutout victim? The Mets, of course.)
• Sean O'Sullivan became the first pitcher this year (and 11th since 2001) to allow 15 hits or more in a game. Since joining the Royals in 2010 in exchange for Alberto Callaspo, O'Sullivan has a 6.38 ERA and 63 ERA+ in 121.1 IP.
• Paul Maholm threw Pittsburgh's 2nd shutout of the season. The Pirates haven't had more than 3 shutouts in a year since 1993. Also, the Pirates' 10-run outburst raised Maholm's average run support this year to 2.20; they hadn't scored more than 4 runs in his previous 10 starts.
• Cleveland scored 4 runs in the 8th last night, extending a 3-2 lead to 7-2. We've seen so many late rallies by the Indians this year, they must rank near the top in "Late & Close" performance, right? Nope. Their .714 OPS in Late & Close situations ranks 6th in the AL. Boston is head & shoulders above the other AL teams with an .849 OPS.
• Jose Bautista reached safely 5 times in 6 trips, nudging his OBP back over .500. The only modern players with a .500 OBP in a qualifying season are Babe Ruth (5), Barry Bonds (4), Ted Williams (3), Mickey Mantle and Rogers Hornsby. In better news for Toronto, Bautista came up in the 1st in a non-pitch-around situation (2 on and 0 out) and slugged his 20th HR.

Last night in Minneapolis:

• Twins RHP Anthony Swarzak did not allow a hit until Peter Bourjos doubled with 1 out in the 8th inning. Francisco Liriano already has a no-no for the Twins this year. The only no-hitters by Twins righties were by Scott Erickson in 1994 and Dean Chance in 1967.
• Swarzak, Matt Capps and Alex Burnett held the Angels to 1 hit in 10 innings. Since 1919, there have been just 16 games of 1 hit or less in 10+ innings.
• Jered Weaver allowed 2 hits in 9 scoreless innings, while Swarzak allowed 1 hit in 8 IP. Since 1919, there have been just 34 games in which both starters went 8+ IP and allowed 2 hits or less.

Minnesota finally broke through in the 10th with 4 straight hits against Hisanori Takahashi and Kevin Jepsen.

Team Pitching Games of 10+ IP Allowing 1 Hit or Less, 1919-2011:

Both SPs Going 8+ IP on 2 Hits or Less, 1919-2011:

Spencer Fordin has the story at mlb.com.

Read the rest of this entry »

Reader Eddy E. wrote in with this gem:

These are AL batting splits by position so far this year. As you can see, the LF cumulatively have an 83 OPS+ putting them as the worst group relative to league average (excluding pitchers, who have a very small number of PAs this year in the AL and are, of course, pitchers.) In raw numbers, LFers have a .651 OPS relative to a league average of .713. They are down about 25 points in OBP and 35 points in SLG.

Some of the guys to have played at least half their time at LF so far this year and have contributed to the poor performance include Delmon Young, Vernon Wells, Travis Snider, Ryan Raburn, Felix Pie, David Murphy, Carl Crawford, Sam Fuld, and Juan Pierre. These guys all have an OPS+ of 83 or less so far in 2011.

The only full-time AL LF who's crushing it is Alex Gordon, to the tune of a 135 OPS+.  Luke Scott and Josh Willingham are also doing well, as the combo of Brett Gardner and Andruw Jones has been decent.

Also, just to emphasize how weird this overall performance is, in 2010 the AL LF position had a tOPS+ of 109. In 2009 it was 104. You have to go all the way back to 1999 to find an AL LF tOPS+ under 100. That year it was 96, and that's only because there was so much offense from all positions that most of the values hovered right around 100. Before that, I went back to the 1970s and didn't find any tOPS+ under 100--back then it was as we think of it--corner outfield was a power position and one of the leaders among OPS every year.

Also, to further show how odd it is, over in the NL, the LFers have a 117 tOPS+ so far this season. Guys raking so far include Matt Holliday, Logan Morrison, Ryan Bruan, Jason Bourgeois, Laynce Nix, Alfonso Soriano, and Chris Heisey. Plus there are a handful of other regular LFers have decent seasons: Mike Morse, Pat Burrell, Jerry Sands, and Jose Tabata. These guys have overcome disappointing starts from Carlos Gonzalez (99 OPS+), Raul Ibanez (90), Carlos Lee (85), Tony Gwynn (45), and others.

Corey Patterson had a 5-hit day today (albeit in 7 plate appearances). He's has 2 previous 5-hit games in his career:

Even before today's game he had an OPS+ of 100 on the year. This for a guy who had an OPS+ of 80 coming in to 2011.

Check out the active players who've had a season with at least 120 games played an an OPS+ of no more than 60.

Patterson (along with Izturis) managed to make this list multiple times, and the casual fan sometimes fails to notice since he's the only guy who put up double-digits in homers while doing it.

Oakland reliever Joey Devine is back after reconstructive elbow surgery that cost him the entire 2009-10 seasons. Devine finished 2008 on a roll, allowing only 3 unearned runs in his last 26.1 IP. (That same year, teammate Brad Ziegler set the all-time start-of-career record with 38 straight scoreless IP.) Devine has added 4 scoreless IP to his streak so far this year. Below are the longest no-ER streaks since 2006, by innings pitched.  (Note: These are game streaks, sorted by total IP during the streak. Some of the streaks may have been preceded or followed by one or more scoreless IP in a game in which they allowed an earned run.)

Game Streaks of 0 Earned Runs, Totaling 25+ IP, 2006-11

Drew Storen had the longest no-ER streak so far this season, 23 IP.

The list above is entirely relievers, since it measures game streaks. Here are the longest 0-ER game streaks by starters since 2006, sorted by IP:

Streaks of 0 ER in Starts, Totaling 21+ IP, 2006-11

Dodgers 1B James Loney hit his 2nd HR of the year tonight, off Javier Vazquez.

What next? -- the McCourts reconcile?

Now that he's (ahem) "out of his slump," let's have a look at the worst qualifying seasons by a 1B in the live-ball era:

OPS+ of 75 or less by a qualifying 1B, 1920-2011

Five current seasons on that list.  It's early yet, but it's getting pretty late for Adam LaRoche, Aubrey Huff, Daric Barton, Loney and Justin Morneau.

How about that Johnny Sturm? He gets one season in the big leagues, starting at 1B for the Yankees, ending the 2-year tenure of Babe Dahlgren; sullies the sainted Lou Gehrig's position even more than Dahlgren did; and winds up a World Champion.

Sturm is the only one of the past players here whose team won it all. Pete Rose made it to the Series.

• Giants SS Brandon Crawford hit a grand slam in his first MLB game Friday. Crawford, fresh from San Jose in the California League (high-A), lined out and hit into a DP in his first 2 trips.  But when he came up in the 7th against Milwaukee's Shaun Marcum with the bases loaded and the Giants down, 3-1, he lifted the ball and the funereal mood of SF fans with the club's first salami of the year, propelling them to a 5-4 win.  (There are still 16 teams that have not hit a slam so far.)

I haven't figured out yet whether the Play Index can unearth players who hit a grand slam in their first game, or for their first hit; I think there's a search feature I haven't discovered yet.  Anyone?

From a search-and-follow operation, I can tell you two things:

• Brandon Crawford is the first SS since 1919 with a debut grand slam; and
• He's just the 4th player since 1991 at any position with a grand slam in his debut. The other 3 all did it in their first time up: Daniel Nava in 2010, Kevin Kouzmanoff in 2006 and Jeremy Hermida (as a PH) in 2005.

I determined those points by searching for debuts with HR>=1 and RBI>=4.  Surprisingly, there have been only 3 such games by a SS since 1919, 1 in each of the last 3 seasons:  Ian Desmond in 2009, Starlin Castro in 2010, and Crawford.

Brandon Crawford's path to the majors has been a little unusual. He played most of last year at AA, but hit poorly, and began this year back in the Cali League -- something Dirk Hayhurst could relate to. Crawford played just 14 games there (injury?), but his 1.005 OPS and the continued ossification of Miguel Tejada at SS prompted his promotion. He's 24, and was a 4th-round pick in 2008

P.S. I need to thank the people responsible for my joining the B-R blogging crew: Sean Forman, for giving me the chance; Andy (not sure if he wants his last name published), for putting on the full-court recruiting press to get me off my duff; Neil Paine, for helping a 20th-century man over the technical hurdles; and all you folks out there who responded to Andy's informal referendum with your encouragement. Thank you!