Mike Napoli does what Enos Slaughter didn’t
Posted by John Autin on May 30, 2011
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....
May 30th, 2011 at 12:43 am
The ball got to Pena so early that my friend and I thought there was no chance that Napoli would be safe. We thought the umpire must have missed the call, but nope, Napoli was clearly safe on the replays. Then again Pena was standing so tall ad so far off to the side that it gave Napoli a lot of room to score. I'm suspecting that Pena may have been influenced by what happened to Buster Posey.
May 30th, 2011 at 1:00 am
Napoli's baserunning numbers are somewhat influenced by playing his whole career (before this year) for Mike Scioscia. The Angels are noted for moving runners and have been the best team at advancing 1st to 3rd and 2nd to home in the AL over last 10 years.
May 30th, 2011 at 1:13 am
Here's another RBI single of a runner from first this year:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/COL/COL201104150.shtml
Helton drove in Herrera in the bottom of the 5th.
In fact, amazingly enough, since 2000 a batter has come to the plate with just a runner on first and recorded an RBI single 113 times.
May 30th, 2011 at 1:21 am
Thanks, Raphy -- I had no idea it was so common!
I wonder how many were walk-off situations, where the batter was certain that his advancing to 2nd was irrelevant.
May 30th, 2011 at 1:49 am
Credit must also be given to The Imbecile Dave Anderson (the same idiot that sent Hamilton to steal home on a foul-pop just 60 feet from the plate... resulting in Josh breaking his arm) for Napoli's miraculous scoring play. Had Pena been in proper position Napoli would have been out by 30 feet. He was so dead to rights on this play that I already had time to form an extended expletive laden sentence cursing Anderson between the time Pena caught the ball and Napoli was called safe. Anderson is the worst coach I've ever seen at the second biggest no-show job in baseball. I can list you 10 separate instances where he has cost TEX runs and games over just the past 3 seasons.
May 30th, 2011 at 2:10 am
Wow - I saw the same thing happen in a minor league game between New Hampshire and New Britain on Sunday, and wrote that I had never seen it happen. How interesting that it happened in the major leagues on the very same day!
May 30th, 2011 at 2:49 am
@5, TLFK -- I'm sure you have a better angle on the Texas 3B coach situation than I do.
But do any of the following affect your opinion of the play tonight?
(a) The game was tied in the bottom of the 9th, so a successful gamble wins it.
(b) If Napoli had stopped at 3rd, the next batter would have been Andres Blanco, a .259 career hitter.
(c) The Rangers had already used Feliz.
May 30th, 2011 at 3:47 am
Re: #7, John
(a) I see where you are coming from with this and from Washington's track record I am accustomed to living with the consequences of those gambles. But with Anderson's horrendous track record of misjudging player speed vs. where the ball actually is on the field, I think this was less a gamble than just a bonehead move gone good... This is the guy who reached out and grabbed Mike Young last season and cost TEX a win when they were in a pennant race... & a hundred more examples I could site that don't show up in the score book. Well maybe ending a game on interference does (?) But in my opinion, anything that goes wrong for TEX between 2nd and home is Anderson's fault. And anything that goes well is shear blind luck or player talent. Short answer; No.
(b) There were 2 outs and I'd bet you $1000 that I don't have that Andrus is stealing on the next pitch. Of course everybody in the park knows that. But its a chance for something wacky to happen. Wash had depleted his bench at that point if I am not mistaken so there is really no other option than to have Blanco hit. With Wash's aggressive tendencies I wouldn't put it past him to put on the squeeze, get all the balls in the air and just roll the dice. That is no more outlandish than sending Napoli home on the hit in my opinion. But as a Rangers fan I would not have had a problem with letting Blanco come to the plate. On a side note since he will likely never come up again, in '10 one of the Rangers play by play announcers would refer to Blanco as "Blank-o" when he wasn't hitting but say his name correctly when he got on base.
(c) Obviously you have not been watching Feliz lately.
May 30th, 2011 at 4:08 am
@3 @4 I don't have my Rulebook handy, but I remember the scoring rules give a single to any hit (not an HR) in a walkoff situation. It would be interesting to see how many of the 113 are not walkoffs if my memory is correct.
May 30th, 2011 at 7:22 am
@9 I only get 3 for that:
http://bbref.com/pi/shareit/X6mxP
May 30th, 2011 at 7:24 am
@9. Provided the batter runs the hit out, he is credited with as many bases as it takes the winning run to score, except for walk-off home runs, which are counted. For example, if the winning run was on second base and the batter gets a hit, he would be credited with a double if he reached second base, even if it is shortly after the run scored. If the batter stopped after reaching first in this situation, he would only be credited with a double. If the winning runner was on third base and the batter hit a fair ball that bounced into the stands, normally an "automatic" double, he would only be credited with a single.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:12 am
Not trying to take anything away from Napoli, but looking at the video (mlb.mlb.com/mlb/gameday/index.jsp?gid=2011_05_29_kcamlb_texmlb_1&mode=recap_home&c_id=tex), it seems he only scored 'cause the defense was awful.
The outfielder threw to first base first, and then Hosmer turned around before throwing to home well before Napoli got there, and the catcher (Pena) did the worst job of blocking the plate I'd ever seen by someone pretending to block it. Napoli should've been, and could've been out if the D played slightly better.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:40 am
@8 (c), TLFK -- Well, no, I haven't seen Feliz pitch lately. I have noticed his troubling K/BB ratio (now 0.64), but I thought that might be just small sample size, and that they would still consider him their best relief option.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:45 am
@9, Raphy -- Thanks for the followup showing that only 3 of the 113 runners scoring from 1st on a single came in game-ending situations.
BTW, when are you going to conduct a webinar on using the Play Index? I want to be in the front row....
May 30th, 2011 at 10:53 am
John, thanks for the kind words. I'm always open to explaining any search, if anyone needs. (Way back when, we even used to have threads for PI questions)
I should point out that all the numbers that I posted in this thread only involved situations with only a runner on first. There are probably other situations with multiple runners on that involve runners being driven in from first on a single, but I don;t have time to search for them.
May 30th, 2011 at 11:19 am
@12 thanks for the link, amazing how irate the catcher was when he failed to block the plate or apply the tag before Napoli slid home.
On a side note, does anyone know why loading MLB gameday pages causes my browser to freeze for about a minute? I think it might be something to do with a flash plugin? I'm using Firefox.
May 30th, 2011 at 4:53 pm
Dodger prospect Dee Gordon scoring from first on a sacrifice bunt: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29eHAjDD2bU&feature=player_embedded#at=85
May 30th, 2011 at 6:53 pm
So, which modern player has the most career "scoring from 1st on a single?"
May 30th, 2011 at 9:04 pm
@17, Bip -- Fun video. (Reminded me of Chuck Knoblauch's "Brain-lauch" play in the 1998 ALCS against Cleveland, the first postseason game I ever attended.) But there clearly was an error charged on the play at 1B.