How rare is a team cycle with just 4 hits?
Posted by John Autin on August 15, 2011
On Saturday, the big news in the Angels' 11-2 loss was Jered Weaver allowing a career-high 8 runs (upping his ERA from 1.78 to 2.13) and failing to complete the 5th inning for the first time in his last 50 starts.
There was an odd little footnote, though: With just 4 hits, the Angels hit for the cyle -- HR and 2B by Alberto Callaspo, 3B by Torii Hunter, single by Howie Kendrick. The 3B and 2B both came in the 9th, with Callaspo's 2-out double completing the cycle.
Such games are far more common than I had expected: Since 1919, there have been 92 team cycles on just 4 hits. There were five last year alone, the most in any live-ball season -- three in June, two on consecutive days.
Here are the 5 games from 2010, and the hitters involved (in order of 1B-2B-3B-HR):
-- August 28, 2010 -- Eli Whiteside, Freddy Sanchez, Andres Torres, Pablo Sandoval. Giants lost to Diamondbacks, 11-3.
-- July 24, 2010 -- Michael Saunders, Chone Figgins, Milton Bradley, Saunders. Mariners beat Red Sox, 5-1.
-- June 27, 2010 -- Miguel Montero, Justin Upton, Rusty Ryal, Gerardo Parra. D-backs beat Rays, 2-1.
-- June 26, 2010 -- Alexis Rios, Alexei Ramirez, Gordon Beckham, Paul Konerko. White Sox beat Cubs, 3-2.
-- June 8, 2010 -- Shin-Soo Choo, Travis Hafner, Choo, Shelley Duncan. Cleveland lost to Red Sox, 3-2.
The last 18 such games were achieved by 17 different teams.
August 15th, 2011 at 1:13 am
Has any player hit for the cycle with that player's four hits being the only hits the team has?
August 15th, 2011 at 1:13 am
The Angels had another team cycle today, on just 6 hits. And, in the Friday game, they again had only 4 hits and were just a triple shy of a team cycle that night. Cycle or not, they need to hit more.
Uggla had his streak snapped today. A nice run.
Ichiro has now hit in 10 games in a row, and 21 of his last 26. He last had consecutive oh-fers a month ago. But, before you get too excited, despite his apparent resurgence, Ichiro's batting average has risen all of 5 points in the past month.
August 15th, 2011 at 2:18 am
Off-topic, but I was curious how unusual Posada's grand slam after age 40 was. But, PI doesn't seem to have an easy way to check for grand slams (does anyone know a way to do this?).
I manually checked since 2000, and Posada is only the 7th player to do it since then. These are the others:
- B.J. Surhoff, 40.047, 2004-09-20, BAL vs. BOS
- Barry Larkin, 40.091, 2004-07-28, CIN vs. STL
- Craig Biggio, 41.127, 2007-04-20, HOU vs. MIL
- Craig Biggio, 41.222, 2007-07-24, HOU vs. LAD
- Julio Franco, 45.285, 2004-06-03, ATL vs. PHI
- Julio Franco, 46.308, 2005-06-27, ATL vs. FLA
- Matt Stairs, 40.077, 2008-05-14, TOR vs. MIN
- Matt Stairs, 41.195, 2009-09-10, PHI vs. WSN
- Rafael Palmeiro, 40.253, 2005-06-04, BAL vs. DET
Franco is easily the oldest in the game-searchable era with a grannie. Next oldest is Carlton Fisk in this game:
- Carlton Fisk, 43.281, 1991-10-03 (2), CHW vs. MIN
August 15th, 2011 at 2:36 am
@3.
Actually, it seems Posada didn't join the over-40 grand slam club, as he doesn't turn 40 until this coming Wednesday (guess the headline I read was a slight exaggeration).
August 15th, 2011 at 3:27 am
Has any player hit for the cycle with that player's four hits being the only hits the team has?
Not in the PI Era, anyway. I checked the box scores for teams that scored seven or fewer runs in a game where one of their players hit for the cycle, and the lowest team hit total I could find was eight, done four times:
Detroit, beat Cleveland 4-3 on 4/20/37 (Gee Walker hit for the cycle).
Washington, lost 3-2 to Boston on 5/26/64 (Jim King).
Los Angeles (A), beat New York 3-1 on 7/28/64 (Jim Fregosi).
Kansas City, beat California 4-0 on 9/26/79 (Frank White).
Walker, King, Fregosi, and White each had four hits in his team's eight-hit game.
For a game where a player might as well have hit for the cycle and his teammates might as well have gotten zero hits (and they almost did), check out Campy vs. the White Sox, August 16, 1966.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:49 am
Follow-up note: Two team cycles have occurred on the same day as an individual player cycle.
July 6, 1999 — Chris Singleton of the White Sox hit for the cycle in an 8-7, 10-inning loss to the Royals. That same day, the Braves got four hits in a 5-2 loss to the Marlins: 1b by Chipper Jones, 2b by Brian Jordan, 3b by Ryan Klesko, and HR by Jones.
July 21, 1925 — Roy Carlyle of the Red Sox hit for the cycle in a 6-3 win over the White Sox in the first game of a doubleheader. (The White Sox won the nitecap.) Meanwhile, the Pirates got four hits in a 4-2 loss to the Phillies: 1b by Roy Spencer, 2b by Clyde Barnhart, 3b by Kiki Cuyler, and HR by Eddie Moore.
Carlyle, incidentally, hit nine home runs in 539 major-league plate appearances.
August 15th, 2011 at 9:33 am
Doug mentioned earlier how difficult it was to check for grand slams. I know this is completely off-topic, but please forgive a newbie trying to figure out how to start a discussion around here without kidnapping someone else's topic! It has always intrigued me that the most dramatic possible comeback to win would probably involve a grand slam. Ideally, to really string out the most unlikely come-from-behind win, it would be the bottom of the ninth (or later) inning, 2 outs, count is 3-2, and to really put the cherry on top, an inside-the-park grand slam to win by one run! The obvious question wouldn't be how many times this has happened, but has it EVER happened? If not, how close to this has a team ever come?
I'll leave this to you research fanatics, since I am clueless as to how this is done. It has been mentioned about "subscribing". How do you do that, and how much does it cost? I assume subscribers are offered a set of research directions?
August 15th, 2011 at 10:37 am
On the topic of cycles, I recently searched for batters who replaced the single in the cycle with the walk. I found, if I remember correctly, 91 such games, as compared to 230+ traditional cycles. I thought it was interesting.
August 15th, 2011 at 12:33 pm
@7
Roberto Clemente is, to my knowledge, the only player to hit a walk-off, inside-the-park grand slam. since it was an ITPGS, the pirates had to have won by one run. there were no outs.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/PIT/PIT195607250.shtml
http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1956/B07250PIT1956.htm
pretty amazing accomplishment!
Jason Giambi hit a walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the 12th, giving the Yankees a 13-12 victory: http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA200205170.shtml
however, there was only one out, it was the first pitch of the at-bat, and it was not an inside-the-park.
just an observation - in my opinion, the full count in this scenario is not particularly more dramatic here, since a walk does not end, or even tie, the game.
August 15th, 2011 at 12:38 pm
Zachary,
I'll offer a situation for your "ultimate" comeback grand slam.
a) The team hitting it completed an 8-run comeback, from 12-5 to 13-12 win, in the bottom of the 9th.
b) The hitter was a below-average infielder more known for his glove.
c) The pitcher was a three-time all-star and former Cy Young award winner.
d) There were two outs and an 0-2 count.
August 29, 1986
August 15th, 2011 at 1:45 pm
@10, Ryan -- Good find. Oddly, there was another 13-12 game that same day, in which the Yankees overcame a 7-run deficit, with the game-winning hit coming from a no-name backup catcher (Juan Espino) getting his next-to-last career hit and RBI. That was also the only 2-HR game in the career of Seattle backup catcher Bob Kearney.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SEA/SEA198608290.shtml
August 15th, 2011 at 1:51 pm
@7, Ken -- Play Index subscription info is here:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/blog/archives/10464
I'm not sure how much tutorial info is available, but the blog gang will be happy to assist you with specific questions.
August 15th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
#5, KT, The most amazing thing about that A's game was Dick Green batting clean-up. Wow! I'm 55 and I remember him as a key part of the 73-74 A's "system" of Green, PH, Kubiak, PH, Maxvill, PH, etc. at second base. What a great glove, though.....
August 15th, 2011 at 4:37 pm
Nice catch, Steven! Green had a .179 average and .439 OPS in 13 career games started batting cleanup. Eleven of those starts came in 1966. I guess management learned all it needed to know about that particular experiment in 1966.
August 15th, 2011 at 8:00 pm
@9, Johnathan.
Another huge grand slam was this year, Blue Jays at Indians.
Indians entered the home 9th down 4-0. Travis Hafner hit the one-out grand slam to win 5-4, and pick up a 0.81 WPA on the play.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CLE/CLE201107070.shtml
August 15th, 2011 at 8:27 pm
@8, Zachary
Re: Cycle with Walk Instead of Single
How about a cycle PLUS a walk. Since 1919, there have been 38 such games. Last one was this game:
- Gary Mathews, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/DET/DET200609130.shtml
In these two games, the batter had a cycle plus 2 walks.
- Joe Gordon, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS194009080.shtml
- Mickey Cochrane, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA193308020.shtml
In this game, a cycle, a walk, plus another HR.
- Yaz, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS196505140.shtml
August 15th, 2011 at 8:32 pm
@16.
Actually, a couple more of cycle + walk + extra HR
- George Brett, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/KCA/KCA197905280.shtml
- Joe DiMaggio, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA193707090.shtml
August 15th, 2011 at 9:08 pm
Tim Stoddard pitched in two of the games linked to in this thread (August 29, 1986, Yankees comeback game and May 28, 1979, George Brett game).
August 15th, 2011 at 10:22 pm
This is a resubmit of a post (preceding 16 above) which for some reason has been removed for "moderation". A mystery to me. Anyway, here goes with some different words.
Regarding Zachary @8, and cycles and walks, there have been 38 cycles since 1919 where the hitter also picked up a walk, most recently in 2006:
- Gary Mathews, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/DET/DET200609130.shtml
Games with a cycle plus 2 walks:
- Joe Gordon, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS194009080.shtml
- Mickey Cochrane, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA193308020.shtml
Games with a cycle, walk, plus an extra HR:
- George Brett, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/KCA/KCA197905280.shtml
- Carl Yastrzemski, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS196505140.shtml
- Joe DiMaggio, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA193707090.shtml
August 15th, 2011 at 10:26 pm
Now, I'm really baffled.
The repost @19 is also "awaiting moderation". And, the original post, which had been removed, is now back, but again "awaiting moderation".
Anyone have any idea what the offending part(s) are?
August 15th, 2011 at 10:50 pm
Thank you Jonathan, Ryan, John, and Doug for your help. Since no one game fit my criteria exactly, we will have to appreciate each one for the unique circumstances present. Maybe I went a little overboard with the full count requirement; as long as there were two outs / two strikes, that would accentuate the drama enough, knowing you're one strike away from losing! 0-2 would probably be more dramatic than 3-2, anyway. I have a Pirates friend that will love getting the Clemente game stats. Thank you for all the info!
August 15th, 2011 at 11:34 pm
Doug, re: comments awaiting moderation -- A comment is automatically flagged if it contains a certain number of links (though I don't know the exact number). I haven't been online for a while, so was unable to approve your comments until now. They should show up shortly.