Most IP Without Allowing an SB
Posted by Raphy on August 28, 2009
Since 1954 there have been only 7 seasons in which a pitcher has pitched 200 or more innings and not been victimized by a SB. Four of those seasons were turned in by Whitey Ford. This season, Joel Pineiro has a chance to complete the eighth such season and become only the fifth different pitcher (since 1954) accomplish this feat. Thus far, Piniero has pitched 170 2/3 innings without allowing a SB. The last player to steal when Piniero was on the mound was Hanley Ramirez last August 11. Here are the leader since 1954 in IP without allowing a SB:
Cnt Player **IP** SB Year Age Tm Lg G GS CG SHO GF W L W-L% SV H R ER BB SO ERA ERA+ HR BF AB 2B 3B IBB HBP SH SF GDP CS Pk BK WP BA OBP SLG OPS OPS+ Pit Str +----+-----------------+---------+---+----+---+---+--+---+---+--+---+--+--+--+-----+--+---+---+---+---+---+------+----+--+----+----+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+----+----+----+ 1 Whitey Ford 283 0 1961 32 NYY AL 39 39 11 3 0 25 4 .862 0 242 108 101 92 209 3.21 117 23 1159 1056 39 8 3 1 7 3 28 3 4 0 8 .229 .291 .347 .638 80 2 Luis Tiant 258.1 0 1968 27 CLE AL 34 32 19 9 0 21 9 .700 0 152 53 46 73 264 1.60 186 16 987 905 27 5 4 4 5 0 10 9 0 0 3 .168 .233 .262 .495 56 3 Whitey Ford 244.2 0 1964 35 NYY AL 39 36 12 8 2 17 6 .739 1 212 67 58 57 172 2.13 170 10 996 922 29 4 3 2 13 2 17 1 4 0 6 .230 .276 .303 .579 65 4 Bob Porterfield 244 0 1954 30 WSH AL 32 31 21 2 1 13 15 .464 0 249 104 90 77 82 3.32 108 14 1034 935 38 5 3 13 6 26 6 0 0 1 .266 .322 .363 .685 97 5 Whitey Ford 219.1 0 1958 29 NYY AL 30 29 15 7 1 14 7 .667 1 174 62 49 62 145 2.01 176 14 872 801 25 3 3 3 5 1 26 7 6 1 5 .217 .276 .308 .584 69 6 Kenny Rogers 210.2 0 2002 37 TEX AL 33 33 2 1 0 13 8 .619 0 212 101 90 70 107 3.84 124 21 892 812 46 5 1 6 3 1 27 1 1 1 5 .261 .324 .408 .732 89 3334 1987 7 Whitey Ford 204 0 1959 30 NYY AL 35 29 9 2 4 16 10 .615 1 194 82 69 89 114 3.04 119 13 877 776 19 5 5 1 9 3 27 3 3 1 5 .250 .327 .338 .665 91 8 Geoff Zahn 199.1 0 1984 38 CAL AL 28 27 9 5 1 13 10 .565 0 200 78 69 48 61 3.12 128 11 821 760 28 4 4 1 6 6 27 7 3 0 3 .263 .306 .354 .660 82 9 Billy Pierce 196.1 0 1960 33 CHW AL 32 30 8 1 1 14 7 .667 0 201 81 79 46 108 3.62 105 24 813 758 26 2 1 0 8 2 22 3 1 0 2 .265 .306 .400 .706 96 10 Carl Erskine 186.1 0 1956 29 BRO NL 31 28 8 1 2 13 11 .542 0 189 92 88 57 95 4.25 95 25 790 715 31 8 5 1 10 7 11 5 2 0 6 .264 .317 .435 .752 98 11 Chris Carpenter 182 0 2004 29 STL NL 28 28 1 0 0 15 5 .750 0 169 75 70 38 152 3.46 123 24 746 691 28 1 2 8 6 3 16 3 0 0 4 .245 .291 .392 .683 79 2694 1722 12 Jarrod Washburn 177.1 0 2005 30 LAA AL 29 29 1 1 0 8 8 .500 0 184 66 63 51 94 3.20 132 19 740 671 31 5 0 8 4 6 24 6 2 0 2 .274 .330 .420 .750 100 2713 1740 13 Don Rudolph 176.2 0 1962 30 TOT AL 38 23 6 2 9 8 10 .444 0 188 84 71 42 68 3.62 112 13 745 684 28 10 2 3 10 7 21 2 1 1 1 .275 .317 .402 .719 98 14 Joel Pineiro 170.2 0 2009 30 STL NL 25 25 3 2 0 13 9 .591 0 169 69 59 18 84 3.11 135 6 679 642 42 2 0 6 9 4 23 4 0 0 3 .263 .288 .363 .651 0 2334 1558
A couple of notes:
- Tiant's season is the (post 1954) record for most stolen base attempted against (9) without a successful steal.
- The (post 1954) record for consecutive starts without an opposing steal is 62 held by Ford and Terry Mulholland. Ford also had a streak of 61 games.
- Catchers obviously play a tremendous role in this stat. This season, the Cardinals have allowed the fewest SB in the majors by a wide margin.
August 28th, 2009 at 10:18 am
My first thought was Holy Cow. But then I remembered that stolen bases were out of fashion in Ford's day. The AL average in 1961 was .35 SB/G compared to .69 SB/G this year. That makes Rogers' performance in 2002 really stand out. It would be interesting to see this stat normalized for league and catcher factors.
August 28th, 2009 at 10:39 am
By '68 there was a decent amount of running. That combined with his being righty plus all the IP makes Tiant really stand out. Of course, Tiant was amazing in '68 and hardly let anyone on base in the first place. So ideally you'd also want to normalize it for stolen base opportunities. Pineiro already has about as many SB opps as Tiant.
August 28th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Pineiro really is having a special season, also allowing so few walks and home runs. He's also remade himself as a great ground ball pitcher this year after being more of a fly ball pitcher in the past.