Niccolò Badii

• Bats Right, Throws Right

• Born December 5, 1978

BR register page

Biographical Information

Niccolò Badii has pitched in Serie A1 and for the Italian national team.

He debuted with Grosseto in 1997, going 1-2 with a 13.50 ERA. He was 2-0 with a 5.68 ERA in 1998. In 1999, he had a 1-2, 3.64 record in the regular season and 1-0, 1.29 in the semifinals. He was 3-2 with a 6.54 ERA during 2000 and was 0-1, allowing one unearned run in two innings, in the semifinals. The next season, he went 3-2 with a 4.55 ERA and was again 0-1 in the semifinals, giving up 8 runs (6 earned) in 3 innings.

In 2002, the 23-year-old hurler became a strong closer at 4-1 with six saves and a 2.15 ERA (three shutout innings in the semifinals). He tied Henry Santiago for third in saves, two behind leader Ilo Bartolucci. That earned him a spot on Italy's squad for the 2002 Intercontinental Cup. He was a bright spot in their 14-4 loss to Taiwan. Relieving Mattia Salsi in the 5th with two outs, he retired all seven batters he faced, three by strikeout. He got Chao-Hang Cheng, Cheng-Min Peng, Feng-An Tsai, Yu-Chieh Shen, Chien-Ming Chang, Chih-Kang Kao and Chia-Wei Chen, many of whom had strong careers. Fabio Mariani then took over. His other outing came against Mexico, replacing Bartolucci in the 8th with two outs and yielding two hits (including a Jesus Estrada homer) and one run in one inning, though he again struck out three. Salsi replaced him. Though he was 9th on Italy in IP, he was second in K (two behind Riccardo De Santis). Only Salsi and William Lucena had better ERAs in the tourney for the Italians.

Badii was not bad for Grosseto in 2003, either. He was 7-2 with 3 saves and a 3.84 ERA. He tied for 10th in wins and tied for 8th in saves. In the semifinals, he had a 3.52 ERA. In 2004, he was 1-1 with two saves and a 5.40 ERA in the regular season, had a 3.18 ERA in the semifinals and pitched seven innings (3 UER) in the 2004 Italian Series, as Grosseto beat Bologna for their first title in 15 years. He was 3-1 with two saves and a 3.75 ERA in 2005 then did not appear in Italy's top league again until 2011, when he allowed one run in one inning.

For his career, he had gone 26-15 with 19 saves and a 4.78 ERA in 172 games.

He later was the pitching coach for Grosseto.

Sources: Scorekeepers.org, Defunct IBAF site, BBC Grosseto