4-for-4 as a sub
Posted by Andy on August 27, 2008
Last night, Chris Coste pinch-hit in the 8th inning of the game for the Phillies, and stayed in to eventually get the game-winning hit in the bottom of the 13th. Overall, he went 4-for-4 despite not starting the game.
Nine guys have done exactly that since 1956:
Cnt Player Date Tm Opp GmReslt PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS BOr Positions +----+-----------------+-------------+---+----+-------+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+--+---+--+---+--+--+---+---+--+--+---+---------+ 1 Chris Coste 2008-08-26 PHI NYM W 8-7 4 4 0 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9th PH C 2 Shawn Wooten 2002-08-05 ANA @DET W 6-3 4 4 1 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th PH 1B 3 Randy Milligan 1991-06-23(2) BAL @KCR W 9-8 4 4 1 4 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4th PH DH 4 Paul O'Neill 1990-04-18 CIN SDP W 11-7 4 4 2 4 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6th PH RF 5 Rufino Linares 1982-04-13 ATL @CIN W 8-5 4 4 3 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3rd PR LF 6 Claudell Washingt 1979-07-04 CHW @CLE W 16-4 4 4 2 4 1 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2nd RF 7 Jay Johnstone 1970-04-12 CAL @KCR W 7-5 4 4 2 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5th CF 8 Felix Mantilla 1962-05-25 NYM @LAD L 8-17 4 4 1 4 1 1 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th SS 9 Matty Alou 1961-07-25 SFG @PIT W 16-7 5 4 1 4 1 0 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 3rd LF
I suspect that most of these performances happened as injury replacements, where the guy who got the 4-for-4 came into the game fairly early on to replace an injured player. I notice that #3, Randy Milligan, was not like that, however. Milligan pinch-hit in the 7th inning for Sam Horn, and the game went into extra innings, just like last night's Phillies-Mets game.
Here are all the games since 1956 where a sub got 4 or more hits:
Cnt Player Date Tm Opp GmReslt PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS BOr Positions +----+-----------------+-------------+---+----+-------+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+--+---+--+---+--+--+---+---+--+--+---+---------+ 1 Chris Coste 2008-08-26 PHI NYM W 8-7 4 4 0 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9th PH C 2 Quinton McCracken 2005-07-18 ARI FLA W 8-7 5 5 1 4 0 1 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 9th CF 3 Shawn Wooten 2002-08-05 ANA @DET W 6-3 4 4 1 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th PH 1B 4 Chad Fonville 1995-06-17 LAD @CHC W 12-5 5 5 1 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1st 2B 5 Randy Milligan 1991-06-23(2) BAL @KCR W 9-8 4 4 1 4 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4th PH DH 6 Paul O'Neill 1990-04-18 CIN SDP W 11-7 4 4 2 4 0 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6th PH RF 7 Kelly Gruber 1988-04-11 TOR NYY W 17-9 6 6 3 4 1 0 2 5 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6th 3B 8 Tom Paciorek 1984-05-08 CHW MIL W 7-6 10 9 1 5 0 0 0 3 1 1 3 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 6th LF 1B 9 Julio Gonzalez 1982-10-03 STL @CHC W 5-4 5 5 3 4 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1st 2B 10 Rufino Linares 1982-04-13 ATL @CIN W 8-5 4 4 3 4 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3rd PR LF 11 Jim Wohlford 1980-05-24 SFG @PIT W 10-9 6 6 1 4 2 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th PH LF 12 Claudell Washingt 1979-07-04 CHW @CLE W 16-4 4 4 2 4 1 0 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2nd RF 13 Jay Johnstone 1970-04-12 CAL @KCR W 7-5 4 4 2 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5th CF 14 Hawk Taylor 1964-06-20 NYM PHI W 7-3 5 5 2 4 0 0 2 4 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th C 15 Felix Mantilla 1962-05-25 NYM @LAD L 8-17 4 4 1 4 1 1 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7th SS 16 Matty Alou 1961-07-25 SFG @PIT W 16-7 5 4 1 4 1 0 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 3rd LF 17 Harry Simpson 1958-05-30(1) NYY WSH L 8-13 5 5 0 4 1 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1st PH RF
There are some really cool games in there.
August 27th, 2008 at 11:02 am
I think you were looking at the wrong columns...no one went 6-for-6 or 9-for-10.
I still think the best pinch-hitting performance was by Art Shamsky, who pinch-hit in the 8th inning and hit a HR in the 8th, 10th, and 11th. And, his team still lost!
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN196608120.shtml
August 27th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Eh, did you misread the column headings there? Tom Paciorek was 5-for-9, right? Still, 5 hits as a sub is nothing to be ashamed of!
August 27th, 2008 at 11:06 am
Andy,
I think you're misreading the AB column as H. It looks to me like there was only one player (Paciorek) who had more than four hits as a sub. It's no 9-for-10, but coming in the fourth inning of a 25 inning game and going 5-for-9 still qualifies as pretty cool in my book.
drewdez
August 27th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Other interesting things that happened in that game, which I'm not sure are something that could be searched for:
- two consecutive intentional walks (after Victorino triples to lead off the bottom of the 13th, the next two batters were walked);
- two starting pitchers used as pinch hitters by the same team (Hamels in the bottom of the 11th, Myers in the bottom of the 13th). I suspect this is very rare; it requires the team to burn through a lot of pinch hitters, which only happened because the Phillies starter, Moyer, was lifted early. Moyer never came to the plate, and the Phillies bullpen combined for ten innings of relief. "Hitter" is only technically true for Myers, though; he never swung at the ball.
The Phillies also had 23 players enter the game at some point. And Kendrick was warming up in the bottom of the 13th, to pitch in the 14th (which never came); that would have been 24. This would probably only be notable in games played with a 25-man roster; with the expanded September rosters it's a lot easier to run that number up.
August 28th, 2008 at 6:29 am
This is the third day this week that that 1984 25th inning game has come up for me.
Several days ago, i had Jay Bruce on my fantasy team, who got 4 K's, 1 CS, and 2 Errors. I looked up the history of 4+ K's and 1+ CS and found it was just the 22nd time since 1956 that that happened. I also noticed that Jeromy Burnitz was the only one to also have an error in such a game (so Bruce really did have one of the worst games ever). I noticed 2 players managed to get a homer in addition to the 4 K and 1 CS, which mostly are mutually exclusive events. One was Ben Oglivie in that 1984 game.
The next day on sportscenter they were talking about the suspended game with the White Sox and Orioles that was just completed from April. It was the last time the White Sox had a suspended game (not sure if at home or at all) since.......u guessed it: 1984 25th game.
That game had some pretty interesting stuff. For one, 3-3 after 9 innings, then both teams scored 3 in the 21st, then Harold Baines ended it with a homer in the 25th.