One True Outcome: February 16

Two things are certain for the foreseeable future: you’ll get your weekly segment of baseball trivia and your weekly discouraging news regarding the baseball lockout and the impending spring training delay.

For the time being, I wanna believe that with everything at stake, a resolution will come sooner rather than later. However, it’s a challenge for the players to force meaningful change in the current setting, but here’s to hoping.

Let’s get into it.

1. Dennis Eckersley is the only pitcher in baseball history with at least 100 saves and also 100 complete games. However, there is more than one pitcher with at least 100 starts and also 100 or more saves. How many exactly?

• (A) Two
• (B) Three
• (C) Four
• (D) Five
• (E) Six

2. If you look at the top 10 of hits allowed in the history of the sport, you’ll see some great names. Any pitcher with enough innings to be on that list was certainly great enough, otherwise, he wouldn’t have been in that position to allow so many hits. However, there is only one out of the ten with more hits allowed than innings pitched. Who is he?

Side note: All five pitchers are in the top 10 for hits allowed.

• (A) Phil Niekro
• (B) Pete Alexander
• (C) Steve Carlton
• (D) Kid Nichols
• (E) Eppa Rixey

3. There are four active pitchers with double-digit balks, but only one with at least 20. That same pitcher is currently closing in on 100 wild pitches and holds the lead in that category as well. Who is this pitcher?

• (A) Justin Verlander
• (B) Zack Greinke
• (C) Johnny Cueto
• (D) Sonny Gray
• (E) Clayton Kershaw

4. In last week’s trivia, we learned that Joc Pederson is the only active player who’s been caught stealing at least 20 times and has fewer stolen bases than caught stealing. Looking at the 2021 season, who was the player with the most caught stealing that had a SB/CS worse than 1 with 8 SB and 9 CS?

• (A) Andrew Benintendi
• (B) Ben Gamel
• (C) Joey Wendle
• (D) J.P. Crawford
• (E) Juan Soto

5. Vladimir Guerrero had an outstanding season in which he hit 48 home runs and struck out a mere 110 times. How many hitters hit at least 30 home runs and struck out fewer than 100 times?

• (A) None
• (B) One
• (C) Two
• (D) Three
• (E) Four

Answers

1. (C) Four. The pitchers with at least 100 saves/holds and 100 or more starts are:

• Dennis Eckersley 361 GS - 390 SV
• Tom Gordon 208 GS - 158 SV
• John Smoltz 481 GS - 154 SV
• Ellis Kinder 122 GS - 104 SV

2. (E) Eppa Rixey. The Hall of Fame southpaw allowed 4633 hits in 4494.2 Innings pitched.

3. (E) Clayton Kershaw. Many know Kershaw as the walk allergic hurler of his prime, but before the slider came into play, Kersh struggled to throw strikes and he always had a borderline great pickoff move which could be called a balk. He leads active pitchers with 21 balks and 97 wild pitches.

4. (A) Andrew Benintendi. The Royals outfielder stole 8 bags and was caught stealing 9 times.

5. (E) Four. Two of them actually played together. Here are the numbers

• José Ramirez 36 HR - 87 SO
• Nolan Arenado 34 HR - 96 SO
• José Altuve 31 HR - 91 SO
• Kyle Tucker 30 HR - 90 SO