The Strat-O-Matic Notebook

Number Three

Outliers: Fourteen Triple Plays and a Lot of Stolen Bases!

Yep- you read right, my friend. Fourteen instant inning-killers of the three out variety were turned during this past season, which officialy marks the second highest total in major league history as far as I'm concerned. The Bitters were involved in the final two triple plays of the season, and they happened in back to back games. In the sixth inning of the final game of their series with the B's, game 137 for both teams, Gus Zernial lined out with runners at the corners, rolling the old "lo(2b)max." Catcher Clyde Klutz was on third and Carl Furillo was on first. B's second sacker Bobby Avila speared the liner by Zernial and fired to Gil McDougald at third, who then relayed to Hodges at first to complete the ultimate pitcher's best friend. Furillo, already furious at his clubs' inability to win enough games to remain in Division One, went into extreme livid mode, and was taken out of the game by skipper Arlie Latham. Same with Zernial, who was also frustrated that the Bitters were already down 6-1, and would go on to lose 11-4. More on this game later. Lets move on to game number 138 for the Bitters- the very next day! Rolling into Bluesville for their final three game series of the year, the Bitters lost no time in hitting into their second triple play in as many days. Top of the first...Randy Jackson singles and Clyde Klutz walks. Furillo lines it to Johnny Lipon at short who steps on second and fires to Hank Arft at first for one of the easiest tri-killings you'd ever want to turn. An exasperated Furillo played out the rest of the game, hitting a single in the ninth as part of a 4-1 loss. He sat out the remaining two games of the season. So, are fourteen triple plays in a single season realistic? Of course not. As mentioned in the previous notebook, there were a total of four in the bigs in all of 1951. Am I playing the game right? I think so. Pretty sure, though I could have implemented the optional super advanced rule to roll the d20 to see if the triple play actually happens or is reduced to a double play. I opted to go with the flow and see what happens, and what happened was a new 5Y record that will never be approached. But enough about triple plays! Let's go back to game 137.

In that very same game, just two innings after the triple play, Gil McDougald smacked his first home run of the season. McDougald if you will recall, made the second out of the triple play at third. Well, his home run completed the cycle for him on a day where he went 5 for 5.  McDougald doubled in the first, singled in the third, doubled again in the fifth, tripled in the sixth and jacked one out in the eighth. He scored five runs and drove in two. Talk about rare events! A triple play and a cycle both in the same game!! An ultra rare event!!

But fourteen triple plays in a season is an outlier. The only other outlier this season was the stolen base merry-go-round...

The Division Two stolen base leader was Phil Rizzuto, who swiped 17 bags in 97 games played. In 1951, the Scooter stole 18 in 144 games. I know- no big deal. The runner up to Rizzuto was Monte Irvin with 15 stolen bases in 95 games for the Spiders. In 1951, Irvin stole 12 bases in 151 games. Again, no big deal. But wait...here comes the fun part...The 5Y League record for stolen bases was 74, set by Tony Womack in 5YII. Womack stole 72 bases in real life in 1999. Jackie Robinson, Richie Ashburn and Sam Jethroe all shattered Womack's mark, as they ran the bases like Maury Wills going after Ty Cobb. Jackie and Richie were nearly unstoppable, stealing 97 and 96 respectively. Jethroe stole 86. In 1951, their actual SBs were 25, 29 and 35 (Jethroe led the league that year). What happened?? According to an APBA lineup sheet for 1951, Robinson batted cleanup, while Ashburn and Jethroe batted in the number two slot. In Retro 5YIV, all three led off for their respective teams. Unlike "Extra Innings," the game used in Womack's record setting season, Strat has no limit to how many times a stolen base can be attempted. Jethroe was rated AA for stolen bases, while Robinson and Ashburn were each given a rating of "A." Runners rated AA for stolen bases are successful on a d20 roll of 1-17, while A rated runners succeed on rolls of 1-15. The catcher's throwing rating comes into play, but each time one of these guys reached base, it was off to the races! It was not uncommon for Richie, Sam or Jackie to steal three, four bases a game, especially Jackie and Richie, who finished one-two in the batting race and were on base all the time. There is a "hold" option in Strat, which I chose not to use, simply because it drastically reduced the chances of stealing a base. Again I ask the question, was I playing the game correctly? This time the answer could be "maybe not." I tried using the 'Hold' option in the early going of the season, but couldn't see the benefit of having Jackie Robinson using his "A" rating to steal, when his chances of stealing a base were cut by more than half depending on the hold ratings of the pitcher, along with a few other adjustments that had to be made, so I nixed the 'Hold' option and let things run their course, so to speak!

Now, if the 'Hold" feature was part of the regular advanced rules, things would have ended very different. Probably only Jethroe would be given the steal sign. Thing is, you gotta be on base in order to attempt a steal, and though Jethroe was on base frequently (he hit .285 with 164 hits and 50 walks), he didn't get on nearly as much as his compadres Robinson and Ashburn. I could see how using the 'Hold' feature as a rule instead of an option would give more realistic stolen base totals, but since it was optional, it was not used.

Bottom line: Outliers will be outliers. The official 5Y League record for triple plays in a season is now 14, and the single season record for stolen bases is 97.