Fascinating and Obscure Baseball Trivia, Part 3 Quiz

Answer: Bengie Molina

On September 26, 2008, Bengie Molina of the San Francisco Giants hit a fly ball that seemed to have hit the top of the wall at ATT Park (now called Oracle Park) in San Francisco. Molina stopped running at first base as the outfielder threw the ball back into the infield. Because Molina was a very slow runner, the Giants replaced him at first with a pinch runner, Omar Vizquel. Vizquel however told his manager that he was pretty sure he heard Molina's fly ball hit the metal roof above the wall, so manager Bruce Bochy requested that the umpires examine the play on replay.

The videotape revealed that the ball did hit the roof and they awarded Molina the home run. But since Molina was already removed from the game, the umps had Vizquel complete the home run trot, and was thusly awarded the run scored.

Answer: Joe Carter

Joe Carter drove in 105 runs in 1989 for the Cleveland Indians. After that season ended, he was traded to the San Diego Padres for three players, Sandy Alomar, Carlos Baerga, and Chris James. That next season, Carter drove in 115 runs for the Padres. Then in another high profile trade, he was sent to the Toronto Blue Jays with teammate Robby Alomar in exchange for Fred McGriff and Tony Fernandez. Carter kept up his streak that season and drove in 108 runs for Toronto.

Answer: Ty Cobb

Jose Valverde played in 626 games from 2003 to 2014 and had a career .500 batting average. Roberto Hernandez played in 978 games and had a career .500 BA. And then there's Brandon Lyon who played in 570 games from 2001 to 2013 and had an astounding 1.000 batting average!
Okay, now for the bad news: Hernandez, Valverde, and Lyon are all pitchers, and as such, although they played in a heck of a lot of games, they had precious few at bats, being pitchers and all.
In his career, Valverde has had 2 at-bats and had 1 hit. Roberto Hernandez played from 1991 to 2007, and in the 1997 he had 2 at-bats with 1 hit. Brandon Lyon was 1 for 1 in his career at the plate.

Answer: Don Larsen and Sal Maglie

Also, Mays, Mantle and Snider all played for teams in New York City during the 1950s. Pitcher Don Larsen was Mantle's teammate for five years from 1955 to 1959 on the Yankees, and was a teammate of Mays in 1964 with the San Francisco Giants. Duke Snider was on that same Giants team in the final year of his career. Sal Maglie, nicknamed "The Barber" played with Willie Mays on the NY Giants from 1951 to 1955, and was Snider's teammate on the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1956 and 1957.

In his last season Maglie played with Mantle on the Yankees in 1957 and 1958. Larsen was also on that team, linking all three together on one team.

Answer: Moose Skowron and Yogi Berra

Moose Skowron hit homers in Game 7 of the 1956 World Series, 1958 World Series and 1960 World Series. Yogi Berra hit two home runs in Game 7 of the 1956 World Series and one in the 1960 World Series.

Answer: Ferguson Jenkins

Ferguson Jenkins hit 24 RBIs and pitched 20 wins back in 1971. It's unlikely another pitcher will do this as they rarely ever get to bat anymore with the designated hitter rule. Babe Ruth won 23 games as a pitcher for the Red Sox in 1916 and 24 games the following season. But in neither of those seasons did he hit more than 20 home runs.

Answer: Tommie and Hank Aaron

Tommie played parts of seven seasons in the MLB, and always as a teammate of his brother Hammerin' Hank Aaron on the Atlanta Braves. In his career, Tommie only hit 13 home runs, much less than brother Hank who hit 755 homers. On July 12, 1962, the two brothers each hit a home run in the very same inning. It was the ninth inning, and it helped the Milwaukee Braves win 8-6 over the St. Louis Cardinals. But the two homers were given up by two different pitchers: Larry Jackson gave up the homer to Tommie and Lindy McDaniel gave up a homer to Henry.

The previous occasion on which two brothers hit homers in the same inning was when the brothers Lloyd Waner and Paul Waner did it in 1932. Tommie and Hank Aaron also homered in the same game on June 12, 1962, in a 15-2 win against the Los Angeles Dodgers, but the home runs were hit in two separate innings and against two different pitchers.

Answer: Sal Maglie

On October 8, 1956, in Game 5 of the World Series, Sal Maglie pitched a very impressive two-run, five-hit complete game when pitching for the Brooklyn Dodgers against the New York Yankees. But despite that great performance he had to take the loss, due to Larsen's perfect game. Early Wynn, and Bob Lemon were both pitchers for the Cleveland Indians, and Whitey Ford pitched for the Yankees, so those three players would not have been pitching against the Yankees, since those three are in the American League.

Answer: Joe Pignatano of the 1962 NY Mets

What other team could have been the source of this dubious distinction but the storied 1962 expansion team New York Mets with their record-breaking 120-loss season? Joe Pignatano was a catcher for the Mets that year having begun his career in 1957 with the Brooklyn Dodgers, moving with that team to Los Angeles and then playing for the Kansas City Athletics in 1961. He played for the San Francisco Giants in 1962 before going to the Mets. His career batting average was .234.

Answer: Walter Johnson

Nowadays, pitchers don't pitch nearly as many innings as they use to. One reason is the 5-6 man rotations as opposed to 4-man. And there are other reasons, but anyway, in the 1916 season, Walter Johnson pitched 369 2/3 innings without yielding a home run to a batter. And that was during the dead ball era! Here are some other pitchers who have pitched the most innings in a season without giving up a homer: Jack Coombs (353 innings in 1910); Bill James (332 innings in 1914); Ed Killian (331 2/3 innings in 1904); Babe Ruth 323 2/3 innings in 1916); Vic Willis (322 innings in 1906); Rube Vickers ( 317 innings in 1908); Ed Killian again (313 innings in 1905); Jack Taylor (311 1/3 innings in 1903, and 309 innings in 1905). Cy Young actually gave up a lot of home runs, relatively- 138 since 1900.