Dan Quisenberry was signed as an undrafted free agent on this day 40 years ago.  That's half of lifetime ago for a guy turning 80 today.  Dan played collegiately at the University of LaVerne near Los Angeles.  Not many famous alums from this school.  That's some good scouting.

Quisenberry played for 12 seasons, leading the league in saves five times in a six-year period.  In all five of those seasons he finished in the top-five in the Cy Young Award Voting, twice being runner-up.

As a long-time AL pitcher he did get seven at-bats in the NL.  He recorded one single, one walk and one RBI.  Some day I'll need to check to see if he drove in the run with the hit or the walk.  I can't picture him swinging the bat, so my money is on the walk.  Maybe intentional?  Nah!

I Can't Stop Thinking About Guys Refusing to Take a Walk - Let's Try This Again - More Kellogg's Cards Please!

So, I should really look at the databases that track pitch counts, but the one I use only looks at season totals.  Sometimes I look at particular box scores to add to the story.  Remember, I'm only looking at statistics from 1969-1982 which would be the seasons that helped decide players for the next set.  Many of the players had careers before, after or both before and after these dates.

1.  Phil Niekro's 15 walks in 14 years equates to only 1350 feet.  That's 450 yards, only a long par-4.  Barry Bonds' season total worked out to 6960 yards, which is a challenging 18-hole course.

2.  Steve Carlton 32 walks in 14 years is only 960 yards.  That's about the distance I ran home from school for lunch in the days when we left the building from 12:00 - 1:00 for lunch if we wanted to do so.

3.  Gary Templeton total from the Kellogg's era comes out to just over 2 miles.  My friend and I would walk that far to White Hen Pantry when we heard that they had the first shipment of baseball cards each year.  We could rarely come up with $3.78 to buy an entire box, but I'd usually get 5-10 packs.

4.   Mario Guerrero didn't fare much better.  His 84 walks totaled about 1.4 miles.  I walked that far to the school bus every day in high school.

For individual seasons here are the bottom three walkers for players with at least 400 at-bats in a season from 1969 -1982.

1. Ken Reitz somehow got only nine walks in 426 offiical at-bats in 1973.  That's only 270 yards all season.  It was dry out today at the golf range and I hit a ball that might have rolled to 270 yards.  Did I mention that we always hit downhill?    

2.  Mickey Rivers had 266 walks in 15 years, just 34 more than Bonds had in a season.  That's 4.5 miles which sounds good, but that's about how far a caddy walks in one round of golf.  Your mileage may vary, especially if your golfer can't hit the ball straight.  My caddying experience for someone who appeared on a Kellogg's card is a story for another day.  

3. In 1980 Wayne Nordhagen received only 10 walks.  I walked further than that to just get to the first house on my paper route. No, not recently.  When I was 11.  I was still doing the route when this card came out of a cereal box.    

Which Kellogg's Baseball Card Set is Pictured Most Frequently in My Posts?

It is my plan to picture every Kellogg's baseball card and related item at some point.  I haven't been following any pattern so I thought I'd start keeping track of this.  Since I actually got to Mario Guerrero already I'd like to see how I'm doing.

This is my 85th post.  For the first 84 posts here are some statistics.

Here is a count of how many times cards from each set have been listed.  This is skewed because I've shown the All-Time Greats many times and when I show two Gehrig cards I count it twice.  Why?  I'm too lazy to trim the picture and I like the way the cards look together.

I didn't include the sheet of 108 cards from 1973 that is pictured and is currently the background for the blog.  I also didn't include the cards pictured in the blog title.

1970 - 31
1971 - 21
1972 - 18
1973 - 18
1974 - 8
1975 - 13
1976 - 6
1977 - 13
1978 - 17
1979 - 15
1980 - 7
1981 - 38
1982 - 18
1983 - 16


1968 Topps 3D - 3
1970 Iron-ons - 4
1972 ATG - 24
1991 Legends - 3
1991 All-Star - 1
1992 All-Star 0
1993 Clemente - 3

The 1974 set was the first one I completed by fighting my brothers for the box of Frosted Flakes.   The 1976 set has always been a favorite of mine.  Neither of these two appear frequently.  I will certainly make some changes to that.

Even though the 1981 set is not worth much I really like it.  It has great player selection.

I guess I should put a picture into this post even though it won't count in the statistics above.

There's an easy solution from an earlier post.  No counting issues now.

Players Who Didn't Walk Their Way onto a Kellogg's Baseball Card

Unlike yesterday, today I am looking at players who refused (or couldn't manage) to take a walk but managed to get on a Kellogg's baseball card.  From 1969 - 1982 here are the top two pitchers and hitters based on at-bats per each walk.  I limited this list to players with at least 1,000 at-bats during the 14 years studied.

1.  Phil Niekro got only 15 walks during this time while having 1,319 offiicial at-bats.  That's a walk every 89 at-bats.  Even if he got 4 at-bats per game he'd get a walk about every 22 starts or two per season.

2.  Steve Carlton fared a bit better getting 32 walks in the 14 years analyzed.  That's a walk every 42 at-bats or every 11 starts.

It's understandable that pitchers wouldn't get many walks.  The next players on the list are position players.

3.  Gary Templeton didn't get walked either.  He went nearly 31 at-bats per walk during these years.   I think he was a lead-off hitter sometimes.  That's not good for on-base percentage stats.  To honor his impatience at the plate, I took the first card of him I could find instead of looking for an uncracked one.

4.   Mario Guerrero didn't fare much better.  He was walked about once every 28 at-bats.

For individual seasons here are the bottom three walkers for players with at least 400 at-bats in a season from 1969 -1982.  Keep in mind that Barry Bonds has the record with 232 walks in a season, the most walks for a batter in a game is six and some players have gotten seven consecutive walks.


1. Ken Reitz somehow got only nine walks in 426 offiical at-bats in 1973.  That's a walk every 48 at-bats.  His career high was 25, which would be less than one month for Barry Bonds.  Pitcher Steve Carlton fared better than Reitz.  

2.  Mickey Rivers had 266 walks, just 34 more than Bonds.  Did I mention that Rivers accumulated these during 15 MLB seasons?  For a guy who led the league in stolen bases with 70 in 1975 I'd think someone would tell him to get on base more often by walking.  In 1976 he walked only 13 times while having 590 official at-bats.  That's a walk every 46 at-bats.  


"Why is this guy so blurry?"  I like the blurry photo for a guy who certainly wasn't standing still at home plat much.  I'll probably use some of his well-known quotes in a future post.

3. In 1980 Wayne Nordhagen received only 10 walks.  This certainly didn't help him in the stolen base department.  For a guy born in Thief River Falls, Minnesota he only stole one base in his career.  More on how he got a Kellogg's card in a future post.
 

There have been 44 players named walk, walker or walkup in MLB history up to 2014.  None got a kelloggs card.  Bob Walk started by winning 11 games in 1980, so he was a bit late

Luke Walker won 15 games in 1970, but he was a Pirate and the 1971 set already had 5 pirates.  He also only started 19 games while pitching in 42 so he probably won lots of game in relief.  There is no love for relief pitchers in Kellogg's card sets.  I will look at that in a future post.

Fifty Years Ago Today the First American Walks in Space. What Did He Have for Breakfast?

I have no idea what he had for breakfast, but it was a few years too late to get a Post cereal card and a few years too early to get a Kellogg's baseball card.   I'm glad that Kellogg's switched to putting cards inside the box instead of on the back of the box like Post did.

The astronaut walked less than 25 feet.  In baseball, there is a lot of walking around, but it is certainly more than 25 feet.  To honor this event I will check out the MLB leaders in walks along with a usual Kellogg's card twist.

Barry Bonds is the career leader in walks.  Why?  They built a short right field for him and he used some great "supplements".  Barry walked over 20% of the time.  His total was over 1,400 more than his father Bobby had.  Intentional walks weren't tracked in earlier years, but Bonds has almost 400 more than the next player on the list, Hank Aaron.

Rickey Henderson was second.  That's more amazing since he was a lead-off batter as well as the career leader in stolen bases.

Babe Ruth was third because..................................he was Babe Ruth of course.  Even though he batted behind Ruth for most of his career, Lou Gehrig amassed over 1,500 walks.

Ted Williams was next with an amazing number of walks.  It was a surprise for me to find out that Williams walk to At-Bat ratio of 20.8% was higher than Bonds' number.  That certainly hurt his other career statistics other than OBP.  Williams didn't end up in the 1972 Kellogg's All-Time Greats set - that's too bad.

A few others who are in the top ten in walks appeared on Kellogg's cards.

Joe Morgan is fifth on the list.



Carl Yastrzemski is sixth on the list.



Pete Rose is 14th.

Harmon Killebrew is 15th.



From 1969 - 1982 when Kellogg' was deciding who to include in future card sets the top three includes Morgan (1st), Yastrzemski (2nd) and Ken Singleton (3rd).  Once again I'm surprised that Singleton shows up on a list.  He had a much better career than I remember.

The most walks in a season during the Kellogg's era (1969 - 1982) was 148 by Jimmy Wynn.  The most walks in any season is a ridiculous 232 by Barry Bonds.


Soon I will check out those players who refused to take a walk.

Jose Can You See? Did This Really Happen?

Jose Cardenal was quite a quirky player for the Cubs.  The cameras would show him eating whatever kind of berries that were growing on the Wrigley Field ivy.  I liked Jose because there was never a regular, boring day with him around.  Baseball teams need someone like that.

He's known for his odd behavior and even more unique reasons for missing games.  He was too tired to play one day after claiming crickets kept him awake all night.  Another time he claimed that his eyelid was stuck open preventing him from blinking - and playing.

In those days, reporters weren't likely to investigate some of these claims further.  The reporters were less likely to try to bust the athletes and their odd/bogus claims.  I have a good story about Shawon Dunston's season-ending injury, but since he doesn't have a Kellogg's card that will have to wait until I have a similar story.

Today I Will Start My Training/Healthy Eating Streak - I don't Plan to Go 2,130 Days. Can I Make it Until the National?

Ninety years ago today, Lou Gehrig began his consecutive game streak.  He pinch hit in the game.    His consecutive game streak was the record until Cal Ripken passed him.  

As you can tell from my posts, Lou Gehrig is among my favorite players.  The Pride of the Yankees is such an inspirational movie.   One of my wife's relatives died from ALS.  It was sad to see the physical changes that she endured as a result of ALS.

My goal is to get my health on better track.  I am going to make it a goal to get that accomplished in two months - that's when the National card show will be in Chicago.  I hope to find some unique Kellogg's items at that show.