Second Chance

As you've probably figured out by now, I am all about odd occurrences in sports.  These abnormalities are what makes sports, more specifically, sports statistics interesting.  Los Angeles Angels pitcher C.J. Wilson started tonight...against his former team the Texas Rangers...for a second consecutive day.  As most baseball fans know, in today's game, pitchers start once every five games, generally breaking down to once every six days.  A full season consists of 33-36 games started.  Pitch counts rarely go beyond 110 pitches in a game.  Therefore, it becomes quite obvious that starting in two consecutive games for a pitcher is quite rare.

To be fair, it wasn't as if Wilson threw many innings both days.  In fact, he only pitched one third of an inning yesterday, albeit it with poor results.  After striking out Rangers lead off hitter Ian Kinsler, he gave up three singles in a row to Elvis Andrus, Josh Hamilton, and Adrian Beltre (allowing one run to score), then walked Michael Young to lead the bases before the game was suspended for rain.  When the game restarted, Jerome  Williams was put into pitch.  The Rangers could score five more runs in the first inning, four of them earned for Wilson.

Given that Wilson had only thrown 22 pitches in his fraction of an inning, the Angels decided to use him for a second straight day this afternoon.  Wilson would throw 93 more pitches today over 5.2 innings, giving up only two runs.  Not a bad day.  Certainly not an impressive record, but definitely a rarity.

Only 102 times since 1957 has a pitcher started a game on zero days rest as was the case today with Wilson.  The vast majority of those occur when a player pitches a relief inning, and then starts the next day.  Quite a few of those relief appearances occurred in games that were long in extra innings the night before, usually leaving no pitchers left.  The media was quick to jump on Wilson being the first pitcher to do this since Aaron Myette in 2002.  While it is true that Myette started in two consecutive games for the Texas Rangers, this is kinda a stretch.  Not only did Myette not complete an inning in his first start, he didn't even complete a batter.  After only two pitches to Baltimore Orioles lead off hitter Melvin Mora, he was ejected and replaced by Todd Van Poppel.  Myette would start the following day for the Rangers going only three innings while giving up five runs.

The last time a pitcher started consecutive games, and stuck around to face more than a batter was more than thirty two years ago in 1980.  Oakland Athletics pitcher Steve McCatty record two outs to start the game against the Seattle Mariners, but then loaded the bases, only to escape the first inning with a line drive out.  In the second inning, he wouldn't be so lucky.  Again he loaded the bases while recording the first two outs of the inning, but then gave up two hits scoring four runs.  A wild pitch to the next batter scored another, followed by allowing another hit.  He would be pulled before the second inning was over.

One day later, McCatty was again given the start for the A's, and this time threw eight shutout innings before allowing three runs in the ninth to the M's.  The A's won 12-3 on the day, and McCatty went 8.1 innings.