1st in class part 2
Yesterday's post regarding which players were the first to get hit by a pitch in each year's draft class probably left you asking the obvious question "Yeah, but who was the first pitcher from each draft year to hit Craig Biggio with a pitch?". Well sorry you had to wait a whole day for the answer. It must have nearly killed you, I'm sure.
The pitchers who have hit Craig Biggio with a pitch who came to the league through the Amateur Draft have been drafted over a span of 32 years, from 1971 when Frank Tanana was the 13th pick overall, to 2003 when Scott Feldman was picked in the 30th round. Biggio has been plunked by a pitcher from every draft class between 1981 and 2001. A first round pick became the first member of a draft class to plunk Biggio in only 8 of the 26 drafts which have had at least one pick go on to do so. Of those 8 1st round picks, only 1, Paul Wilson, was the #1 pick overall.
Biggio's draft class, 1987, took 5 years to plunk him for the first time - 6th round pick Frank Castillo hit him with a pitch on August 13, 1992. 10 other pitchers from the 1987 draft would help Castillo plunk Biggio a total of 16 times, 2nd most of any draft class. Those other 10 are Willie Banks, Brian Bohanon, Mark Guthrie, Pete Harnisch, Darryl Kile, Barry Manuel, Jaime Navarro, Mark Petkovsek, Steve Schrenk, and Anthony Telford. The 1993 draft has produced the most, with 23 total plunks by 16 pitchers.
First pitcher from each draft year to hit Craig Biggio with a pitch:
| Draft Year | Player | HBP:BGO date | Draft Round |
| 1971 | Frank Tanana | 06/04/1993 | 1 |
| 1974 | Mike LaCoss | 07/30/1989 | 3 |
| 1976 | Bob Walk | 05/19/1989 | 3 |
| 1979 | Jose DeLeon | 06/08/1993 | 3 |
| 1981 | Sid Fernandez | 07/18/1989 | 3 |
| 1982 | Tim Birtsas | 04/22/1989 | 2 |
| 1983 | John Costello | 09/01/1989 | 24 |
| 1984 | Barry Jones | 08/30/1991 | 3 |
| 1985 | Mark Gardner | 07/22/1990 | 8 |
| 1986 | Jim Bullinger | 07/26/1992 | 9 |
| 1987 | Frank Castillo | 08/13/1992 | 6 |
| 1988 | Kenny Greer | 07/15/1995 | 10 |
| 1989 | Steve Cooke | 07/23/1994 | 35 |
| 1990 | Donovan Osborne | 05/04/1995 | 1 |
| 1991 | Joey Hamilton | 08/11/1994 | 1 |
| 1992 | Juan Acevedo | 04/30/1995 | 14 |
| 1993 | Marc Valdes | 09/02/1995 | 1 |
| 1994 | Paul Wilson | 04/17/1996 | 1 |
| 1995 | Kerry Wood | 05/06/1998 | 1 |
| 1996 | Shawn Chacon | 06/07/2001 | 3 |
| 1997 | Rick Ankiel | 04/20/2001 | 2 |
| 1998 | Josh Fogg | 05/11/2002 | 3 |
| 1999 | Ben Sheets | 06/29/2001 | 1 |
| 2000 | Dontrelle Willis | 05/18/2004 | 8 |
| 2001 | Aaron Heilman | 08/06/2003 | 1 |
| 2003 | Scott Feldman | 07/02/2006 | 30 |
Number of pitchers to plunk Biggio from each draft class, and total plunks:
| Draft Year | Total plunks | Pitchers |
| 1971 | 1 | 1 |
| 1974 | 1 | 1 |
| 1976 | 1 | 1 |
| 1979 | 4 | 2 |
| 1981 | 4 | 4 |
| 1982 | 5 | 4 |
| 1983 | 6 | 4 |
| 1984 | 9 | 6 |
| 1985 | 11 | 5 |
| 1986 | 15 | 11 |
| 1987 | 16 | 11 |
| 1988 | 8 | 5 |
| 1989 | 7 | 7 |
| 1990 | 13 | 11 |
| 1991 | 15 | 10 |
| 1992 | 13 | 13 |
| 1993 | 23 | 16 |
| 1994 | 14 | 11 |
| 1995 | 12 | 9 |
| 1996 | 13 | 9 |
| 1997 | 5 | 5 |
| 1998 | 8 | 8 |
| 1999 | 6 | 4 |
| 2000 | 3 | 2 |
| 2001 | 2 | 2 |
| 2003 | 1 | 1 |
6 Comments:
The baseball needs to travel sixty feet, six inches in order to hit Craig Biggio, but, how far does Craig Biggio need to travel to get hit by a pitch?
Is there a correlation between the distance, from Houston, travelled to a visiting ballpark and the number of plunks recorded? Does Biggio get plunked more often in far away games or near away games?
Is there a range (in radial distance, in miles) from Houston in which Craig Biggio gets plunked most often?
If so, is there a major leage ballpark that falls within that range? If so, how many HBPs have been recorded at that ballpark (Biggio HBPs and/or league-wide, visiting team HBPs)?
If not, is there a major city (American or otherwise) that falls within this range? If so, do you support the possible creation, or reclocation of a major league franchise, and construction of a baseball stadium in that city, in order to increase the rate of CB HBPs, and therefore decrease the time it will take for Biggio to break the all time plunk record?
-t
apologies if the above comment appears more than once, blogger ate my first two tries. If I had to guess I imagine the result would put Biggio getting plunked most often somwhere in Ohio, though I would certainly support the creation of the Mexico City Matadors, if the data were to suggest it.
-t
...and, in answering the above questions, you can also address the question of why you don't use graphs and charts more often in communicating your analyses to an eager and mathematically literate populace.
pbr, don't listen to him. dm, words are more fun. Also, they provide great opportunity for statistical, and other, puns.
nice posts, tom. And one helluva good question. How far does BGO have to travel to get hit? What about the distance from the dugout to the batter's box? Are there differences between ballparks? This is probably not publicly available data, but assuming no significant differences in that distance, one could assume that while playing at home, he travels further to home plate from the home dugout, being a rightie and all.
281!!!
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