2 straight wins in Chicago

The Astros picked up another win in Chicago yesterday, 4-2, but the Craig Biggio did not contribute to the offense either by getting hit by pitches or getting hits. He did reach base on an error and score a run though, so I'm sure that website that's all about Craig Biggio reaching base on errors is very excited today (173!).

Biggio and the Astros will try to complete a sweep at Wrigley Field against Cubs starter Rich Hill. Rich Hill has only hit 3 batters ever, and they all played for red teams (Wily Mo Pena, and Royce Clayton of the Reds and David Eckstein of the Cardinals). We'll see if he can break out of the trend and plunk Craig Biggio today. But Biggio will need to break a streak of his own... he's never been plunked on April 11th. (He's never reached base on an error on April 11th either.)

hitting on the road

Craig Biggio hasn't had 2 doubles in a regular season games since September 27th 2004, and he had a total of two double last season from May 30th to the end of the season. But he had 2 doubles in yesterday's game and those doubles moved him into a tie with Honus Wagner on the all time Doubles list at 8th place with 640. Yeah - Honus Wagner - the guy who was one of the first five players inducted to the Hall of Fame with Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson. Next up on the doubles chart is Carl Yastrzemski at 646 and Nap Lajoie at 657. Lajoie hit more doubles than any right handed batter ever, and he should be able to hold that distinction for another few months. Aside from moving up lists, hopefully those 2 doubles are a sign that last year's struggles to hit baseballs on the road have been solved by Biggio.
Now we just need to see him get the get-hitting in gear...

Once again it was the Astros catcher - Humberto Quintero - who got plunked yesterday, and not Craig Biggio. Their other catcher, Brad Ausmus has been hit three times this year, and center fielder Chris Burke has been hit twice, so it appears that Biggio needs to go back to one of his former positions if he wants to pick up the pace toward that 288th record breaking HBP.

But maybe he can still get plunked while playing 2nd base if the Cubs send Jason Marquis to the mound today, as they're scheduled to do. Marquis plunked Biggio on May 29th for the Cardinals last season, as well as 15 other batters. But, he managed not to hit anybody in his only prior outing this season.

Shawn Chacon plunked Biggio on April 10, 2002 for the Rockies.

Lou

Aside from being for sale, the Chicago Cubs are under new management this year Lou Piniella running the team from the dugout. Teams managed by Piniella have hit a total of 997 batters to date, which makes him third among active managers, behind Tony Larussa (1,333) and Joe Torre (1,045). Larussa is actually 2nd all time for plunks thrown by teams he's managed, behind only Connie Mack (1,724). Of those 4, only Connie Mack did not watch from the dugout as one of his pitchers plunked Biggio, but he died in 1956, so that's understandable.

Among managers who have actually managed while Biggio has been in the league, Sparky Anderson's teams have hit the most batters (785) without plunking Biggio, but Anderson retire before Biggio ever played against his Tigers.

Piniella hasn't managed a team that plunked Biggio since the '92 Reds hit him twice. Piniella's teams have only plunked Biggio in two of the 57 games he's managed against Biggio, giving him a managerial plunk rate of just 0.035%. Terry Bevington holds the record in that category - his pitchers plunked Biggio in 2 out of 3 games he managed against Biggio. Current Astros' manager Phil Garner is actually 7th - overseeing 5 plunks for Milwaukee, for a total of 5 plunks in 23 games.

If Piniella's Cubs do plunk Biggio, he will be the 6th person to manage the Cubs when they plunked Biggio. That would move them into a tie for 2nd place with the Mets for most managers who have overseen a Biggio-plunking for the team. The Reds lead the way with 8 different managers. Jim Riggleman managed the Cubs for 8 of Biggio's HBPs, Don Baylor managed 4, Jim Lefebvre and Dusty Baker were there for 3 each, and Bruce Kimm could have pulled a Cubs pitcher after plunking Biggio once. But he didn't - he let Kyle Farnsworth pitch to Lance Berkman, who doubled, driving in Biggio and Vizcaino, but the Cubs still held on to win.

Road trip - North Coast

Craig Biggio spent the weekend not getting hit by pitches, but the Astros did get their first win of the season on Saturday, 5-1 over the Cardinals. And, he picked up 1 hit, leaving him just 6 short of 2,942.

The Astros head out on their first road trip of the season today, at Wrigley Field to write a new chapter in the baseball's long running North Coast/South Coast rivalry. Biggio collected two thirds of his HBPs away from Houston last season, and he's been hit at Wrigley 12 times, but not since June 1, 2004. That was also the last time he was plunked by the Cubs.

New Cub Ted Lilly will be throwing against the Astros tonight. He's never hit Craig Biggio with a pitch, but he has hit 34 batters, including 4 last season (Frank Thomas, Carl Crawford, Jonny Gomes, and current Astro Mark Loretta).

Biggio hasn't been hit by a pitch on April 9th in the last 10 years, but he was hit on this date in 1996, by Allen Watson, who was pitching for the Giants and is, like Ted Lilly, left handed.

2007 Preview: Chicago Cubs

Hey, the 2006 Cubs may have finished last in the National League, and completely failed to hit Craig Biggio with a pitch, but they hit more batters during day games than any team in the majors. 31 of their 67 plunks were thrown during day games. They hit Houston 9 times, which is as many plunks as they threw against any other team (tied with Pittsburgh), but none of those Astros they hit was Biggio.

The Cubs continued failure to plunk Biggio may have been the main reason for their acquisition of Jason Marquis, who threw plunk #277 on May 29, 2006. The Cubs haven't contributed to Biggio's plunk total since June 1, 2004, and no one on the Cubs roster has done it since Carlos Zambrano threw plunk 233 on August 21, 2003 and 222 on May 31, 2003. Their only other pitcher to hit Craig Biggio with a pitch is Kerry Wood, who did so on three occasions. Zambrano led the Cubs in hitting batters last year with 9, with Mark Prior behind him with 8 and Sean Marshall had 7. But the new guy, Jason Marquis hit 16 batters for the Cardinals last year.

The Cubs play Houston 15 times this year, but after three games in April (9th-11th), they don't play again until July 13th - the first game after the All Star break. If the Cubs are going to be the answer to a trivia question about Biggio's 288th plunk or his 3000th hit, they'll have to hope he hasn't passed both marks by then. The Cubs are 3rd all time in giving up hits to Biggio, with 255, but they're only 5th in hitting him with pitches (at 19, tied with the Giants).

The list of batters plunked by the Cubs in 2006 is as follows: Eliezer Alfonzo, Pedro Astacio, Willy Aybar, Jose Bautista, Jason Bay, Ron Belliard, Chris Burke (twice), Mike Cameron, Vinny Castilla, Jose Castillo, Alex Cintron, Royce Clayton, Roger Clemens, David Dellucci, Matt Diaz, Ryan Doumit (twice), Chris Duffy (three times), David Eckstein (twice), Edwin Encarnacion, Morgan Ensberg (twice), Prince Fielder (twice), Cliff Floyd, Ryan Freel (twice), Tony Graffanino, Shawn Green, Scott Hatteberg, Ryan Howard (twice), Orlando Hudson, Aubrey Huff, Tadahito Iguchi, Geoff Jenkins, Jason Lane, James Loney, Xavier Nady, Timo Perez, A.J. Pierzynski, Hanley Ramirez, Dave Roberts, Scott Rolen (twice), Olmedo Saenz, Alfonso Soriano, So Taguchi, Willy Taveras (twice), Chad Tracy, Troy Tulowitzki, Juan Uribe, Chase Utley, Shane Victorino, Daryle Ward, Rickie Weeks (twice), Josh Willingham (three times), Preston Wilson and Vance Wilson.

Astros travel to Milwaukee

Well, it may have seemed like a good idea to the Astros to agree to let the Cubs, whose pitching staff was exhausted, pick some random guy off the street to start the game. Just the Astros luck, the Cubs picked someone named Ryan O'Malley, and he shut out the Astros. Okay, they might have just called him up from triple-A.
Craig Biggio had a pinch hit single in the 8th inning, but he didn't have an opportunity to hit by any pitches.

Tonight the Astros will be guests at Miller Park in Milwaukee, where they will face one time offender Ben Sheets. Sheets commited his plunking of Craig Biggio on June 29, 2001. The Brewers haven't plunked Biggio since April 21st last season when Matt Wise hit him with the bases loaded.

Craig Biggio has been hit by a pitch three times on August 17th, but only by the Phillies. Wayne Gomes and Scott Ruffcorn both plunked Biggio on August 17, 1997 for the Phillies, and Randy Wolf did it on August 17, 2004.

In vaguely related news, Scott Feldman of the Rangers, who plunked Biggio on July 2nd , bounced a pitch off Adam Kennedy's butt in Arlington last night. Kennedy took offense to this (possibly because of the assorted plunks traded in the prior inning and prior game) and decided that instead of taking his base and giving his team a chance to put together a 2-out rally, he'd rather run toward the mound, exchange awkward arm swinging motions with Scott Feldman, and be tackled by a large number of men. This is a questionable choice for a number of reasons. It was Kennedy's 55th career HBP, and he was probably frustrated with his lack of progress toward the all time record, but that's still no reason to take it out on Scott Feldman.
Of course, when you get the Rangers and Angels together, you can spell "anger" twice.

Clemens plunked, nearing record.

Roger Clemens got hit by a pitch for the second time in his career last night, making it two consecutive years now that he's recorded an HBP. If he keeps up this one plunk per season pace, he could tie Hughie Jennings record by the year 2291, but there isn't much chance he'll still be pitching much beyond 2250. Craig Biggio did not get hit in last nights game, and he didn't play in the second game of the one game double header. It took 18 innings for the Astros to lose to the Cubs 8-6.

Despite pitching the 17th and 18th inning and picking up the win last night (or early this morning), Rich Hill is still expected to start this afternoon's game facing the Astros. Craig Biggio is not one of the 2 major league batters who Hill his plunked.
The only 2 pitchers on the Cubs roster who didn't pitch last night are Zambrano and Carlos Marmol, who started the previous two games. Perhaps today's game could be a good time to see a position player pitch given the 297 pitches the Cubs staff threw last night.

Seth Etherton hit Craig Biggio with a pitch on August 16, 2003.

Padres out, Cubs in

Craig Biggio only saw 14 pitches on Saturday, and none on Sunday in a pair of losses to the Padres, but tonight begins a 3 game series against the 49-68 Chicago Cubs. The Cubs are well out of the playoff race, so they might have nothing left to play for this season but their place in Biggio plunking history. But, even bad teams sometimes have good pitchers, and the Cubs will send Carlos Zambrano to face the Astros batters tonight. Zambrano is 12-5, accounting for nearly 25% of the Cubs wins this season. He has also hit 7 batters, and is sitting at 50 for his career. He plunked Craig Biggio on May 31, 2003 and August 12, 2003.

Craig Biggio has not yet recorded an HBP on August 14th.

out of Chicago, into New York

Craig Biggio didn't play yesterday, and not even a guy with 279 career HBPs can get hit by a pitch in a game he doesn't play. But even if he had played, he might not have gotten plunked, because Carlos Zambrano was throwing strikes. 10 Astros struck out against Zambrano, who held his opponents to just 2 hits and 1 run in 8 innings. The Cubs took the game 4-1.

Tonight the Astros will be traveling to New York to face the Mets, who hold the best record in the National League at 57-38. Orlando Hernandez is the Mets scheduled starter - he'll be looking to hit his 8th batter of the season and the 58th of his career. Hernandez has never hit Craig Biggio with a pitch.
The Mets don't have any pitchers on their roster named Mark, so if Biggio does get plunked today it will be his first on July 21st by a pitcher not named Mark. Mark Leiter plunked Biggio twice on July 21, 1995, and Mark Brownson plunked Biggio on July 21, 1998.

Wrigley finale

Craig Biggio took Greg Maddux's 2nd pitch of the game deep last night, for his 49th career leadoff homer, and the Astros never trailed in the game, winning 4-2. But, none of the 11 pitches Maddux threw Biggio that Biggio didn't hit out of the park became plunk #280. Neither team hit a batter in the game. Elias Sports Bureau has an interesting note on Biggio's success against Maddux in the espn writeup:

Craig Biggio's home run in the first inning was his 38th career hit off Greg Maddux. That's the most career hits by any active batter against any active major-league pitcher. The rest of the top five: Barry Bonds against Maddux (34), Bernie Williams against Jamie Moyer (34), Luis Gonzalez against Maddux (32), Garret Anderson against Moyer (31).

This afternoon the Astros play they're final game of the 2006 season at Wrigley field, facing starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano. Zambrano has hit Biggio with a pitch twice, on May 31, 2003 and August 12, 2003.
Zambrano has hit 7 batters this season, and sits at 50 hit batters for his career. Coincidentally, Biggio's only plunk on July 20th was the 50th of his career, thrown by Jose Bautista on July 20, 1995.

Cubs take first

Carlos Marmol threw a wild pitch, 6 walks, and was called for a balk night, but he didn't hit anybody with a pitch. The Astros bats didn't hit much either, scoring just 2 runs on 4 hits in the 4-2 loss.
Tonight, you may have heard, the pitching matchup will be Roger Clemens vs Greg Maddux. The pair have a combined record of 667 wins, 374 losses and 275 hit batters. Maddux could become the first 200 game loser in the majors since Charlie Hough lost his 200th on July 6, 1993, which was just 25 days before the first time Greg Maddux hit Craig Biggio with a pitch - July 31, 1993. Maddux also plunked Biggio June 12, 1994. Losses, by the way, are won of the few pitching categories which Maddux does not lead all pitchers who have hit Craig Biggio with a pitch. Frank Tanana holds that record among Biggio plunkers, with 236 losses. Maddux leads that group in wins, starts, shutouts, innings pitched, hits allowed, cy young awards in years he plunked Biggio, and strikeouts. Among active pitchers who have hit Biggio with a pitch, Maddux leads about everything, although Pedro Martinez has pulled into a tie in career HBPs at 125.
Craig Biggio has never been hit on July 19th, but tonight could be exactly the sort of game in which two veteran pitchers pull out all their tricks from the past, and maybe Maddux will remember those Cy Young winning years in '93 and '94 when he did things like hit Craig Biggio with a pitch. Maybe.

few plunks, few runs

The 2006 Chicago Cubs, tonight's opponent for the Astros, have been plunked a major league low 23 times. Perhaps not coincidentally, they have scored a major league low 376 runs. In the past 50 seasons, only 1 team has come in last in the majors in both plunks and runs scored (the '04 Diamondbacks) but the last place team in plunks has been in the bottom 10 in runs scored in 24 of those 50 seasons. The last place HBP team has been in the top 10 in only 11 of the past 50 seasons, with only the '94 Cleveland Indians managing to be last in plunks but first in runs. The Indians that year scored 679 runs, and this year's Cubs should finish close to that number, but Cleveland only played 113 games because of the work stoppage, and the Cubs will need the full 162 to score that many.

The Cubs and Astros have plunked each other 7 times this season, but only 1 of those plunks hit a Cub. During the span of Biggio's career, the Cubs have hit Houston batters 86 times now, while the Cubs have only been plunked by Houston 67 times. Houston's 5 plunk lead this year ties the biggest difference between the two teams in the Biggio years. In 2003 the Astros plunked 10 Cubs while only getting hit 5 times. In 2002 Houston took 11 plunkings from the Cubs, while striking bake only 6 times, and in 1997 the teams matched this years plunks to date with 6 for Astros batters and 1 for the Cubs. The Cubs have never before hit more than 4 Houston batters in a season with hitting Biggio, but this year they're up to 6. The Astros and Cubs have 6 games left to correct that issue, beginning tonight.

back to the North Coast

The Astros are back in action in Chicago tonight where the North Coast/South Coast baseball rivarlry will no doubt be rekindled, and where it's entirely possible that Craig Biggio will get hit by a pitch. Rookie Carlos Marmol will be on the mound for the Cubs tonight looking for his third career hit batter, and his first plunk of a team other than the Milwaukee Brewers. Marmol has hit a batter in 2 of his last 3 games, but one of them was Rickie Weeks, who not many pitchers have missed this year.

On July 18, 1989, Sid Fernandez threw what would become Craig Biggio's 4th career HBP. On July 18, 2001, Biggio was plunked in the first inning by Mike Mathews and in the 7th inning by Andy Benes. Biggio scored a run after both of those plunks, being driven in by a Jeff Bagwell single in the first inning and a Jeff Bagwell triple in the 7th. That triple completed the Cycle for Bagwell, having hit both a double and a homer in the 5th inning. That was the only game in Bagwell's career in which he hit for the cycle.

Astros look to sweep Cubs

Yesterday Craig Biggio played his 39th consecutive game against the Cubs without getting hit by a pitch, and the Astros won their 4th consecutive game, beating the Cubs 7-2. They'll be looking for their third straight 7-2 win, or a win by some other score, tonight against the Cubs rookie starter Sean Marshall. Marshall has hit 4 batters so far in his career, but has not hit Craig Biggio with a pitch. In his last outing he gave up 4 runs in 6 innings against the White Sox and plunked AJ Pierzynski, who is widely rumored to have deserved it.

Robert Ellis plunked Biggio on July 5, 2001, and Jeff Suppan hit Biggio with a pitch on July 5, 2003.

274 historical perspective

Before Saturday, the last time a major league player recorded his 274th hit-by-pitch was sometime during the 1901 season. Hughie Jennings would only record 1 more plunk that season while playing for the Phillies. In the seasons between 274th plunkings, there have been somewhere around 75,000 HBPs recorded by 14,386 batters (including Biggio and Jennings), and 6,907 pitchers. 138 batters have recorded 274 home runs in that span. 60 pitchers have given up 274 home runs in that period of time. 102 players have stolen 274 in those 104 seasons.
Between 1901 and the next time someone would be hit by 274 pitches, 2,784 people were born, played in the major leagues, and died. And, perhaps most amazingly, the Red Sox, Cubs and White Sox won the World Series 10 times.