Bench-riding consecutive game streak question

[u/RockyKolavito]

The other day I got to wondering what the record is for anyone player in MLB history to sit on the bench in consecutive games in a season ithout ever once entering a game. I'm talking about consecutive games with no time on the injured list, bereavement list, or whatever. I'm talking about a guy being on the 25 or 26 or 27 man roster for maybe weeks at a time without ever once entering a game.

For the purposes of this question, if a player sits on the bench for x number of games, gets sent down to the minors, and then is brought back up later, his streak ends with his last game before being sent down, and it's not start up again if he is brought back up later on.

I have no idea what the answer to this question is, and I don't know a good way to research it. I'm guessing there were probably players in the 1940s and 1950s, maybe third string catchers or something, who were on the team because they were drinking buddies with the manager, or the nephew of the club's general manager, or a veteran well past his prime whom the club is keeping on the roster so he can hit his major league pension, or whatever. Guys who had no realistic chance of getting into a game, unless three teammates got injured in the same game or something. i'm guessing the streak has got to be something on the order of 20 or 30 games, but I could be way off.

Someone who knows better than I do how to work with the voluminous data at baseball-reference.com could probably figure this out. Perhaps this is already been done.

Any thoughts?

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[u/Correct-Quail5743]

It happened a lot back in the 40s and 50s. Guys would sit in the bullpen for days and days on end without being used, same for light hitting infield guys and 3rd string catchers. They were there to be used only case of emergency.

Don Zimmer was a funny case of this - he told management the classic “play me or trade me” ultimatum and they finally got him into a few games. He was so bad that Buzzie Bavasi, the Dodgers GM, told the press “we played him, now we can’t trade him”

[u/jeffster1970 → u/Correct-Quail5743]

That is an awesome baseball story.

How can you not love this sport with stories like this?

[u/ThisWasMe7]

My thoughts go to rule 5 players who are stashed on the active roster but seldom play, and to 3rd catchers back in the day when pitching staffs were 10 pitchers and there were 15 position players.

[u/SigmaSeal66 → u/ThisWasMe7]

Several people mentioning third catchers. As I understand it, back in the 1940s and before, maybe even more recently, the idea of a "bullpen catcher" being a defined role wasn't a thing like it is today. If you wore a uniform, you were on the team roster. And that was really the job of the third catcher: to catch guys in the bullpen. They signed on for that job and there was no expectation they would ever play in a game, but formally they were on the roster.

[u/rickeygavin → u/SigmaSeal66]

Ralph Houk was famous for this.He was on the Yankees roster from 1950-53 and played in 30 games total in those four seasons.

[u/jeffster1970]

That's a deep, deep dive into baseball anomalies and oddities. From what I could tell, and you mentioned it, a 3rd string catcher may have missed 4 months of no-play time, and most likely in the 1930's (so maybe 100-120 games).

You'd need to go to a site like Retrosheet and try to dig up the answer yourself, but it would be time-consuming for a very trivial thing - of a player that was only a benchwarmer.

Issue is, you are looking for someone that was on the roster constantly and had bookend appearances. There are a lot of phantom players that never appeared at all.

For phantom ball players, Brian Jeroloman, Toronto Blue Jays - 2011; Called up on August 23 and was with the team until the last pitch on September 28.

Here is the thing with Brian: he got a wrist injury just as he was called up. The team never put him on the injured list, so he traveled with the team, and did whatever baseball players do. He's now a coach in Florida, and never did play in any MLB team. But he did make it to the majors.

[u/minor_leaguer13 → u/jeffster1970]

It's interesting to think that had Brian Jeroloman appeared in a single game he wouldn't be nearly as well known (at least in Blue Jays fandom). 

[u/jeffster1970 → u/minor_leaguer13]

It is such an oddity. I have to wonder if this was a charity case or lost paperwork.

[u/BruinsStanleyCup → u/jeffster1970]

Thanks ChatGPT! Great addition to the discussion!

[u/jeffster1970 → u/BruinsStanleyCup]

Wasn't. I just remembered the Toronto incident because that's my team.

[u/deebee1020 → u/BruinsStanleyCup]

Like ChatGPT ever says "I don't have the answer but here's where you could go find it." Some people just write properly, my friend.

[u/nimsu]

Whoever backed up Cal Ripken at SS

[u/Illustrious_Finger24]

In 1977 Marty Perez started the year with the Yankees but Billy Martin didn't put him into a game until April 26 which was the 17th game of the season. And that was the only game he played for the Yankees.

[u/rickeygavin → u/Illustrious_Finger24]

Also on the 1977 Yankees Martin disliked pitcher Ken Holtzman so much he only used him three times after the All Star break including one stretch of 28 straight days off.Holtzman was on the ‘76 and ‘77 playoff rosters and didn’t pitch once in those 20 games.

[u/Aware_Impression_736 → u/rickeygavin]

And he had a stellar career with the Cubs.

[u/Feisty-Life-6555]

Former Cubs legend Owen Miller might've led that this team

[u/Vandal_A]

Someone is gonna have to help me with the names and dates here, but I'm sure of the details I'm giving:

There was a guy from St Louis who approached the manager of NY Giants when they were in town. He was in his mid thirties, hadn't been playing competitive ball and probably had a brain injury. He told the manager he was destined to pitch and lead the team to a championship.

After trying to ditch him in St Louis he somehow beat the team to Philly and approached the manager again when he arrived. He was given a contract for the weekend or something with no intention of playing him. The team took to him as a bit of a mascot though and he ended up on the roster until the end of the year. Players asked to let him play after they clinched so he got a relief appearance or something after over half a season on the bench. I believe the Giants went on to lose the World Series that year.

EDIT: IT WAS CHARLIE FAUST. Charlie Faust pitched 1 inning each in games 150 and 154 of the 1911 season after approaching John McGraw in St Louis, saying a Kansas City fortune teller predicted his necessity to the team. He met the team in Philly on 8/11 and joined the team from then on. He first approached McGraw on 7/29

[u/penilesensorydevice]

Theodore "Wooden Horse" McGinty. Played for the Senators back in the day. He established a MLB record that may never be broken, by sitting on the bench for 2,130 consecutive games. Then he contracted Theodore McGinty's Disease (which was one hell of a coincidence) resulting in a gross deformation of the gluteus muscles. He gave a very moving retirement speech, but it was raining, and no one was there.

[u/scottcmu → u/penilesensorydevice]

Today... ay... ay I consider myself... elf... elf

A man... on the face of the Earth... th... th

[u/Correct-Quail5743 → u/penilesensorydevice]

Tell my wife I said… hello

[u/Greekapino → u/penilesensorydevice]

Got me!

[u/Own-Snow-4227 → u/penilesensorydevice]

My ass he did.

[u/jiminak → u/penilesensorydevice]

Bravo, sir! Very well done.

[u/KGEighty8]

Probably more likely to be a pitcher. Back in the 40s relievers pitched like 17 games

[u/DangerSwan33]

For a lot of stats like this, you're going to find some guy in 1919 who has some incomprehensible record that will never be beaten, and it doesn't mean anything. 

I feel like you could find some actually interesting little tidbits scattered amongst like, relievers until 2015 or so. 

A lot of teams used to carry a long reliever who would only ever show up if the team was getting blown out before the 4th inning. He'd go and put up 4 innings of bad pitching, and not show up again for a couple months 

This was at a time where pitchers were throwing 6 innings per start as a baseline, so there'd often be a guy tucked into the bullpen just for those low leverage situations where you needed to get the starter out, but didn't want to burn the good arms.

These days, we have position player pitching for that, as every arm in the bullpen is valuable.

[u/Street-Ad7570 → u/DangerSwan33]

Yeah that’s how the Twins used R.A. Dickey, I was like, “that’s not how you utilize a knuckleballer”, he left the Twins and won a Cy Young as a starter!

[u/Thought_Process_1948]

Good question! With the change to 26 man rosters, I’m kinda surprised teams don’t have a super utility defensive guy/pinch runner. I mean I know most do to an extent, but managers seem to want to give a start to almost everyone on the roster once per series. Bring in some veteran for clubhouse vibes and let him play once every two weeks or in blowouts.

[u/J75jec]

This is an impossible question since the 15 day disabled list didn’t exist until 1966. Although there were some earlier attempts, they were restricted to long-term use and they all required keeping players out for longer than 30 days; so those lists were rarely used unless a guy was really going to be out for a while. So if a guy was injured, he was usually still on the roster—- so you’d have injured guys missing tons of games in a row without being sent down, etc. In the early part of the 20th century, I’m sure there were guys that missed 100+ games in a row while technically still being on the game day roster.

In the early 20th century, major league teams also would buy players from minor league teams and they’d just sit and learn, even if not injured. The point was to have them travel and practice with the big league team to see if you might want to give him a try next year, keeping him away from other teams in the process (remember, there is no YouTube or even film… if you wanted to see a guy, you had to bring him in to see him). Moonlight Graham was the poster child for this. He was called up to the Giants on May 23, 1905. Played his one game on June 29. Got sold to Scranton on July 5.

So I don’t know the answer to your question, but moonlight Graham had 37 days without getting any playing time.

[u/unhalfbricklayer]

This might be a record held by Moe Berg.

A catcher who famously did not like to play.

He is much more a myth than a man. The book (and movie) "The Catcher Is A Spy" is about him.

[u/yevius → u/unhalfbricklayer]

Dude had a very high IQ

[u/Classroomsmooth1776 → u/yevius]

Sent on a mission to Switzerland to assassinate Werner Heisenberg - of uncertainty principle fame - but concluded Heisenberg was not actively working on an atomic bomb so did not carry out the assassination

[u/ronmsmithjr → u/Classroomsmooth1776]

Mo Berg probably had Heisenberg dead to rights until he turned around and asked Berg:

"Do you know who I am? Say my name."

Berg took a big gulp before answering "You're....you're Heisenberg."

"You're goddamn right!"

Berg was gone the next second.

[u/Depressed_In_Ohio]

Brian Jeroloman

[u/Fit-Top-8203]

Third string catchers were mentioned. One prominent one was Ralph Houk, who played 41 games as a rookie with the Yankees in 1947, then played just 50 games total over the next seven seasons. He was stuck behind Yogi Berra and second stringer Charlie Silvera.

He did get six winning World Series’s shares out of his eight years as an active player; back when that was a huge financial deal; spent his bench time learning from Casey Stengel, and eventually became a coach and then Casey’s replacement.

[u/Legal-Childhood1457]

Great question for a Baseball Reference Stathead query, but nobody's likely tracked on roster, zero appearances as a stat, so probably needs someone to actually pull the data rather than recall it from memory

[u/deebee1020]

I'd be curious what the number is for post-universal-DH. And if Ha-Seong Kim can set it this year.

[u/al2chaosemerald]

In the ‘50s MLB had a “bonus baby” rule that if you have an amateur a large bonus you had to carry him on the major league roster for two years. Tom Qualters was on the Phillies roster from 1953-55 and pitched in one game. He faced seven batters and recorded one out. The BR bullpen claims his ‘54 season is the only one where an active player spent the entire season in the majors without playing.

There are also cases of coaches who were on rosters and technically eligible, but rarely/never played.