Baseball’s Untouchable Milestones – Part 1
In each and every sport that is played, records are made and broken all the time. At times there are players who perform the unthinkable. They set records that are almost unachievable and even the best of players cannot imagine surpassing those records.
Same is the case with baseball, as the top untouchable milestones in baseball history are as follows.
Joe DiMaggio had a streak of 56 consecutive game hits in 1941. No one has dared to venture anywhere near the record. The only attempt was made by Pete Rose in 1978 who managed a 44 game streak which was a very long time ago. The only recent player who came
close was the Philadelphia Phillies’ Jimmy Rollins, who had a 38-consecutive-game-hitting streak during the 2005 and 2006 season. That may be Rollins best, but he or anyone else for that matter has a long way to go before conquering the milestone set by DiMaggio.
The next record is of the most single seasons and career walks and Barry Bonds have the honour of that record to his name. Bonds has a mind blowing record of 2,558 career walks. The only person coming near this record is Rickey Henderson who has 2,190 walks
under his belt but there is quite a considerable gap in between. Among current players, the Minnesota Twin’s Jim Thome is the closest with 1,671 walks which is still quite distant. Bonds also broke the 78-year-old single season record of 170 walks which was
set by the legendary Hall of Famer, Babe Ruth. Bonds managed to walk 177 times at first and then later broke his record twice. First in 2002 and then later in 2004, walking 198 and 232 times respectively.
The talent-laden Nolan Ryan who now manages and owns the Texas Rangers holds the record for the highest number of career strike-outs, 5,714. Randy Johnson came close to this record with 4,875 through the length of his career but there is a good difference
of almost 1000 strike-outs between the two. In today’s baseball, achieving even 3000 strike-outs seems like a big feat, and the last player to do so was Pedro Martinez who does not pitch in the Major Leagues anymore. Jamie Moyer of the Philadelphia Phillies
has 2,400 to his name and has quite a lot to cover before he can even come near Nolan’s record.
The single season earned run average record is held by Bob Gibson of the St. Louis Cardinals. He finished the 1968 season with an excellent 1.12 ERA which is hard to achieve and 22-9. By doing this he surpassed the 1.14 ERA which was recorded by Christy
Mathewson in 1909 and tied Walter Johnson’s record in 1913. The closest anyone has ever come to break Gibson’s record is Dwight Gooden in 1985, when he had an ERA of 1.53.
Rickey Henderson stole 1,406 bases in his career. This set an all time record of him having the highest number of career and single-season stolen bases. Lou Brock came close with 938 bases but still had a lot of catching up to do. Among the current players,
who have come anywhere near the record is Juan Pierre who has a record in the lows 500s, quite far from Henderson’s record.
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