Twelve stats you may not know about… Bruce Sutter
One of baseball’s greatest relief pitchers, Hall of Famer Bruce Sutter, passed away on October 13 at the age of 69. He played for the Cubs, Cardinals, and Atlanta Braves in his 12-year major league career. In his first professional season in 1972, he injured his arm. At spring training in 1973 he was taught how to throw a split-finger fastball and it energized his career.
Sutter was a six-time All-Star and won a Cy Young Award in 1979 with the Cubs. He ended his career with 300 saves.
- Sutter was born in Lancaster, PA. He is one of 1,488 MLB players born in Pennsylvania, and one of 678 pitchers born in that state. Sutter is also one of 19 players born in Lancaster; one of his teammates with the St. Louis Cardinals was second baseman Tom Herr, another Lancaster, PA-born MLB player. The two of them won a World Series together with the Cards in 1982.
- Drafted by the Washington Senators in the 21st round of the 1970 draft, Sutter never played a game in the Senators organization. He in September 1971, signed a free agent contract with the Chicago Cubs and played his first professional game as a member of the Gulf Coast Cubs in 1972 at age 19.
- He made his MLB debut on May 9, 1976, with the Cubs pitching one inning in a game against the Cincinnati Reds. His first career strikeout was Dan Driessen.
- Sutter was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006. He is one of seven relievers in the Hall with at least 300 saves. He collected his 300th save in the last game of his career on September 9, 1988. He was then pitching for the Atlanta Braves.
- Bruce was a six-time National League All-Star, making the team five straight years from 1977-81. He won or saved the All-Star game for the N.L. in four consecutive years (1978-81).
- Sutter had 22 saves in the minors. He did start two games in his minor league career. In his MLB career, all 661 games that he pitched were in relief. He is one of 47 relievers to pitch in 600 or more career games, all in relief.
- He led the National League in saves five times. He did it twice as a member of the Cubs and three times with the Cardinals.
- Sutter accumulated 133 career saves with the Cubs and 127 with the Cardinals. He is second on the Cubs all-time career saves list behind Lee Smith. He ranks fourth on the Cardinals all-time career list. Jason Isringhausen ranks #1 in that category for the Cards.
- Sutter had a career batting average of .088. He had six RBIs, no extra base hits, but did steal a base in a game.
- He had the most saves in his career against the Mets with 38. He gave up 77 home runs; the player who hit the most HRs off Sutter was a former Cub, Ryne Sandberg. The two, however, never played together with the Cubs. Sutter’s last year with the Cubs was 1980; Sandberg’s first year with the Cubs was in 1982.
- Sutter twice lost 10 or more games in a season. In 1978 he was 8-10 with the Cubs; in 1983 he was 9-10 with the Cardinals. He is one of 21 relief pitchers (80% or more of their games pitched as a reliever) to lose 10 or more games in multiple seasons. Former reliever Mike Marshall tops this list losing 10 or more games as a reliever in five seasons.
- Bruce Sutter pitched in one post-season, 1982. The Cardinals defeated the Atlanta Braves in the NLCS and then beat the Milwaukee Brewers in seven games to win the ‘82 World Series. Sutter pitched in six post-season games that season collecting two wins and three saves.
Brewers Adames, Renfroe fall ‘one swing of the bat’ short of hitting milestones in 2022
For Brewers shortstop Willy Adames and right fielder Hunter Renfroe, missing the post-season was not the only disappointment in their 2022 campaign; both players fell short of a hitting milestone… one that would/could have been met with one swing of the bat.
Let’s start with Adames. He became the eighth Brewers player in team history to fall one swing short of reaching 100 RBI for the season. He finished with 98 RBIs. For the record, Adames reached 90 RBI on September 17 (with a three-RBI game) and in the 16 games he played after that, he had only six RBI with one HR and a .243 average. He also struck out 23 times in those 16 contests.
Here’s a look at the eight players who had 96-99 RBI in a season for the Brewers:
99-Cecil Cooper, 1985
98-Willy Adames, 2022
98-Jeromy Burnitz, 2000
98-Greg Vaughn, 1991
97-Ryan Braun, 2007
97-Ted Simmons, 1982
97-Greg Vaughn, 1993
97-Christian Yelich, 2019
As you see above, Cooper was the only Brewer to fall one RBI short of a 100-RBI season. He did, however, have four seasons in his career with 100 or more RBI. There have been six players who have fallen short of 100 RBI in a season twice in a career. The six: Jay Bruce, Sean Casey, Kirby Puckett, Lee May, Bibb Falk and Ty Cobb. All of the six except Sean Casey did have a 100-RBI season in their career.
Now to Renfroe. He became the sixth Brewers player in team history to fall one swing short of 30 home runs for the season with 29. He started the month of August with 19 home runs and then hit four in August and six in September/October. He hit his 29th on October 3 but did not get an at-bat in the team’s final 2022 game the following day.
Here are the six Brewers players who ended a season with 29 HRs:
2022-Hunter Renfroe
2021-Avisail Garcia
2021-Rickie Weeks
2002-Richie Sexson
1982-Robin Yount
1979-Ben Oglivie
Two other MLB players ended the 2022 season with 29 homers… CJ Cron (Colorado) and Jose Ramirez (Cleveland).
Since 1919, there have been 176 times (done by 151 players) when a player ended the year one home run short of the 30-HR milestone. The first to end a season with 29 home runs in a season was “The Bambino,” Babe Ruth. Two players, Joey Votto and Reggie Jackson, each had three seasons with 29 home runs, most in MLB history.
Will NBA experience be a key factor in Bucks ’22-’23 season?
A week from today, on October 20, the Milwaukee Bucks will open their 2022-23 NBA regular season with a trip to Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Center in their season opener versus the 76ers.
According to research on the basketball-reference.com website, the Bucks enter this season with one of the most NBA-experienced teams in the league. Based on the rosters posted on this website, the Bucks have six players on the roster with 10 or more years of NBA experience on their resume.
The six: Brook Lopez (14 years), George Hill (14 years), Serge Ibaka (13 years), Wesley Matthews (13), Jrue Holiday (13 years) and Khris Middleton (10) years. And their best player, Giannis Antetokounmpo, is entering his 10th season.
The Bucks six players with 10 or more years of NBA experience are tied for the most in the league. The Los Angeles Clippers also have six players on their roster with 10-plus years of NBA experience: Nicolas Batum (14), Paul George (12), Reggie Jackson (11), Marcus Morris (11), John Wall (10) and Kawhi Leonard (10).
Will this experience lead to success for the Bucks this season? We’ll find out as the season tips-off next week.
Here’s a look at how many players with 10 or more years of experience are on each team’s roster:
6-Milwaukee, L.A. Clippers
4-Brooklyn, Chicago, L.A. Lakers
3-Boston, Cleveland, Denver, Detroit, Golden State, Houston, Miami, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Washington
2-New Orleans, N.Y. Knicks, Sacramento, Utah
1-Charlotte, Dallas, Indiana, Memphis, Minnesota, Orlando, Portland, Toronto
0-Atlanta, Oklahoma City, San Antonio
Packers at 3-2: Fans rally around the ‘Don’t forget the 2010 season’
No doubt the loss to the New York Giants in London was a tough pill to swallow for the green and gold faithful… especially in a game where they held a 10-point lead at halftime (in the 61 games prior where the Pack had a 10-point or larger lead at halftime they were 57-3-1).
But as they say… on to next week.
The Packers stand at 3-2 on the season and a game behind the Vikings in the NFC North. They are currently one of eight teams with a 3-2 record.
Since 2008, the year that Aaron Rodgers took over as starting QB for the Packers, the team has now been 3-2 after five games in six of those seasons. In fact, many all-knowing Packers fans will quickly point out that when the Packers won the Super Bowl in 2011 (2010 season), they started that 2010 campaign with a 3-2 record, and in fact saw their record drop to .500 at 3-3 that season with a 23-20 overtime loss the following week to Miami.
Here’s a look at some numbers from the first five games of the season from 2008-2021 (14 seasons):
Started season, Made playoffs, Season record
0-5, None
1-4, None
2-3, 2 times (2008, 2012)
made playoffs once, finished 6-10 and 11-5
2-2-1, Once (2018)
did not make playoffs, finished 6-9-1
3-2, 5 times (2009, 2010, 2013, 2014, 2016)
made playoffs five times, finished 11-5, 10-6, 8-7-1, 12-4 and 10-6
won Super Bowl after 2010 season
4-1, 4 times (2017, 2019, 2020, 2021)
made playoffs three times, finished 8-7-1, 13-3, 13-3, 13-4
5-0, 2 times (2011, 2015)
made playoffs twice, finished 15-1, 10-6
Based on research on pro-football-reference.com, there were 131 teams that started the season 3-2 from 2008-2021. Of those 131, 46.6% made the playoffs that year. Included in those 131 teams are five 3-2 teams that went on to win the Super Bowl (2010-Green Bay, 2011-New York Giants, 2014-New England, 2018-New England, and 2020-Tampa Bay, and four 3-2 teams that lost in the Super Bowl.
Note: Had the Packers won the game this past weekend versus the Giants, they would have been 4-1 for the fourth straight year.
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