Hitting Class With Arizona’s Micah Owings
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Arizona Diamondbacks rookie pitcher Micah Owings evened his record at 6-6 by going 7 innings as Arizona pounded the Atlanta Braves by a 12-6 score on Saturday (Aug. 18, 2007).
It wasn’t enough that Owings held the Braves to 3 runs on 3 hits (all homers) while striking out 7 and walking none on 78 pitches in 7 innings of work. Owings clubbed 2 monstrous homers, plus a single and a double while driving in 6 runs. He missed hitting for the cycle for lack of a triple.
When this blog posted it’s piece entitled Multi-Homer Game Feats by a Pitcher on August 14, little did we know that 4 days later Owings would take us all to school.
The AP report for Fox sports gives additional details;
Owings was 0-5 with a 5.70 ERA in his previous nine starts and one inning of relief. The rookie, who played two seasons at Georgia Tech, lifted his batting average to .273 with the four hits. He has three homers and 11 RBIs.
“We knew he was a good hitter. Not just a good hitter, but a good hitter with power,” Atlanta manager Bobby Cox said.
He hit a two-run double in Arizona’s four-run second inning, a solo 415-foot homer to left in the fourth, a two-run 446-foot drive to center in a three-run sixth and a broken-bat RBI single to center in a four-run seventh. He lined out in the eighth.
“He hit the ball 900 feet tonight,” said Buddy Carlyle, who surrendered both homers. “It’s kind of frustrating that it’s the pitcher that did all that damage.”
The record for RBIs by a pitcher in one game is nine set by Tony Cloninger of Atlanta, who had two grand slams against San Francisco on July 3, 1966.
Owings’ 11 total bases were the most for a pitcher since Jim Tobin of the Boston Braves had 12 when he homered three times on May 13, 1942, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. Owings was the first pitcher with at least six RBIs in a game since Robert Person drove in seven for Philadelphia against Montreal on June 2, 2002
Owings without doubt is a fine hitter for a pitcher. Here are some other stats on some of baseballs’ all-time greatest hitting pitchers;
Baseball Library records that Tobin clubbed 6 homers in 1942, 4 of those homers in two days against the Chicago Cubs having clubbed a pinch homer on May 12 before hitting 3 more dingers on May 13th. He had 17 lifetime homers over his 9 year career.
Cloninger, who hit the two grand slams in one game against the Giants in 1966, had 5 homers that year and 11 lifetime homers over his 12 years in the major leagues.
Rick Wise had 6 homers for the Phillies in 1971, hit 15 lifetime homers in his 18 year career. They were all hit between 1968 and 1973.
Don Newcombe hit 7 homers in 1955 and had a lifetime total of 15 homers over his 10 year major league career.
Don Drysdale who had 7 homers in both the 1958 and 1965 seasons and 5 homers in the 1961 season finished his 14 year career with 29 homers.
Wikipedia gives a comprehensive list of the all-time leading homerun hitting pitchers, both seasonal and career.
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