September 8th, 2013 at 9:21 am 
by Ron Cervenka It’s pretty easy to see why Cincinnati Reds prospect Billy Hamilton draws comparison to Herb Washington, especially when each of Hamilton’s four major league appearances thus far (including his MLB debut on September 3) have been solely as a pinch runner.
Washington, who was a World Class sprinter and world record holder but who hadn’t played a day of baseball since high school, was signed by eccentric (but beloved) Oakland Athletics owner Charlie Finley in 1974 as baseball’s first (and only) known ‘designated runner.’ Washington even had a 1974 Topps baseball card proclaiming such. As you may (painfully) recall, the Oakland A’s defeated the Dodgers in the 1974 World Series, thus earning Washington a World Series ring. The silver lining is that former Dodger Cy Young Award winner “Iron” Mike Marshall picked Washington off in the 9th inning of game-2 of that series, which was the only game the Dodgers won in that disappointing Fall Classic.
After his very short MLB career, Washington went on to become one of the most successful African American restaurateurs in the country, having owned numerous McDonald’s franchises – primarily in the inner cities of Rochester, New York and Youngstown, Ohio.
The glaring difference between Herb Washington and Billy Hamilton is that Hamilton is actually a baseball player. In fact, the 23-year-old Collins, MS native set a new all-time minor league record for stolen bases during the 2012 season when he split time between the Reds Advanced Single-A Bakersfield Blaze and the Double-A Pensacola Blue Wahoos. Hamilton’s 155 stolen bases broke Vince Coleman’s record of 145 set in 1983, seventeen years before Hamilton was even born. Interestingly, Herb Washington also hails from Mississippi (Belzoni), a short 134 miles from Collins, MS.
Hamilton’s 155 stolen bases in 2012 set a new all-time minor league record.
(Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)
During Hamilton’s record-setting 2012 minor league season, he was used primarily as a shortstop and actually posted some pretty good numbers with a triple slash of .310 / .410 / .420. Yes, that’s an on-base percentage of .410, and when you’ve got wheels like Hamilton does and you get on base, even a walk can become a triple is as few as two pitches. Hamilton had one glaring weakness, however; as a shortstop he had a fielding percentage of .935 with the Blaze and .968 with the Blue Wahoos. In fact, in his 5-year MiLB career, Hamilton’s FPCT is a rather dismal .953 (sound familiar?)
Hamilton began the 2013 season with the Reds Triple-A affiliate Louisville Bats where he was converted to a center fielder. This experiment resulted in mixed results as Hamilton made seven errors in 348 chances for a FPCT of .980 – not horrible but not great either. The problem for the speedster is that there are guys named Shin-Soo Choo and Chris Heisey ahead of him on the Reds depth chart, both of whom are far better center fielders, although not nearly as fast.
Since his MLB debut on September 3, Hamilton has appeared in four games, each as a pinch runner. He has stolen four bases and has yet to be caught stealing. More importantly, however, is that he has scored three runs, including Saturday’s game-winner against Brian Wilson and the Dodgers.
With the Reds in the thick of the tightest divisional race in the majors right now, and with the probability that the Reds will make the post-season either as the NL Central Division winner or as one of the two NL Wild Card winners (of which both will undoubtedly come out of the NL Central), you can pretty much count on Billy Hamilton being on the Reds post-season roster – even if only in a Herb Washington-type role.
As they say – “Speed never slumps.”
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In 7 days, Billy Hamilton has played a major role in 3 Reds wins in the heat of a pennant chase. I would say that they’d be crazy not to place him on the post season roster. He’s a secret weapon that isn’t so secret anymore. Hopefully, this guy doesn’t come back to burn the Dodgers as he has in this series.
The Herb Washington experiment was for the most part unsuccessful. Hamilton, however, has already paid dividends and made Cincinnati a legitimate force, especially in late inning games that are close. I wish Mattingly would use Gordon in a similar fashion.
I think you might be right that Gordon isn’t 100% healthy after getting hit in the back of the head the other day. No other explanation.
If not addressed today by those covering the team, I will ask Mattingly tomorrow during his pre-game interview.
Thanks for bringing back the Herb Washington incident, Ron, when he was picked off by “Iron” Mike Marshall in the ’74 World Series. I have a newspaper photo of that in a scrap book for that series. That was an exciting night and the pickoff was the brightest moment.
Unfortunately, that was the brightest moment of the entire Series for the Dodgers.
That 1974 Dodger team was so very very good, having gone 102–60 (.630) and finishing 4 games ahead of the (are you ready for this) Cincinnati Reds. It was an absolute heart-breaker that the Dodgers got blown out in five games by the 90-72 Oakland A’s.
1974 was the year that Steve Garvey was a write-in All-Star and he ended up winning the ASG MVP Award (I got a foul ball by Garvey that year, too). It was also the year that Iron Mike won the Cy Young Award.
What stands out in my memory was Joe Ferguson in RF, cutting in front of the CFer and throwing out someone (Joe Rudi?) at the plate.
That was actually Reggie Jackson: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RekGF1J1OKA
Remember when World Series games were played during the day time? I really miss that.
That was Sal Bando thrown out at the plate. Reggie Jackson hit the fly. We all knew it was gonna happen as Fergie had stepped in front of Wynn and thrown out runners during the season too. I guess advance scouting didn’t warn the A’s though.
A great moment. That Dodger team was the first break through of the young core of players that would remain with the team up until the 80’s. Hated to see them lose that series. All the games were 3-2 until the last one.
First World Series day game that’s still in my memory was Game 7 of the ’55 Series. Living on Long Island back then, my 4th grade teacher brought a radio to school so we could listen to the game. As I remember, the class was pretty evenly split between Dodger & Yankee fans. I’m pretty sure the teacher was a Dodger fan too.
A GREAT time to be a Dodger fan and living in New York, Norm. Based on your time line, I am guessing that you are maybe 6 or 7 years older than me.
One of my greatest childhood memories was my dad taking my brothers and me to game-3 of the 1963 World Series and watching my all-time favorite Dodger Don Drysdale toss a CG 1-0 3-hit shutout. I about died when Joe Pepitone hit a high fly ball to deep right field that Ron Fairly caught with his back to the bullpen gate for the final out of the game.
Although 19-years old, I’m hoping to take my son to his first Dodger World Series this year. (I took him to game-2 of the 2002 WS when he was 8, but that was the Angels
.)
A 2:00 P.M. game here was 3:00 P.M. so we got home from school for most of it. As with you the early part of the game was on the teacher’s radio.
Bluenose Dodger, what grade were you in?
Ron, it was a great time, that is except for when the Dodgers left town and Campy’s auto accident at the same time. I was spoiled early, seeing the Dodgers winning the World Series 4 times from the age of 9 to 19. I actually got to meet Jackie Robinson, shortly after he retired, when he gave a speech at my synagogue. My father took a polaroid of him with his hand on my shoulder, which he autographed. I’m disgusted and embarrassed to say that I don’t know what became of that photo.
Oh yeah, I’m 67, and can you believe I’ve never even come close to snaring a foul ball?
Ask Truebluewill where his autographed Jackie Robinson baseball is.
In addition to this blog site we also have an interactive forum with members from across the U.S. and even a few from Canada and Mexico. You would definitely fit in with this Wild Bunch (many of whom are around our age). We would absolutely love to have you join us. Simply go to the forum page and click on ‘Register.’ Once I see your membership request, I will approve it immediately. Here is the direct link: https://thinkbluela.com/forum/
I’ve gone ahead and registered for the forum, Ron. I’ve run into trouble on other forums in the past, but I’ll try to behave myself. I think I’ll just observe for awhile before I jump in.
I have a question for you, as it seems that you’ve attended quite a few Quakes games. How would you assess Corey Seager’s defense? I check the box scores on a daily basis, and am very concerned by all of his errors.
Your forum account has been activated – welcome aboard.
The very reason we created the ThinkBlueLA forum back in 2009 was because of all of the vile crap that went on over on the original ‘Inside the Dodgers’ forum, which got downright nasty (and vulgar). As you just found out, we require membership approval and will ban those who have a problem playing well with others.
Feel free to jump on in whenever it feels right for you, but you will soon see that you are definitely among friends and even the spirited debates are civil.
Oops! My bad Norm – NOW your account has been activated.
I get so many spam bots that I clicked on the wrong button out of habit. Sorry about that.
Grade 9.
I remember the pessimism of my parents’ generation and the older kids your age about the Dodgers’ chances after all the times they had been beaten by the hated Yankees. Myself, I was too young to believe that the Dodgers couldn’t win