They Called Them the Streaker! Quiz

Answer: 52

The Bambino took over the career home run leadership in 1922 when he surpassed Roger Connor who had hit 138 in his career. Ruth held that record and kept adding to it until he retired with 714 in 1935 with the Boston Braves. Along came Hank Aaron and tied Ruth's career record less than one hour into opening day of the 1974 season against Cincinnati. Four days later Hank hit the magic number 715 to stand on the top of the mountain.

Answer: Cy Young

Galvin played from 1875-1892 in an era when there was only one starting pitcher for a team in the entire season. He retired with a 365-310 record. The Hall of Fame great Young pitched from 1890-1911. Cy Young not only set a career record with an amazing 511 wins, but also set a new career record with 316 losses. To put things in perspective, the great Nolan Ryan who pitched in 27 seasons lost 292 games.

When Ryan retired in 1993, he was still looking up at both Galvin and Young to be the only pitchers to lose 300+ games.

Answer: New York Yankees

The Yankee franchise won four consecutive World Series from 1936-1939. After winning the big ones in 1941, 1943, and 1947, the Yankees began another streak of five consecutive World Series wins from 1949-1953. The Yankees would win nine more World Series before the century ended.

Answer: Billy Hamilton

Hamilton played from 1888-1901. Being a stand-alone for stolen bases, Billy stole 100+ bases in a season four times. He retired with 914 thefts, a career record that stood in 82 seasons until St. Louis Cardinal Lou Brock surpassed Hamilton's etching at the end of the 1978 season with 917. Lou retired in 1978 with 938 career thefts, and those all stood until Rickey Henderson of the Athletics came along and broke that career record in 1991.

Answer: Warren Spahn

Warren played with the Braves in Boston and Milwaukee from 1942-1964 and then finished his career with a season each with the Mets and Giants. Spahn was a 20-game winner for the first time in 1947 when he went 24-10. He duplicated the 20-mark from 1949-1951 by winning 21, 21, and 22 games.

After having an 'off-season' in 1952, Warren came back by winning 20+ games again in 1953 and 1954. After taking a 'break' in 1955 with winning only 17 games, he ran off a six-season streak from 1956-1961 of being a 20-game winner.

In 1963, he topped it all off by going 23-7. Overall he was a 13-time 20-game winner. He retired with 363 wins and ironically had 363 hits himself as a batter. Spahn retired in 1965 and was an easy inductee into the Hall of Fame in 1973.

He died in 2003 at the age of 82.

Answer: Steve Carlton

Johnson was a career Washington Senator from 1907-1927. Amongst his seasons with the Senators he was the 1913 and 1924 American League MVP. Walter also pitched for two Triple Crown Awards in 1913 and 1918. He led the league 12 times in strikeouts and topped out at 313 in 1910. Johnson retired with 3509 career strikeouts. Hall of Fame pitcher Steve Carlton came along with his strikeout crowns and finally surpassed Johnson's career record in 1983 while with the Philadelphia Phillies. Carlton held the career strikeout record for only year as the strikeout king of baseball took over the lead in 1984. That fireballer was Nolan Ryan who eventually retired with 5714 strikeouts in 1993.

Answer: Willie Keeler

The others never hit 200 singles in a season. Keeler played from 1892-1910. He was a rookie with the New York Giants, played with a few other teams, then retired as a Giant. Keeler had a steak-and-egg season in 1898 with the Baltimore Orioles of the National League. Willie hit 206 singles, seven doubles, two triples and one home run.

His season record for singles stood until the 2004 when Seattle Mariner Ichiro Suzuki hit 225 singles to finally break Keeler's record.

Answer: Dick Radatz

Lidge set his season record in 2004. Radatz was a career relief pitcher from 1962-1969. He came out of the pen throwing as a rookie with the Red Sox and had four outstanding seasons with them. In 1964 he struck out an amazing 181 batters in 157 innings of relief while leading the league in saves. Moving around the league after that, Dick played for the Indians, Cubs, Tigers, and Expos. Radatz's steak continued into the 21st Century.

He died in 2005 at the age of 67.

Answer: Cleveland Spiders

The Spiders of the National League were a better than average team in the 1880s and 1890s. When the administration of baseball didn't like the Spiders being owned by someone who also owned another baseball team, an ultimatum was made to sell one of the teams.

As a result, the owners sold off all the good players from the Spiders (including Hall of Fame great Cy Young) after the 1898 season to their other team of ownership which was the St. Louis Browns/Perfectos. The 'traded' players left the Spiders as a dismal team for 1899 and helped the Perfectos to a fifth place finish of 12 teams.

The Perfectos changed their name to the well known St. Louis Cardinals in 1900. The New York Mets came fairly close to this record by losing 120 games in 1962 by going 40-120.

Answer: Pete Rose

Rose was a Cincinnati Red in 1978 when he came closer than any other National Leaguer to break Keeler's record. Pete's streak stopped on August 1 when the Reds met pitcher Gene Garber and the Atlanta Braves. Garber continued to throw Rose change-ups which was not a choice pitch for Gene, but that was it for the streak. Pete had 198 hits in the season while batting .302, but it wasn't good enough to break 'Wee' Willie Keeler's streak. Keeler's hitting streak record lasted for more than 100+ seasons and into the 21st Century.

In the American League the great Joe DiMaggio of the Yankees set the Major League record by hitting safely in 56 games in 1941.