Baseball notes …

Baseball Digest, May, 2002 by Bill Deane

* Hideo Nomo's no-hitter for the Boston Red Sox against the Baltimore Orioles on April 4, 2001 made him the first active pitcher with mulitple no-hit games since Nolan Ryan retired in 1993. Nomo, who had no-hit the Colorado Rockies while with the Dodgers in 1996, became the first active hurler other than Ryan with more than one career no-hitter since Bob Forsch retired in 1989, and Forsch was the only one since Steve Busby quit in 1980. That gives some idea how unapproachable Ryan's record of seven no-hitters is.

* Sammy Sosa drove in 20.6 percent of the Cubs' runs in 2001. Slammin' Sammy knocked in 160 runs for a team that scored just 777. The only other players to drive in a higher percentage of their team's runs were George Foster (25.8 in 1981), Nate Colbert (22.7 in 1972), Wally Berger (22.6 in 1935) and Ernie Banks (21.2 in 1959). See chart below.

* Alex Rodriguez continues to make history as a hard-hitting shortstop. His .622 slugging percentage was the second-highest ever posted by a regular at that position, narrowly falling short of his own .631 mark set in 1996. Rodriguez now owns three of the top five--and five of the top 18--best slugging percentages ever achieved by a shortstop. The list is dominated by recent players, including the Giants' Rich Aurilia, Boston's Nomar Garciaparra, Cincinnati's Barry Larkin, and the Yankees' Derek Jeter.

* Among the curious accomplishments by Barry Bonds in 2001 is that he hit far more home runs (73) than singles (49). Until 1995, no player with at least 20 home runs had ever collected more four-baggers than base hits in a single-season. Since then, Mark McGwire did it four times and came close on three other occasions. During that span (1995-2001), McGwire amassed 345 home runs, 331 singles, 102 doubles and one triple. See the accompanying chart for smallest differential between homers and singles in a season.

* Montreal pitcher Javier Vazquez had a remarkable season in virtual anonymity. Vazquez was 16-11 (.593) for a team that was 52-83 (.385) in its other decisions. He struck out 208 and walked just 44 in 223.2 innings. And he even batted .258, with 16 hits and 16 sacrifices.