Mike Schmidt
King of the Wild Pitch

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Baseball fans of the proper vintage know who Mike Schmidt is.

Sure. Philadelphia Phillies for 18 years, 549 home runs, 2234 hits, 1595 runs batted in, batting average .267, on-base percentage 0.380.

Oh, yes. Number of runs scored from first base on a wild pitch: 1.

There was a bit of help from the other team, though.

You see, on April 18, 1988, the Phillies were playing the Mets. David Cone, who was just starting his career, was pitching. Gary Carter was the Mets catcher.

It was the eighth inning and the Phillies led 9 to 6. Dave walked Mike to put him on first base. That brought the Phillies' first baseman Von Hayes to the plate (Von is his first name not an indication of German nobility).

The pitch hit the dirt by the plate. It got by Gary and then bounced off a pipe and bounded toward the Phillies dugout. Normally it would have rolled on in and fallen out of play.

But for some reason it just trickled along the edge of the dugout. Gary hurried after the ball but hesitated, hoping it would fall out of play. When it was clear that wasn't to be, he scooped it up.

Since the throw was a wild pitch, Mike could advance the bases at his discretion. Normally he would have run to second and that would have been that.

For the team playing defense - the team pitching - the rule here would be for the catcher to pursue the ball and the pitcher to move from the mound to cover home plate. But Dave stuck by the mound. He later said it was unheard of for a runner on first to round the bases on a wild pitch.

But given the unexpected trajectory of the ball plus the extra time Gary took hoping the ball would roll into the dugout, Mike ran on to third. Then seeing there was no one protecting home, Mike ran on in to score.

The strong language of the announcer expressed his surprise:

"Oh, my goodness!"

A note of self-appraisal is that this rendering of Mike unintentionally has something of the style of Virgil Partch. Virgil was a cartoonist from the 1950's through the 1970's who signed his cartoons as VIP. VIP cartoons were on the whacky side, somewhat foreshadowing the Far Side cartoon strip that was popular in the 1980's and 90's.

One of Virgil's cartoons showed two explorers canoeing upstream on the Amazon River. Floating downstream was a baseball team sitting in their dugout. One of the explorers was trying to point out the odd craft, and as they paddled on, the other one simply said:

"You've seen one dugout, you've seen them all."

References

"Mike Schmidt", Baseball Reference.

"That Time Mike Schmidt, Age 38, Scored From First On A Wild Pitch", Dom Cosentino, Deadspin, November 1, 2013.

"25th Anniversary: Mike Schmidt Scores from First on Wild Pitch", Chris Jaffe, Hardball Times, April 18,2013.

"Philadelphia Phillies at New York Mets Box Score, April 18, 1988", Baseball Reference.

Super Duper Baseball Bloopers, Baseball Park Magazine, 1989.

Cartoons Out of My Own Head, Virgil Partch, Fawcett Gold Medal Books, 1964.