Today in White Sox History: May 12
Red Faber is ruthlessly efficient in a complete game win
1904
Future Hall-of-Famer Ed Walsh made his White Sox debut, pitching in relief. It happened in Philadelphia, during a 9-3 loss to the A’s. Walsh threw one inning, giving up two hits and a run.
1915
Red Faber threw a complete game win at Comiskey Park vs. Washington, 4-1.
So what? Well, it was Faber’s sixth start of 1915, fifth win ... and sixth complete game.
OK, yeah, so what? How about this:
Yes, Faber threw just 67 pitches for the win.
While there was no official pitch-counting 110 years ago, a boy-clerk in Washington, Frank Saffell, tracked each pitch for an electronic scoreboard. He telegraphed The Chicago Tribune after realizing how remarkable Faber’s efficiency was. While it’s hard to recognize the pitch count-tracking of a child not even at the park for the game, Saffell’s inning-by-inning count — adding to 50 strikes, 17 balls and two three-pitch innings — has been accepted enough into baseball lore as to be acknowledged by the Baseball Hall of Fame. Saffell had been at pitch-counting for enough time to have qualified the count to the Tribune as being five pitches better than the previous record (Christy Mathewson, 72 pitches).
Faber carried a one-hitter into the ninth, when with two outs a single, passed ball and double gave the Sens their tally when the game was no longer in doubt — or, as the Tribune accounted, at a point when “nobody cared a whoop what happened.” The game lasted just one hour, 35 minutes.
The most efficient officially-counted game at Baseball-Reference is 75 pitches, by Bob Tewksbury (1990) and Andy Ashby (1998). The unofficial but almost certain MLB record comes on Aug. 10, 1944, when Red Barrett of the Boston Braves had a 58-pitch win that was tracked by official scorer Frank Grayson.
1923
St. Louis’ haste helped the White Sox score a coup, as just two games and four innings into his professional career Hollis “Sloppy” Thurston was placed on waivers by the Browns. Chicago wasted no time in completing a purchase for the screwballer.
In 1923 Thurston would immediately fill an important role for the White Sox, throwing some starts (and complete games) but also working out of the bullpen. It was out of the pen Thurston became the fifth pitcher ever to hurl an immaculate inning, on Aug. 22, 1923. And in 1924 Thurston moved almost exclusively to the starting rotation, to great success.
In 1923-24 Thurston amassed 10.6 WAR on the South Side, topping all White Sox hurlers both seasons. His stardom was brief, but Thurston remains one of the best waiver pickups the franchise ever made.
1932
For the ninth time of the 1932 season, White Sox third baseman/second baseman Carey Selph struck out.
It is also the last time in 1932 that Selph whiffed, as he played another 89 games strikeout-free, setting a major league record.
(When was the record broken? Oh, in 1958, when another White Sox second baseman, Nellie Fox, went 98 games between strikeouts.)
Selph had a decent enough season, hitting .283/.341/.371 over 396 total at-bats tying and for seventh among position players with 1.0 WAR on the 49-102-1 White Sox. At a .325 winning percentage, 1932 was the worst White Sox team in history, although it still finished 7 1⁄2 games ahead of the cellar-dwelling Boston Red Sox.
This would be Selph’s first full, but last overall major league season. He had been plucked from St. Louis in the Rule 5 draft before the 1932 season, and was swapped back to the Cardinals in the offseason. The St. Louis system was loaded, and Selph was sent to the minors, where he played his final two pro seasons for the Houston Buffaloes of the Texas League.
1953
With a 9-7 win in 10 innings at Boston, the White Sox not only climbed to 16-10, they got a monkey off of their backs: By rallying for the win in the top of the 10th, the club hung a defeat on Ellis Kinder, snapping his 18-game winning streak against the White Sox. Kinder didn’t even get a chance to “defend” his streak, as a leadoff walk to Minnie Miñoso, Jim Rivera beating out his sac bunt and Chico Carrasquel moving both runners up and prompted Bill Kennedy into the game to put out the fire — but instead serve up the eventual game-decider, an RBI double from Ferris Fain.
Kinder would come to the South Side to finish out his career, in 1956-57. Kennedy had just been traded from Sox to Sox a few months earlier, in February.
Also on this day, the White Sox purchased Sandy Consuegra from the Washington Senators. He’d make his debut in a 3-0 loss at Boston the next day, and would end up with an outstanding, career-high 3.0 WAR for the White Sox in 1953, going 7-5 with a 2.54 ERA while both starting and closing games. Consuegra, pitching for the White Sox over three more seasons to come, forged a terrific record with the team, with a career 2.85 ERA/3.28 FIP and 8.0 WAR over 140 games.
2013
Chris Sale couldn’t have picked a better time to show the baseball world what type of pitcher he was, as on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball he tossed a complete game one-hitter, beating the Angels, 3-0, at U.S. Cellular Field. Sale was dominant, taking a no-hitter into the seventh inning before Mike Trout broke it up with a single to center. Chris would finish the night with seven strikeouts, and Trout would be the only Angels base runner. The game was scoreless until the Chicago half of the seventh, when they scored three runs. The big blow was a two-run single from Alexei Ramírez.