The Stolen Base. A Lost Art. Will We Ever See a 100 Steal Man Again?

The stolen base in Major League Baseball is sadly, a lost art. In an era that is slowly recovering from the aberration that was the "live ball era" (i.e. steroid era) and coming to grips that it all was just a sham, before this fad, was the art of the stolen base.

Sure we've been spoiled by the likes of Hall of Famer Rickey Henderson, Tim "Rock" Raines, Marquis Grissom, and Vince Coleman who used this form of poetic strategy and skill to their benefit, and with superb accuracy. I however, would still rather see a player on any given night steal four bases in a game than hit four home runs-this means you, Mike Cameron.

The Past

Henderson led the American League in steals an amazing eleven times during his storied twenty-five year career. In only his second season, Henderson stole 100 bases in 1980 at the encouragement of his then-manager Billy Martin while with the Oakland A's.

In 1982 in only 149 games, he stole an all time single-season record, 130 bases. Think about that number for a minute.

130. (take it in).

In 149 games, he'd have stolen a base at the rate of .87 a game (130/149). That means, on any given night at the ballpark, chances are very good he was going to get on base and steal at least one bag. Not only does this take skill, patience, and strategy, but consider that he has to work his way on to base in the first place successfully for any of this to come into play.

Next consider he was caught stealing an astounding, 42 times that year. Even at this high number, he still had a 75% success rate. While any major league manager will tell you anything above 80% is the desired line, they clearly don't have 172 attempts in their equation anymore either.

Finally, consider in 2008, not a single team had 172 attempts collectively, and  only the Tampa Bay Rays, had more successful thefts (142) than Henderson's magical 130 in 1982.

That means of the now 29 other major league teams, only one had more successful attempts than Henderson's individual accomplishment that year.

But enough about Henderson and 1982.

Consider also, that in 1985 Vince Coleman, (pictured) a speedster of there ever was one, stole a rookie record, 110 bases in 1985 while playing for the St. Louis Cardinals. Why did he do this? Not only because this was the way baseball was played in the Eighties, but because it was effective and so was he.

While Coleman never matched the statistics of that season the rest of his thirteen year career, he too wasn't just a one-year wonder as the next two years he stole 107 and 109 bases respectively, before never cracking so much as 90 ever again.

The Present

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?