One of the more surprising stories in baseball this year was the rise of Arizona’s Josh Collmenter, who will start Game 3 of the NLDS and attempt to keep the Diamondbacks alive. Collmenter wasn’t a heralded prospect before the season started -- he couldn’t even crack Baseball America’s list of the 30 best Diamondbacks prospects -- but he came up and threw strike after strike. His career BB/9 in the minors is 3.1. In the majors he lopped off more than a walk per nine innings.
The Odd Company Josh Collmenter Keeps
That control put him in some rare company. There aren’t a lot of rookies in baseball history who came up and threw more than 150 innings without walking more than two batters per nine innings. But though it’s rare company ... it’s also oddly nondescript company:
| Player | Year | IP | Age | Tm | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Josh Collmenter | 2011 | 1.63 | 154.1 | 25 | ARI |
| Rene Arocha | 1993 | 1.48 | 188.0 | 27 | STL |
| Donovan Osborne | 1992 | 1.91 | 179.0 | 23 | STL |
| Derek Lilliquist | 1989 | 1.85 | 165.2 | 23 | ATL |
| Dave Rozema | 1977 | 1.40 | 218.1 | 20 | DET |
| Mark Fidrych | 1976 | 1.91 | 250.1 | 21 | DET |
| Joe Niekro | 1967 | 1.70 | 169.2 | 22 | CHC |
| Fritz Peterson | 1966 | 1.67 | 215.0 | 24 | NYY |
| Jim Turner | 1937 | 1.82 | 256.2 | 33 | BSN |
| Cliff Melton | 1937 | 2.00 | 248.0 | 25 | NYG |
| Curt Davis | 1934 | 1.97 | 274.1 | 30 | PHI |
| Bill Swift | 1932 | 1.09 | 214.1 | 24 | PIT |
| Ray Kremer | 1924 | 1.77 | 259.1 | 31 | PIT |
| Sloppy Thurston | 1923 | 1.75 | 195.2 | 24 | TOT |
| Mike Regan | 1917 | 1.71 | 216.0 | 29 | CIN |
| Harry Gaspar | 1909 | 1.97 | 260.0 | 26 | CIN |
| Bill Burns | 1908 | 0.99 | 164.0 | 28 | WSH |
| Ed Summers | 1908 | 1.64 | 301.0 | 23 | DET |
| Irv Young | 1905 | 1.69 | 378.0 | 27 | BSN |
| Watty Lee | 1901 | 1.55 | 262.0 | 21 | WSH |
| Roy Patterson | 1901 | 1.79 | 312.1 | 24 | CHW |
There are a couple of Hall-of-Gooders there, I suppose. Joe Niekro had a long career, and Mark Fidrych was a sensation before blowing his arm out. You can swap Fritz Peterson onto the list of Hall-of-Gooders if you’re feeling frisky. And Sloppy Thurston deserves a mention here because his name was Sloppy Thurston.
But it’s not the kind of list you’d expect from guys with historically unique control as rookies. This isn’t to say anything poignant about Collmenter -- just noting the odd company he keeps.
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