Pinch runner
Encyclopedia
A pinch runner is a baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

 player substituted for the specific purpose of replacing a player on base. In the typical case, the pinch runner is faster or otherwise more skilled at base-running than the player for whom the pinch runner has been substituted. But occasionally a pinch runner is inserted for more subtle reasons (such as a double switch), ejection, or if the original player on base has become injured (such as having been hit by a pitch
Hit by pitch
In baseball, hit by pitch , or hit batsman , is a batter or his equipment being hit in some part of his body by a pitch from the pitcher.-Official rule:...

).

A pinch-runner is not credited with a game played for the purpose of consecutive game streaks, per Rule 10.24(c) of baseball's Official Rules. In fact, Alfredo Griffin
Alfredo Griffin
Alfredo Claudino Griffin is a former Major League Baseball player, who played shortstop for four teams from 1976 to 1993. He is currently the first base coach for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.-Playing career:...

 of the Toronto Blue Jays
Toronto Blue Jays
The Toronto Blue Jays are a professional baseball team located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The Blue Jays are a member of the Eastern Division of Major League Baseball 's American League ....

 scored the winning run in a game, yet his consecutive game streak ended as he appeared only as a pinch runner.

As with other substitutions in baseball, when a player is pinch run for, that player is removed from the game. The pinch runner may remain in the game or be substituted for at the manager's discretion. Earlier in baseball history, teams would occasionally use "courtesy runners" as well as pinch runners. A baserunner that had to leave the game temporarily due to injury would be replaced by a courtesy runner. The courtesy runner could leave the game and re-enter later, or could be a player already in the game playing a different position. The player who had to leave the game was free to return to play. The last use of a courtesy runner in Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...

 was in 1949.

Probably the most famous pinch runner of all time was Herb Washington
Herb Washington
Herbert Lee Washington is a former world-class sprinter in the early 1970s who parlayed his speed into a brief Major League Baseball stint, and later became the owner/operator of numerous McDonald's restaurants and a minor-league professional hockey franchise and held a number of high-ranking...

 of the Oakland Athletics
Oakland Athletics
The Oakland Athletics are a Major League Baseball team based in Oakland, California. The Athletics are a member of the Western Division of Major League Baseball's American League. From to the present, the Athletics have played in the O.co Coliseum....

. Oakland owner Charlie Finley, known as an unconventional thinker, came to believe that it would be useful to have a "designated runner"—a fast player on the roster whose only job was to periodically enter a game and run the bases for slower players. He signed Washington, a track star with no baseball experience. Washington appeared in 105 games for the Athletics in 1974 and 1975, scoring 33 runs and stealing 31 bases, without once playing the field or coming up to bat. His 1975 Topps baseball card is the only baseball card in history to use the "Pinch Runner" position label.

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