"But it wasn't until I saw Rickey that I understood what baseball was about. Rickey Henderson is a run, man. That's it. When you see Rickey Henderson, I don't care when, the score's already 1-0. If he's with you, that's great. If he's not, you won't like it."
- A's teammate Mitchell Page
Rickey Henley Henderson was born on December 25, 1958, in Chicago, Illinois. I am assuming that sometime between then and high school his family moved out to Oakland, California, for Rickey graduated from Oakland's Technical High School in 1976. There he played baseball, basketball and football. After graduating, Rickey received several offers and scholarships to play football, but Rickey turned them down. Rickey was drafted late in the June draft, in the 4th round, by the Oakland Athletics. In 1977 he played for Modesto in the California League, and had a then record 95 stolen bases and became the 4th professional baseball player to steal 7 bases in one game! Rickey would make his Major League Baseball debut on June 23, 1979. The next day he would steal his first of over 1400 bases.
His first full season was in 1980, and he started it off running. He broke Ty Cobb's single season American League stolen base record of 96 with an even 100 bases. In 1982 he set the single season record for stolen bases in the Majors with a whopping 130, shattering the previous record of 118 held by Lou Brock. However, Rickey would also set the Major League record for the most times caught stealing in a single season with 42. People appropriately enough started to refer to Henderson as The Man of Steal. Rickey's first tenure with the A's would come to a halt as he was traded to the New York Yankees alongside pitcher Bert Bradley for pitchers Jay Howell and Jose Rijo, outfielder Stan Javier, as well as minor leaguers Tim Birtsas and Eric Plunk.
Even though he was playing for a different team, it was the same old Rickey. On September 25, 1985, Rickey stole his 75th base of the season, breaking the Yankees record held by Fritz Maisel set back in 1914. In 1986, he became the only player since former Yankee Mickey Mantle to lead the American League in runs for consecutive seasons. He also led the league in steals for the 7th consecutive season. However, the 1987 season would be a rocky one for Rickey, as he suffered through various pulls and strains. On June 20, 1989, he was traded back to Oakland for Eric Plunk, Greg Cadaret and Luis Polonia.
Rickey helped the A's to dominate the late 80's and early 90's. His speed and ability to get on base helped the bash brothers drive in runs for the powerhouse A's. In 1989, Rickey was named the AL playoff MVP, and in the following year, he was named the Season MVP. On May 29, 1990, in his 11th season, Rickey Henderson stole base number 893, surpassing Ty Cobb as the All-Time AL leader. In less than a year, Rickey would break Lou Brock's all time record of 938 steals, and then go on to leave it far behind. It would take henderson two more seasons to surpass Yutaka Fukumoto, a player in the Japanese Leagues from 1970 to 1988 who held the World's Record of 1,065 career stolen bases. Rickey would need 4 fewer seasons to accomplish the feat. Can you say future hall of famer boys and girls? I knew you could.
He was traded to Toronto Blue Jays on July 31, 1993 for minor leagers Steve Karsay and Jose Herrera. On July 5th of that year, Rickey became the second player in MLB history to leadoff both games of a double header with a homerun, the player to do it before him was Harry Hooper for the Boston Red Sox, back in 1913. The two would later be joined by Baltimore Orioles outfielder Brady Anderson.
On August 13, 1993, Rickey gave teammate Turner Ward $25,000 to have number 24 on his back again. He claimed he wasn't hitting well as number 14. It wouldn't matter too much as on December 17, 1993, Rickey would be signed by the A's, for the third time. Rickey only played two years for the A's before he was signed by the San Diego Padres on December 29, 1995. He signed on for two years. On August 13, 1997, the Anaheim Angels would trade pitchers Ryan Hancock and Steven Agosto for the Style Dog. He would only play a short time for the Angels and the Athletics would pick Rickey up from the seas of free agency. This would mark the fourth different time Rickey played for the A's, a major league record. On September 27, 1998 Rickey Henderson becomes the oldest stolen base leader in major league history as he stole an American League leading 66 bases. Later in that year, free agent Rickey Henderson would sign with the New York Mets.
Rickey was a Met for two years before being released on May 13, 2000. Five days later he would be picked up by the Seattle Mariners. A month and a half before he would be traded, Rickey Henderson would join the Splendid Splinter as the only player to steal a base in four different decades. Later Tim Raines would join the two. On May 23, 2000 Rickey Henderson drew his 2,000th career walk, becoming the third player to do so, behind Babe Ruth and Ted Williams.
On March 19, 2001 the Padres sign Rickey Henderson and send him to Triple-A to get in shape. It is Rickey's first time in the minors since a 3-game rehab 16 years ago. Rickey became the all-time runs leader on October 4, 2001.
Like other great sports players Rickey has been known to slip into the third person at times. While he's not The Rock who refers to himself all the time, I wouldn't even consider him Bob Dole in his amount of third personage. Then again, no one uses it as much as The Rock, except for maybe Caesar, who originated the whole darn thing. After all "Rickey wants to play another year and he thinks he wants to play for you." Needless to say, much fun has been poked at Rickey over some of his more memorable quotes, as Orange Julius points out below.
Rickey has had a Hall of Fame career. I'd be surprised if there isn't a place set aside in Cooperstown for him already. He is the all-time leader in steals with 1402 at the time of this write up. He led the American League in steals a record 12 times. He leads the majors in runs with 2278, walks with 2168, and lead off home runs, with over 77. He will be the only player who has played on 8 teams (or more) who is in, or is an active player with a chance of getting into the hall of fame. Rickey was on the American League All Star Team in 1980, and from 1982 to 1991, a total of 11 times. He also won a Gold Glove for his fielding efforts in 1981.
Rickey was inducted into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame in 2009, his first year of eligibility. He received 94.8% of the vote.
Statistics:
Number: 24 most often; also 14 and 35
Position: Left Field
Height: 5'10"
Weight: 190
Bats: Right
Throws: Left
Season Team G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS
1979 Oak 89 351 49 96 13 3 1 26 34 39 33 11 .274 .338 .336 .674
1980 Oak 158 591 111 179 22 4 9 53 117 54 100 26 .303 .420 .399 .819
1981 Oak 108 423 89 135 18 7 6 35 64 68 56 22 .319 .408 .437 .845
1982 Oak 149 536 119 143 24 4 10 51 116 94 130 42 .267 .398 .382 .780
1983 Oak 145 513 105 150 25 7 9 48 103 80 108 19 .292 .414 .421 .835
1984 Oak 142 502 113 147 27 4 16 58 86 81 66 18 .293 .399 .458 .857
1985 NYY 143 547 146 172 28 5 24 72 99 65 80 10 .314 .419 .516 .935
1986 NYY 153 608 130 160 31 5 28 74 89 81 87 18 .263 .358 .469 .827
1987 NYY 95 358 78 104 17 3 17 37 80 52 41 8 .291 .423 .497 .920
1988 NYY 140 554 118 169 30 2 6 50 82 54 93 13 .305 .394 .399 .793
1989 NYY 65 235 41 58 13 1 3 22 56 29 25 8 .247 .392 .349 .741
1989 Oak 85 306 72 90 13 2 9 35 70 39 52 6 .294 .425 .438 .863
1990 Oak 136 489 119 159 33 3 28 61 97 60 65 10 .325 .439 .577 1.016
1991 Oak 134 470 105 126 17 1 18 57 98 73 58 18 .268 .400 .423 .823
1992 Oak 117 396 77 112 18 3 15 46 95 56 48 11 .283 .426 .457 .883
1993 Oak 90 318 77 104 19 1 17 47 85 46 31 6 .327 .469 .553 1.022
1993 Tor 44 163 37 35 3 1 4 12 35 19 22 2 .215 .356 .319 .675
1994 Oak 87 296 66 77 13 0 6 20 72 45 22 7 .260 .411 .365 .776
1995 Oak 112 407 67 122 31 1 9 54 72 66 32 10 .300 .407 .447 .854
1996 SD 148 465 110 112 17 2 9 29 125 90 37 15 .241 .410 .344 .754
1997 SD 88 288 63 79 11 0 6 27 71 62 29 4 .274 .422 .375 .797
1997 Ana 32 118 21 21 3 0 2 7 26 23 16 4 .183 .343 .291 .604
1998 Oak 152 542 101 128 16 1 14 57 118 114 66 13 .236 .376 .347 .723
1999 NYM 121 438 89 138 30 0 12 42 82 82 37 14 .315 .423 .466 .889
2000 NYM 31 96 17 21 1 0 0 2 25 20 5 2 .219 .387 .229 .616
2000 Sea 92 324 58 77 13 2 4 30 63 55 31 9 .238 .362 .327 .689
2001 SD 123 379 70 86 17 3 8 42 81 84 25 7 .227 .366 .351 .717
Sources:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?statsId=1650
http://www.geocities.com/stolenbaseking/
http://www.infoplease.com/ipsa/A0109272.html
http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Dugout/2543/
http://espn.go.com/page2/s/questions/rhenderson.html
http://www.users.csbsju.edu/~sjfische/rickey.html
http://www.pubdim.net/baseballlibrary/ballplayers/H/Henderson_Rickey.stm
http://www.thebaseballpage.com/past/pp/hendersonrickey/default.htm
Major League Baseball Hall of Fame
← Harry Heilmann | Rickey Henderson | Billy Herman →