A few of the intelligent, attractive, and generous folks who have read my book, Pinch Hitter, have commented that I should’ve written more about the history of pinch hitters in my brief description before Chapter One. Well, I guess I could’ve done that, but Pinch Hitter is a fictional story about a middle-aged man who becomes a pinch-hitting specialist for his local team. Other than a basic description of what a pinch hitter is and does, I didn’t feel it was necessary to bore everyone with the history. In my description, however, I did mention the three top pinch hitters of all time.

For those who are interested in the history of pinch hitters, I recommend they read Stand and Deliver by Paul Votano. In that book, which I only recently discovered, Paul does an excellent job of chronicling the history of pinch hitting beginning in 1892 and ending in 2001.

However, for those who are interested only in how it all began and where things stand in 2008, I offer the following:

Prior to 1892, substitutions of any kind in major league baseball were only allowed in situations where there were injuries. That rule was changed in 1892, however, and the very first pinch hitter was “Princeton Charlie” Reilly. Reilly, who broke into the big leagues in 1889 with the Columbus Solons, played for only eight seasons. Besides being the first pinch hitter, he was also one of the people involved in the formation of the Pacific Coast League.

There have been many successful pinch hitters over the years. The most famous include Smoky Burgess, Jerry Lynch, Gates Brown, José Morales, and one of my all-time favorites, Manny Mota.

Manny Mota played for twenty seasons in the major leagues and, up until 2001, led all pinch hitters with 150 pinch hits. The right-handed hitter was basically a platoon outfielder who was used against left-handed pitchers until 1974. From that year on, he was primarily a pinch hitter. A singles hitter, Mota had the uncanny ability to drive in runs with line drive singles in the later innings. Hall-of-Fame Dodger announcer Vin Scully once said, “Mota could wake up on Christmas morning and hit a line drive to center.”

Mota passed Smokey Burgess on the all-time pinch hitting list with his 146th career pinch hit on September 29, 1979. The Dominican Republic native finished his career in 1982 with a .304 lifetime batting average.

Mota’s record of 150 pinch hits held up for nineteen years. On October 6, 2001, left-hander Lenny Harris took control of that record by collecting his 151st career pinch hit.

Harris, who played eighteen seasons in the majors, ended his career in 2005 with 212 career pinch hits – which is the current record and may never be broken. Harris also holds the record for the number of pinch-hitting at-bats: 804.

Second on the all-time list is Mark Sweeney. At last count, the left-hander, who is currently playing for the Dodgers, had 163 career pinch hits – although he may have added a couple since these stats were compiled. However, in order to surpass Harris’ record, he would need at least three or four more productive seasons. And, being that he’ll be thirty-eight in October and is hitting below .130, that prospect seems unlikely.

One cannot talk about the greatest pinch hitters of all-time without mentioning John Vander Wal, who holds the major league record for the most pinch hits in a season: twenty-eight in 1991. The same applies to Cliff Johnson, who hit twenty pinch-hit home runs during his twenty year career that ended in 1986. Both of those records may hold up for many years.

And then there’s San Diego rookie pinch hitter, David Robbins – oh, wait…he’s just a character in my book. Sorry, folks…sometimes I get a little confused.

Dean Whitney, a semi-retired music producer & publisher and avid baseball fan, recently self-published his debut novel, Pinch Hitter, through BookLocker.com. Dean also writes a baseball blog, which can be found at Dean’s Baseball blog. To learn more about Dean and his baseball novel, visit Dean Whitney.