Bill Bergen

Infobox MLB retired
name=Bill Bergen
position=Catcher


bgcolor1=black
bgcolor2=black
textcolor1=white
textcolor2=white
bats=Right
throws=Right
birthdate=June 13, 1878
deathdate=death date and age|1943|12|19|1878|6|13
debutdate= May 6
debutyear= 1901
debutteam= Cincinnati Reds
finaldate=September 20
finalyear=1911
finalteam=Brooklyn Dodgers
stat1label=Batting average
stat1value=.170
stat2label=Home runs
stat2value=2
stat3label=Runs batted in
stat3value=193
teams=
* Cincinnati Reds (1901-1903)
* Brooklyn Superbas/Dodgers (1903-1911)
highlights=

William Aloysius "Bill" Bergen (1878-1943) was a Major League Baseball catcher in the early 20th century. Bill Bergen was born in North Brookfield, Massachusetts on June 13, 1878. He played eleven seasons in the National League, three with the Cincinnati Reds and eight with the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Bergen's claim to fame is his complete inability to hit. The question of who was the worst hitter of all time is obviously a subjective one, but what is known is that no one played as long as Bill Bergen and hit so poorly. Bergen had 3,028 at-bats in his career, and in that time he compiled a batting average of .170, the all-time record low for players who compiled more than 2,500 at-bats. Davy Force is second-to-last with a career average of .211. [Pepper 46] Bergen's career on-base percentage was .194 -- he is the only player with at least 500 at-bats with an OBP under .200. He had only two home runs. In 1909, Bergen hit .139, the lowest average ever for a player who qualified for the batting title. That season, he set another record for futility by going 46 at-bats in a row without a base hit, the longest streak ever by a position player (pitcher Bob Buhl went 88 at-bats without a hit). [Pepper 49] From 1904 to 1911, Dodger pitchers as a group outhit Bergen, .169 to .162. [Pepper 50]

Bergen was able to play for so long despite being such a terrible hitter by playing in an age where pitching dominated and by being a first-rate defensive catcher. Bergen ranks ninth on the all-time list for [http://members.tripod.com/bb_catchers/catchers/fieldcar.htm assists] by a catcher with 1,444, despite never being a full-time player. In 1908, "The Sporting News" called him one of the best catchers in the game. His .989 fielding percentage in 1909 was a record (since broken) for a catcher. [Pepper 48] On August 23, 1909, he threw out six St. Louis Cardinals on the basepaths, a record that still stands. [Pepper 50] Charles Faber, in his book "Baseball Ratings", called Bergen the third-best defensive catcher ever, behind Gabby Hartnett and Pop Snyder and ahead of Johnny Edwards and Roy Campanella. "Total Baseball" ranks Bergen the fifth-best defensive catcher of all-time. [Pepper 51]

Another explanation was that most of the teams he played for were not very good anyway: the Dodgers had a losing record every year Bergen was on the team, bottoming out with a 48-104 record in 1905.

After his terrible hitting finally cost him a job in the big leagues, Bergen played minor-league ball until 1914. He coached and managed in minor league ball until 1920 before retiring. [Pepper 51] He died on December 19, 1943 of heart disease.

His brother was Marty Bergen, who played for the Boston Beaneaters as a catcher, and became infamous for killing his family and then himself.

ee also

*Dead-ball era
*Batting average
*On-base percentage
*Los Angeles Dodgers all-time roster
*Mendoza Line

References and external links

*baseball-reference|id=b/bergebi01
*Pepper, Al. "Mendoza's Heroes: Fifty Batters Below .200".
*SABR [http://bioproj.sabr.org/bioproj.cfm?a=v&v=l&pid=964&bid=925 biography]
* [http://members.tripod.com/~alpepper/billbergen.html Webpage] dedicated to Bergen