If you are a third string player in the NFL, you are sitting on the bench hoping someone else gets injured so you have a chance. So, I was wondering in the NFL,MLB,NHL,and NBA what players have spent the most time on the sidelines without playing a down, getting up to bat or going on the court or ice? Has any player spent an entire season on the roster without seeing any action?
Injured reserve lists do not count. Player must be willing ,able and ready to play but coach never sends him in. Minor leagues do not count.
A backup shortstop probably got some time pinch-running or subbing in for other infielders. Plus, Ripkin didn’t play every inning of every game for that whole period: his consecutive inning streak only lasted from 82 to 87. The back-up SS filled in for for him sometimes after that.
NFL QB Todd Collins had last started a game in December 1997, before he started for the Redskins in December 2007. In eight seasons with the Kansas City Chiefs he played in a total of 12 games and attempted 27 passes - so not the same as the OP Q for most time.
But as to has *it ever happened * part of the Question it happens in the NFL with 3rd string QB’s and Rookies fairly often:
In 1998, 1999, & 2000 he played in 0 games for KC and in 2006 he played in 0 games for the Redskins. QB Jason Campbell (then a Rookie QB) played in 0 games in 2005
I was semi-kidding about Ripken’s backup. Guys like Lenn Sakata, who were supposedly backing up Ripken, were usually utility guys who played all over the infield at one time or another. Baseball’s season is so long, even the 25th man on the roster is bound to play 25 or 30 games at least
Third string QB’s often sit 16 games without playing a single down. Gale Gilbert comes to mind.
It has happened in baseball, in the days of the bonus baby rule*. Tom “Money Bags” Qualters played in only one game in 1953 and none in 1954 despite being on the major league roster the entire time.
A team was required to keep a player on its 25-man roster if they paid him more than a set amount as a signing bonus.
I’ve often heard in the “bad old days” of college football that major schools would recruit players simply to keep them away from other schools The school that recruited them had no intention of playing them.
Was this true? Has anyone actually played 4 years of NCAA football at a major school and never gotten into a game?
Obviously, all major league starting pitchers sit on the bench for the vast majority of their team’s games. So any starting pitcher who played a long time, like Greg Maddux or Steve Carlton, was effectively a bench player for thousands of games.
Thousands. Keep in mind that 1A teams have rosters of 80, 90, 100+ players (including walkons), of which only 50 or so play in any given game.
It’s not uncommon for players to be recruited as 18-year-olds and just never develop in the way the coaches thought they would. Until recent years, it was very rare for coaches to take away a player’s scholarship simply because he turned out to not be any good, and so there were some 4-year scrubs.
With respect to baseball, I know of two cases which achieved a modicum of attention in my lifetime, both involving third-string catchers whom the manager didn’t want on the roster, and thus declined to play. (Nowadays teams seldom carry three catchers, but you could do it when pitching staffs were smaller.)
One was Mike Figga, who sat on the Yankees roster (allegedly at the behest of The Boss himself) from Opening Day through June 3, 1999, but appeared in only two games, both as a defensive replacement with no plate appearances.
The other was Jerry Moses, who performed the same role for the White Sox from July 18 through September 11, 1975, and appeared in only two games, one as a pinch-hitter and one as a backup first-baseman in a blowout.
This level of inactivity is increasingly rare, as concern about pitching workloads forces teams to carry and use 12 pitchers, which in turn ensures that all 13 position players will see action. With only four (AL) or five (NL) position players on your bench, you can’t afford a dead spot.
That’s true, but I’ll bet (w/o having any actual facts to back it up), that most scholarship players who’ve been on the team that long get into a game somewhere along the way, at least on the kickoff team in the 4th quarter against Nowhere State.
