A's Stolen Base Records, odds and ends, and such...

Someone submitted a fanpost on this site commenting on how thye A's might steal 200 bases this year (with Crisp, Davis, and Taveras in the starting line-up). 

With that in mind, I think it might be useful to look at one of the many stolen base records associated with the Oakland A's...and no, Rickey Henderson does not hold the record, nor is he part of the group that does.

I draw your attention now to the 1976 Oakland Athletics.  In 1976, Charles Finely still owned the team.  The A's had won the AL West Division the previous year, without Catfish Hunter, but had lost the ALCS in a three game sweep to the Boston Red Sox.  Before the start of the season, the A's traded Reggie Jackson and Ken Holtzman to the Baltimore Orioles. 

That year, the A's were managed by Chuck Tanner.  Tanner must have had a perpetual green light on at first base, because the A's set a modern major league record for stolen bases, swiping an impressive (in fact, unheard of) 341.

The top three base stealers were Billy North--who also led the major leagues with 75, Bert Capaneris with 54, and a very young and speedy Don Baylor came in a close third with 52.  The rest of the team swiped the remaining 160. 

All of this mad dashing around the basepaths wasn't enough to win the division, however, as the A's came in second at 87-74--although they only finished 2 1/2 games behind the Kansas City Royals in what must have been a much weaker division than previous years. 

Rickey Henderson wasn't signed until 1977.  Imagine how many bases the A's might have swiped had he been on that team, under Tanner's managing (571?  More?)!

What I have not been able to track down, is the number of times the A's were caught stealing that year, but it must have been quite high (anyone have a copy of the Baseball Encyclopedia?)

Speaking of which, at the A's fanfest, the subject of statistics came up time and again (usually in the context of asterisks and steroids).  One statistic that I discussed was the changes in what was defined as a stolen base.  Prior to the 20th Century--though again, I am not sure how far back into the past (Baseball Encyclopedia again folks?)--walks, advancing on wild pitches and passed balls, and advancing on sacrifice flys / hits were also counted as stolen bases. 

A great many of the National League major league ball players recorded stolen base totals in the low 100s over the course of the 19th century, but it's likely that most of those were not what Rickey Henderson, Vince Coleman, or Lou Brock would call a stolen base. 

In any case, I am happy to see the stolen base being brought back into the A's offense.  I have argued here (and elsewhere) in the past that it has been sorely missing from the A's game plan for far too long.

With that in mind, even though Taveras is not on the roster, after all, what do AN members project as the A's stolen base total this year?