Rafael Belliard Home (Run) Page

The Rafael Belliard Home (Run) Page

Rafael Leonidas Belliard was born October 24, 1961 in Pueblo Nuevo in the Dominican Republic. He began playing baseball at age 10. Eventually this led him to professional baseball. He debuted with the Pittsburgh Pirates on September 2, 1982.

He played for the Pirates through their 1990 NL East Division championship season, though he did not have an at-bat in the NLCS that year. He then signed with the Atlanta Braves, and has played with them ever since, as the Braves have won an unprecedented six consecutive division titles.

He has hit two regular season home runs in his career, one in 1987 off of Eric Show of the Padres, and one in 1997 off of Brian Bohannon of the Mets.

Raffy's Stats:

        G       AB      R       H       2B      3B      HR      RBI     BB      SO      AVG     OBP     SLG
1997    72      71      9       15      3       0       1       3       1       17      .211    .219    .276
Career  1148    2281    216     503     55      14      2       141     136     383     .221    .271    .260

Just a graphic illustration of ineptitude here. The man really can't hit any better than your average high school player, and it's amazing to me to think that he's still on the roster when much better players have been sent on. He really should be a coach, that seems a proper role for him. At least he's hurt now.

At his current rate of one home run every ten years, Raffy is on pace to break fellow Brave Hank Aaron's record for career home runs in the year 9537.

Raffy vs. Larry

"Runs Created" is a statistic created by Bill James to put all of a hitter's contributions into one number, reflecting the approximate number of runs that batter's efforts created for his team.

In 1997, Larry Walker of the Rockies led the major leagues with 187 Runs Created. In his entire 16-year Major League career, Raffy has created 161 runs.

But then again, Walker's only played in three postseason games in his career, while Belliard has played for a playoff team in every year there's been a playoffs since 1990.

Belliard Notes

Rafael's cousin Ronnie is a second-base prospect in the Brewers' organization. Ronnie can hit some. His 1997 stats at AAA Tucson:

G    AB   R    H    2B   3B   HR   RBI  BB   SO   AVG
118  443  80   125  35    4    4    55  61   69   .282

Fifteen players since 1900 with 2000 or more plate appearances hit no or one career homer, so Rafael is ahead of all of them.

Rafael was the oldest shortstop in the major leagues in 1997.

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