Slowest Mets

[seawolf17]

Kinda feel like this deserves its own thread. From the 4/22 IGT:

11 hours ago, Gwreck said:

Also Mark Vientos is possibly the slowest man I have ever seen play for the Mets.  John Olerud carrying a refrigerator is faster.

 

11 hours ago, Edgy MD said:

Wilmer Flores has feelings, you know.

 

11 hours ago, Benjamin Grimm said:

I'm thinking Rusty Staub. 

 

11 hours ago, Frayed Knot said:

Staub second tour was definitely slower.

But Rusty '72- '75 was only somewhat slow. He had 47 career SBs more than half of them (24) of them during a three year span with Montreal in his age 25 to 27 seasons ['69, '70, '71]

 

10 hours ago, Edgy MD said:

  

 

1 hour ago, seawolf17 said:

We used to joke about the time that one of the broadcasters (Kiner?) said something about Charlie O'Brien "carrying a piano on his back" down the first base line.

 

22 minutes ago, The Hot Corner said:

You forgot about me, so soon?

I made numerous unsuccessful efforts at posting a picture of Daniel Vogelbach "running".  https://www.nydailynews.com/2023/08/19/daniel-vogelbachs-grand-slam-secures-mets-series-victory-over-cardinals/

Had to do it this way to make it work.

 

 

[seawolf17]

I know it's only one data point, but Mets with notable CS-SB splits.

Name	SB	CS
Elliott Maddox	6	22
Ed Kranepool	15	27
Doug Flynn	7	15
Mike Vail	0	8
Charlie Neal	3	10
Chris Cannizzaro	1	8
Jerry Grote	14	20
Bobby Klaus	4	10
Bobby Bonilla	8	13
Robin Ventura	6	11
Carlos Baerga	2	7
Ellis Valentine	1	6
Jeff Kent	12	16
Al Moran	3	7
Al Luplow	2	6
Jeromy Burnitz	15	18
Jay Payton	14	17
Félix Millán	11	14
Ron Hodges	10	13
Jim Hickman	9	12
Ryan Thompson	8	11
Tim Teufel	6	9
Willie Mays	2	5
Charlie O'Brien	1	4
Amos Otis	1	4
Mackey Sasser	0	3
Jeremy Reed	0	3

[Edgy MD]

With regard to image posting, right_click the photo of your subject wherever it resides on the Internet, select "Copy image URL" from the menu, and then just drop the URL into a post here.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I don't know. He looks like he's built for speed.

Another way to post photos is to copy the graphic itself and paste it into the edit window. I've found that it works for me when using a PC but not on a smartphone.

[Centerfield]

A lot of those guys had a bit more frame to move so it’s understandable. Mark Vientos is a young, fit dude. It’s inconceivable how slow he is. 
 

Olerud was surprising too. For a guy that all and that athletic he was crazy slow. 

[Edgy MD]

I bet, in a race around bases, Vientos would score and reach second on lap two before Wilmer Flores came around.

And young Wilmer was as fit as a fiddle.

[seawolf17]

Mets with at least 1500 PA and less than 10 total SB attempts:

Name	PA	SB	CS
Rusty Staub	2965	6	3
Dave Magadan	2483	5	3
Gary Carter	2448	2	3
Carlos Delgado	2023	5	1
John Olerud	2018	5	2
Wilmer Flores	2011	3	3
Rafael Santana	1632	2	4
Todd Zeile	1631	4	4

[The Hot Corner]

Granted, Vogelbackh was (is) build like a tank, but he had no SB attempts with almost 2000 PAs in career.  At least you could look at him and anticipate that he wouldn't be very fast on the base paths.  Flores, Vientos, and Olerud are plodders without any visibly obvious reason.

 

 

[Benjamin Grimm]

I was a plodder without any visibly obvious reason. Skinny kid with long legs, but I couldn't move them fast enough. I was always the slowest kid in gym class.

[Centerfield]

5 hours ago, Edgy MD said:

I bet, in a race around bases, Vientos would score and reach second on lap two before Wilmer Flores came around.

And young Wilmer was as fit as a fiddle.

This is true. I remember thinking Wilmer must be flat footed. He was not only slow. He acted like his feet/ankles had fewer joints than the rest of us. 

[Frayed Knot]

4 hours ago, Benjamin Grimm said:

I was a plodder without any visibly obvious reason. Skinny kid with long legs, but I couldn't move them fast enough. I was always the slowest kid in gym class.

Runner's builds are funny sometimes. John Olerud [6' 5"/205] had a similar long, lean build to that of Von Hayes [6' 5"/185], or Cris Collinsworth [6' 5"/192] to bring a football player into the mix. Hayes roamed the OF and stole over 250 bases. Olerud remained anchored at 1B and stole 11 in a longer career. Collinsworth was a schoolboy sprint champion in the state of Florida prior to an eight year career as an NFL wide receiver.

 

And we can talk about who carried around the biggest piano while running all we want. But it took Mo Vaughn so long to round the bases you swear he stopped to play it a couple times.

[Edgy MD]

My All-Sluggish Mets Team

p: Bartolo Colon
c: Wilson Ramos
1b: Mo Vaughn
2b: Juan Uribe
3b: Robin Ventura (in fairness, he came to the Mets immediately after rehabbing from an ankle injury that was BOTH a compound fracture AND a dislocation)
ss: Wilmer Flores
lf: Todd Hundley (that's cheating, but I already kind of cheated with Juan Uribe), otherwise, go with Lucas Duda
cf: Duke Snider (I could be wrong, be he sure looked too old and too heavy in the 1963 bits I've seen)
rf: Rusty Staub I (His other skills made him an average-ish outfielder, but they had a lot to make up for)
 

[duan]

This is well worth a look to get a sense of relative sprint speeds. 
https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/sprint_speed

[MFS62]

Looking at Seawolf's list reminds me that stealing bases wasn't the only thing Al Moran wasn't good it. I can't imagine how he got on base enough times to have that many steal attempts.

Later

[Edgy MD]

5 hours ago, duan said:

This is well worth a look to get a sense of relative sprint speeds. 
https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/sprint_speed

So, my takeway there is that Vientos at full sprint (25.6 ft./sec.) is as slow as Alvarez, but Polanco is even slower.

The part that doesn't show up is that scoring from first on a double goes beyond sprint speed into whatever is left for you to generate after the acid builds up, and what Vientos showed there ... wasn't great.

Looking for the most recent version of the 2025 Giants for Wilmer Flores we find that 33-year-old Wilmer was dragging the ball and chain beyond Vientos at 24.5 ft./sec.  While there, I found it notable that the 30-year-old version of Dom Smith was a half a tick faster than Vientos at 25.7. ft./sec., while Sam Huff came in at a blasphemous 23.4 ft./sec. — which pretty much means that Giancarlo Stanton can catch you from behind.

[Cowtipper]

Pete Alonso never seemed very bright.

[Frayed Knot]

Small sample size obviously, but how about Pitt's Konnor Griffin, all 6' 3" / 222 of him, appearing 7th on that linked running speed list. Of course it helps to be just 20 y/o (today). Think this guy's going to be a menace for years to come?

[The Hot Corner]

Griffin just hit his 1st MLB HR.  His trot around the bases was significantly slower than his top speed.  

[MFS62]

On 4/23/2026 at 4:38 PM, Frayed Knot said:

And we can talk about who carried around the biggest piano while running all we want. But it took Mo Vaughn so long to round the bases you swear he stopped to play it a couple times.

A couple of other slowness expressions.

IIRC Tim McCarver said a player was so slow, you could time him with a sun dial, and

Comedian Ron White used the term "slower than the  speed of smell".

Later