Steven Ralph Arlin (September 25, 1945 – August 17, 2016) was an American

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

who played for the

San Diego Padres The San Diego Padres are an American professional baseball team based in San Diego. The Padres compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) West division. Founded in 1969, the club has won two NL penn ...

and

Cleveland Indians The Cleveland Guardians are an American professional baseball team based in Cleveland. The Guardians compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. Since , they have played at Progressive Fi ...

for six seasons.

College star

Born in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

, Arlin was a collegiate star at

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

and was a star in the

College World Series The College World Series (CWS), officially the NCAA Men's College World Series (MCWS), is an annual baseball tournament held in June in Omaha, Nebraska. The MCWS is the culmination of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisi ...

. In a 1965 semifinal game against

Washington State Washington (), officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. Named for George Washington—the first U.S. president—the state was formed from the western part of the Washington ...

, he

struck out In baseball or softball, a strikeout (or strike-out) occurs when a batter accumulates three strikes during a time at bat. It usually means that the batter is out. A strikeout is a statistic recorded for both pitchers and batters, and is denote ...

20 batters in 15 innings, both CWS records, in a 1–0 complete game victory for the Buckeyes. Ohio State, however, lost the final game to an

Arizona State Arizona State University (Arizona State or ASU) is a public research university in the Phoenix metropolitan area. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, ASU is one of the largest public universities by enrollment in the ...

team that featured

Rick Monday Robert James "Rick" Monday Jr. (born November 20, 1945) is an American former professional baseball player who now serves as a broadcaster. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a center fielder from 1966 to 1984, most notably as a member ...

and

Sal Bando Salvatore Leonard Bando (born February 13, 1944) is an American former professional baseball player and general manager. He played in Major League Baseball as a third baseman from to , most prominently as the team captain for the Oakland Athletic ...

. The following year in 1966, Arlin led Ohio State to the title and was named the CWS most valuable player. In his two years with the Buckeyes, Arlin posted a 24–3 record with 294 strikeouts. His 165 strikeouts in 1965 remains an Ohio State single-season record; it and the career strikeout record had been set by Paul Ebert in the 1950s. Arlin's number 22 was the first to be retired by the Ohio State baseball team. In 1978, Arlin was inducted into the

Ohio State Varsity O Hall of Fame The Ohio State Varsity "O" Hall of Fame is the athletic hall of fame for The Ohio State University. Its purpose is to recognize individuals who have contributed to the honor and fame of the university in the field of athletics. An athlete must h ...

. In , Arlin was a finalist for the first induction class of the

College Baseball Hall of Fame The National College Baseball Hall of Fame is an institution operated by the College Baseball Foundation serving as the central point for the study of the history of college baseball in the United States. In partnership with the Southwest Collect ...

. In he was inducted.

Minor Leagues

In the Philadelphia Phillies drafted Arlin in the first round (13th overall) in the secondary phase of the amateur draft. On July 25, 1967, he pitched a no-hitter in the Eastern League. Arlin also pitched in the Phillies’ farm system in before being selected by the San Diego Padres in the

expansion draft An expansion draft, in professional sports, occurs when a sports league decides to create one or more new expansion teams or franchises. This occurs mainly in North American sports. One of the ways of stocking the new team or teams is an expansio ...

Major Leagues

Pitching for a struggling young team, Arlin led the

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team ...

in losses in both and (19 and 21 respectively). In those seasons, however, he posted

earned run average In baseball statistics, earned run average (ERA) is the average of earned runs allowed by a pitcher per nine innings pitched (i.e. the traditional length of a game). It is determined by dividing the number of earned runs allowed by the number ...

s of 3.48 in 1971 and 3.60 in 1972. The 1972 season was an especially curious one for Arlin: he pitched a one-hitter, three two-hitters (in one, on July 18 against the Phillies, he had a no-hitter broken up by

Denny Doyle Robert Dennis Doyle (January 17, 1944 – December 20, 2022) was an American professional baseball second baseman who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Philadelphia Phillies, California Angels, and Boston Red Sox. Listed at and , ...

with two out in the ninth— the closest a Padre had come to pitching a no-hitter until

Joe Musgrove Joseph Anthony Musgrove (born December 4, 1992) is an American professional baseball pitcher for the San Diego Padres of Major League Baseball (MLB). He previously played within the Toronto Blue Jays, Houston Astros, and Pittsburgh Pirates organ ...

in 2021), and a 10-inning stint in which he allowed only one hit, yet he finished 10–21. In Arlin recorded a personal best 11 victories against 14 losses, but with a 5.10 ERA—nearly a run and a half above his career ERA to that point. Arlin was primarily a starting pitcher in the major leagues (141 games, 123 starts) but on June 9, 1974, he did pick up his one and only MLB save. Midway into the season, the Padres traded Arlin to the

for two

players to be named later In Major League Baseball, a player to be named later (PTBNL) is an unnamed player involved in exchange or "trade" of players between teams. The terms of a trade are not finalized until a later date, most often following the conclusion of the seaso ...

. The Indians completed the trade a week later by sending pitchers Brent Strom and

Terry Ley Terrence Richard Ley (born 21 February 1947, Portland, Oregon) is a retired baseball pitcher who began his career in the season for the New York Yankees. He was a student of University of Oregon before he was drafted in the 3rd round of the Janu ...

to the Padres. After closing out the season, Arlin, a dental student, retired from baseball and went into the dental profession. During his Major League career, Arlin won 34 games (11 of which were

shutout In team sports, a shutout ( US) or clean sheet ( UK) is a game in which one team prevents the other from scoring any points. While possible in most major sports, they are highly improbable in some sports, such as basketball. Shutouts are usuall ...

s) while losing 67, with 463 strikeouts and a 4.33 earned run average in 788 innings pitched. Arlin's grandfather,

Harold Arlin Harold Wampler Arlin (December 8, 1895–March 14, 1986) was an American engineer and foreman and was arguably the world's first full-time and salaried announcer in broadcast radio. Arlin originally worked as an engineer and later foreman f ...

, was the first broadcaster ever to call a game on radio, an August 5, 1921 game between the Phillies and Pittsburgh Pirates at

Forbes Field Forbes Field was a baseball park in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1909 to June 28, 1970. It was the third home of the Pittsburgh Pirates Major League Baseball (MLB) team, and the first home of the Pittsburgh Steelers ...

. Harold Arlin also broadcast the first-ever football game to be called over the radio months later, a college football game between Pitt and

West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the B ...

Death

Arlin died in

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United Stat ...

on August 17, 2016, at the age of 70.Former Padres pitcher Arlin dies at 70
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Sources

External links