Alomar broke the 50 barrier twice, but only the great Dave Collins ever made it to 60! Here is the official Top Ten:


Rank    Player              SB          Year
1.    Dave Collins        60        1984
2.    Roberto Alomar        55        1993
3.    Damaso Garcia        54        1982
        Otis Nixon                54        1996
5.    Roberto Alomar        53        1991
6.    Shannon Stewart        51        1998
7.    Roberto Alomar        49        1992
8.    Otis Nixon                47        1997
9.    Damaso Garcia        46        1984
10.    Lloyd Moseby        39        1984
         Lloyd Moseby        39        1987

And Collins wasn't even playing full-time that year, as I recall: he was the larger half of a platoon with Jesse Barfield.

Collins played left field, and Barfield played right field; George Bell, who was playing full-time, shuttled between left and right. Yes, sports fans - Bell was once good enough in the field to play right.

Kind of surprised to see how well the box is doing here.  Collins was just here a brief period but boy could he run.  His '84 season, where he stole the 60, was his best.  120 OPS+, 308/366/444 then traded to Oakland with Griffen (who's bat is best forgotten) to get Bill Caudill.  Two 80 OPS+ before it, two immediately after it.  Now THAT is selling high!

 His '84 season, where he stole the 60, was his best. 

Disagree with that. It was his best OPS+, but in '80 with the Reds (I was in Ohio at the time so remember it well) he stole 79 bases and scored just shy of 100 runs ... Rickey and Raines were just getting started and Collins was widely seen as one of, if not the best leadoff man in the game at the time. (Actually, Rickey was already in the top spot as an '80 rookie, but Collins was right there.) Didn't last, of course.

He was solid in Cincinnati but that Toronto year was the one time he put it all together.  1980 he had 613 PA vs the Toronto 492 which was actually his second highest PA total.  Odd how his career went, from solid leadoff hitter in the Lou Brock mold in Cincinnati to cannon fodder in NY to team MVP in Toronto to cannon fodder in Oakland & Detroit to designated runner status for the rest of his career.

His last season, 1990, he played 99 games and had just 74 plate appearances for good ol' Whitey Herzog in his final season (Herzog fired 1/2 way through, then Red Schoendienst then Joe Torre ran the team to end it).  Funny - Herzog and Schoendienst both finished their managing careers that year along with Collins and John Tudor (after a 146 IP with a 158 ERA+ but a wonky elbow ended it for him).  Quite the goodbye season there in St Louis.

Yes, sports fans - Bell was once good enough in the field to play right.

As someone who grew up with the young George Bell, I never would have thought of him any other way.  Bell was a perfectly fine outfielder up until he was purged, except for the one year in 1988 when he was just terrible and couldn't throw.