Washington held world indoor track records in both the 50- and 60-yard dashes (5.0 and 5.8 seconds), but hadn’t played baseball since his junior year in high school when A’s owner Charlie Finley signed him as the club’s designated pinch runner two weeks before the 1974 season. He appeared in 104 games in 1974-75, never batting, and he stole 30 bases but was not nearly as good a base stealer as his speed would suggest. In the 1974 WS, Washington ran for Joe Rudi in the ninth inning of Game Two after Rudi’s single had cut Oakland’s deficit to 3-2, and was promptly picked off by Dodgers pitcher Mike Marshall.
