Thirteen years have passed since Larry Biittner’s turn on the mound for the Cubs. Position player pitching was still pretty rare in Major League Baseball.

And then came the spring of 1990. You have to remember the context here: The Cubs had come off a division title year in 1989 in which they won 93 games. But they had gotten off to a slow start in 1990 and, after muddling around .500 much of April and May, went on a 4-13 slide that put them 10 games under .500 at 22-32 and in last place in the NL East. A four-game winning streak followed, but the Cubs were still 9.5 games out of first place after winning the first of a series against the Mets at Wrigley Field.

The next afternoon was a disaster. Mets pitchers pounded starter Mike Bielecki for eight runs in less than two innings, and the next two relievers, Kevin Blankenship and Dean Wilkins, weren’t much better. The Cubs were still within shouting distance at 11-6 when manager Don Zimmer called on left-hander Joe Kraemer to start the seventh.

Kraemer was just awful. He faced 17 batters and 13 (!) of them reached base, seven hits and six (!) walks. He allowed eight runs and it likely would have been more except for a double play he started that ended the seventh.

And so, with the score 19-6 after eight innings, Zimmer called on outfielder Doug Dascenzo (who had not started the game) to pitch the ninth. (Video should be cued to the top of the ninth, if not, scroll to 23:35.)

Dascenzo threw a scoreless inning, allowing a hit but getting out of the inning with a double play. The Cubs scored a couple of consolation runs in the ninth and lost 19-8.

The left-handed Cubs outfielder would pitch three more times in 1991, all of them after Zimmer was fired and replaced by Jim Essian. He threw the last two innings of a 13-5 loss to the Dodgers June 10, 1991, also not allowing a run. A few weeks later the Cubs were trailing the Cardinals 14-5 entering the ninth and Dascenzo threw that inning, recording his first strikeout. The Cubs lost 14-6, June 28, 1991. Sadly, no video survives of the strikeout, which was of Cardinals pitcher Willie Fraser.

Dascenzo’s fourth, and final, pitching appearance for the Cubs happened July 2, 1991, when the Cubs went into the ninth inning trailing the Pirates 13-1. Again he registered a strikeout, this one of pinch-hitter Joe Redfield. The Cubs scored three in the ninth, but Dascenzo grounded out to end the game.

Dascenzo is one of only three pitchers in Modern Era (since 1900) Cubs franchise history to throw at least five innings for the team without giving up a run. And one of those was just this year!

While there’s video of Dascenzo pitching, as you see above, there are no still photos of him available to me showing this, so instead you get one of him running the bases.