Editing Fernando Valenzuela (section)

=== Hitting ===
Valenzuela was considered an atypically good hitter for a pitcher. He won the [[List of Silver Slugger Award winners at pitcher|Silver Slugger award for pitchers]] in 1981 and 1983.<ref name="almanac" /> Of his 41.5 career wins above replacement (WAR), 4.1 were attributed to his bat, including 1.2 WAR in 1990 (in just 78 plate appearances) and 0.6 WAR in both 1981 and 1986 (71 and 116 plate appearances, respectively). By way of comparison, [[Mike Hampton]] (the all-time leader in pitching Silver Sluggers) never tallied more than 1.2 batting WAR in a single season.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Mike Hampton |url=https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/h/hamptmi01.shtml |access-date=October 24, 2024 |website=Baseball-Reference.com |language=en}}</ref>

Valenzuela's best year at the plate was 1990—his last year with the Dodgers—when he had a .304 [[Batting average (baseball)|batting average]] with five [[Double (baseball)|doubles]], a home run, and 11 [[runs batted in]] (RBIs) in 69 [[at-bat]]s. That gave him a 101 [[OPS+]], meaning Valenzuela ranked just above average among all NL hitters that year, including non-pitchers. He batted .200 for his career (187 hits in 936 at-bats, roughly equivalent to two seasons as a position player) with 10 home runs, 26 doubles, and 84 RBIs.<ref name="br" /> Valenzuela was even used on occasion as a [[pinch-hitter]], batting .368 (7-for-19) as such. Twice while with the Dodgers, Valenzuela was called upon to play the [[outfield]] and first base in marathon [[extra-inning]] games in which he did not pitch.<ref>{{cite web|first=Philippe |last=Cousineau|title=Pitchers in the Field: The Use of Pitchers at Other Positions in the Major Leagues, 1969–2009|publisher=Society for American Baseball Research|url=https://sabr.org/journal/article/pitchers-in-the-field-the-use-of-pitchers-at-other-positions-in-the-major-leagues-1969-2009/|access-date=October 23, 2014}}</ref>