#2 - I know the guy you are talking about because of his unique career. His name was Darrell Woodard and he made it to the big leagues for a brief time. Never had a hit. Reached base once by walk but had 10 runs, 3 steals and caught stealing 4 times. A's mainly used him as a pinch runner.
He wasn't bad at the plate in the minors. He knew how to take a walk and reached base often but he was playing when batting average was still king of stats. Had he come along a decade later when Tony Larussa was managing the A's he might have made a decent career for himself as TLR placed a higher value on on-base percentage.

No apology needed. I'm sure he would appreciate just being remembered.
My father was a Vietnam vet too. He was never the person he was before he went according to my mom. He had a lot of mental health and addition problems after coming back but he loved baseball and that is one of the few good things he passed on to me. He used to read Bill James in the 1980's and got me interested in SABR. It is my interest in SABR that led me to know who you were talking about.
Charlie Finley owned the A's back then. He took a lot of unorthodox approaches towards baseball and one of those was the idea of the "designated runner". He'd keep a guy on the roster who rarely if ever hit or played the field, just pinch run. Herb Washington was the most of famous of those. He played in 105 MLB games and stole 31 bases but never had a plate appearance or played the field.