Baseball Stars of 1960
As everyone knows from reading the first four posts of my High Heat Stats tenure, I enjoy writing about players and games from the past and this post will be no different, thanks to a gem of a book my brother happened to find in my father’s room.
Now, don’t worry, this will not be a book report – I haven’t written one of those in, well, decades so I probably wouldn’t be any good at it but I will tell you that the book is about 30 players who were touted to be the “Stars of 1960″ and the essays written about them shine a spotlight on their 1959 season(s).
For this piece, I will forego writing about the usual suspects like Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Don Drysdale because that’s boring and predictable. Instead, you will read about Roy Face, Sam Jones, and Wally Moon, who were well-known then but who may not be as recognizable to most fans today.
Roy Face of the Pittsburgh Pirates:
Face was described in the book as “small enough to get by in a New York subway rush, but large enough in spirit and heart to have picked off 18 incredible victories in 57 relief appearances last year.” Those 18 wins that he picked up as a reliever, are still a league record. In 1959, the right hander finished 18-1 with a 2.71 ERA. He followed that up with a 10-8 record in 1960 with a 2.90 ERA, 130 ERA+ and a 1.064 WHIP.
As most baseball fans and historians know, 1960 was also a big year for Face’s Pittsburgh Pirates, who won the World Series in an exciting seven-game set against the New York Yankees. It was also big for Face who became the first pitcher to save three games in a series.
Face made the All-Star team in 1959, 1960 and 1961 and also finished in the Top 20 of the MVP voting from 1958-1960. He finished with a career record of 104-95 and an ERA of 3.48.
Sam Jones of the San Francisco Giants:
According to Arnold Hano, author of the essay on Sam Jones in the book, Jones had the best season of any pitcher in 1959. He won 21 games, pitched four shutouts, was second in strike outs to Don Drysdale – Jones finished with 209, he made 50 appearances, he led the league in earned run average and he performed well against the teams the Giants had to beat – the Braves and the Dodgers. He beat those teams nine times in 1959. Unfortunately for Jones and his Giants, it wasn’t enough. They finished third behind Milwaukee and the Division winning Dodgers with an 83-71 record.
Jones finished second in Cy Young voting, was named to the All-Star team and he also finished 5th in MVP voting in 1959.
He followed that up with a less stellar 1960. It’s not like he was bad, he won 18 games but his ERA went up a tick from his career best 2.83 in 1959 to 3.18. Jones played in his final game on October 3, 1964 with Baltimore.
Wally Moon of the Los Angeles Dodgers:
Moon happens to be the only position player I’m focusing on in this piece and as Ray Robinson says in his essay, “[Moon] has always gotten his job done, but somebody else always has gotten the applause and the kudos.”
And when I googled Moon’s name to get more info on him, “Wally Moon unibrow” was one of the first results I got. This is why:
Wally Moon played with the St Louis Cardinals from 1954-1958 and was traded to Los Angeles in December 1958 along with Phil Paine for Gino Cimoli.
He finished 1959 with a .302/.394/.495/.890 line, hitting 19 home runs and collecting 74 RBI. He was an All-Star and finished fourth in the MVP vote. Moon hit .261/.320/.391/.711 in his first Dodgers World Series appearance in 1959 with one home run and two RBI.
Moon followed up his 1959 with a Gold Glove and 13 home runs in 1960. He actually ended up havin his best offensive season the following year. Moon finished his 1961 batting .328/.434/.940. He also accumulated 89 walks that year.
Moon played with the Dodgers until 1965 when they won another World Series title. He retired at age 35.
***
Other players in the book include Al Kaline, Frank Malzone, Larry Sherry, Early Wynn, Ernie Banks and Rocky Colavito. It was published by Pyramid Books and it cost only 35 cents.
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Rocky Colavito was traded from the Indians to the Tigers after the 1959 season much to the chagrin of the Indians fans. The Indians sagged from 2nd to 4th place and lost more than 1/2 million fans in attendance.
Colavito wasn’t the only player the Indians traded away in the ’59 offseason.
They also traded away Minnie Minoso who was coming off a 12th place MVP finish. Minoso finished 4th in the MVP balloting in 1960.
They traded away Cal McLish who led the team with 19 wins and finished 11th in the MVP balloting. WAR shows that McLish wasn’t very good but it’s still strange that a second place team would want to trade away their top starter.
They traded away Norm Cash (one of the players they got in the Minoso trade) before he played a single game for the Indians.
They traded away Gordy Coleman who went on to have a decent career for the Reds.
Talk about a disastrous offseason….
Give lack of credit where lack of credit is due: Frank “Trader” Lane.
Writer Terry Pluto titled his history of the Indians down period from 1960 – early 90s “The Curse of Rocky Colavito (A Loving Look at a Thirty-Year Slump)”.
The Indians were above .500 only six times in the 34 years from 1960 to 1993.
You gotta wonder about a team that trades its most popular player, especially since he was:
- only 26 years old
- had hit 83 HRs that last two years
- finished 4th and 3rd in the MVP voting the last two years
And they traded Minoso for the second time, the first being in 1951.
I mentioned this before but when they re-acquired Colavito in 1965, they made an even more disastrous trade. It was a three team trade with the Royals and the White Sox and the Indians gave up Tommy John (56.7 subsequent WAR), Tommie Agee (24.3 subsequent WAR) and John Romano (4.5 subsequent WAR).
In 1965, the return of Colavito was regarded as “saving the franchise” in Cleveland. 26 homers, 108 RBI (led the AL).
Bill James wrote about the late 1950s “fad” of the “challenge trade”. As in, I’ll trade my second baseman (or whatever position) for your player at the same position, when there really wasn’t much to choose between the two players. Meaning, there wasn’t much point to the trades, other than the two GMs gambling on the shrewdness of their instincts.
L*O*V*E this!
Somewhere around here I think I still have a couple of the Robinson Baseball Stars of books from the early to mid-60′s (I’ve got more than 20 bookshelves) but a quick search didn’t wasn’t enough to find them. They really take you back to a different world.
I have the Stars of 1963. Besides Daddy Wags, I love the Floyd Robinson bio in that edition.
This book is in relatively good shape considering how old it is although I think if I open it one more time the cover may fall off.
I used to buy these baseball mags as a kid and remember this one. Nellie Fox and iirc Jr. Gilliam from the 59 world series on the cover?
Looks like Face got some official scorer help in his 18-1 season.
This game:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN195905312.shtml
It was 11-11 after 6.
The Pirates scored three in the top of the 7th to go ahead.
Face entered in the bottom on the seventh.
Three scoreless for the win.
Interesting!
I wonder what else we could dig up.
He worked for most of those wins, though.
8 of them he pitched at least 3 innings.
And only 3 of them were one inning.
_____________
And he only pitched well for half the year.
July 9th, he was:
13-0
9 saves
1.10 era
The rest of the way:
5.00 era
1 save
5 blown saves
(5-1 record)
Though Face never got a chance to win this game, a game that featured a sacrifice bunt by the man would would lead the league in homers:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/MLN/MLN195905260.shtml
Voomo (#10):
Why do you say Face got some official scorer help, the win was clearly his?
He entered the game with a 3-run lead.
The pitcher who preceded him, Bob Smith
2 innings
3 runs
1 earned run
Not lousy enough to disqualify him (at least, the way it is done nowadays).
Smith entered the game with a 3 run lead.
He immediately blew the lead.
The Pirates tied it back up while he was pitching.
And the man who pinch-hit for Smith in the top of the 7th, Smokey Burgess, hit a 3-run homer.
Then Face came in for the bottom of the 7th.
Voomo: I rushed to judgment on that one. Actually it fell into the category of “official scorer’s discretion” as you explained.
I suppose the scorer reasoned that Smith left the game (when removed for a pinch-hitter) with the score tied. Thus, he could have no part in the decision.
Of course, that logic would not work if the Pirates were at home, and that pinch-HR by Burgess comes in the 9th inning.
“And the man who pinch-hit for Smith in the top of the 7th, Smokey Burgess, hit a 3-run homer.”
Which is why Face got credit for the win…Smith was out of the game and no longer the pitcher of record.
Burgess’ 17 PH HR have him tied for 6th place overall. When he retired in 1967 he was second only to Jerry Lynch.
Good sleuthing, Voomo. Even if Face hadn’t snagged that questionable win against the Reds, he still would have finished 17-1 and would still be the single-season leader in winning percentage for a year (you need one decision per 10 team games to qualify).
Face’s 18-1 slate in ’59 supplanted Johnny Allen’s 15-1 season in 1937 for the record, and Roy has held the single-season mark now for over 60 years.
Greg Maddux and Randy Johnson came close fairly recently, with Maddog’s 1995 19-2 and RJ’s 18-2 (also in ’95, amazingly).
Also in the top ten all-time are Guidry’s 1978 25-3 mark, Bob Stanley’s 15-2 record that same year as a reliever for Boston, and Cliff Lee’s 22-3 2008 season with the Indians.
D’oh! 2013 – 1959 = 54 years Face has held the record.
Biggest differential between wins and losses is 29 by Jack Chesbro (41-12), Walter Johnson (36-7) and Smoky Joe Wood (34-5).
I assume that we’re talking about post-1901 here since in 1884 Old Hoss Radbourn put up a record of 59 and 12, or a W-L differential of 47. And it used to be 60 and 12 until it was changed recently.
Hard to imagine that the 29 W-L will ever be broken much less 47.
If we’re gonna let Old Hoss in, we may as well mention Al Spalding’s 54-5 record (a differential of 49) in the National Association in 1875.
Of course, Spalding’s team, the Boston Red Stockings, went 71-8 that year and won the league by 15 full games.
Yes, but Old Hoss shares a birth day with me whereas Al Spalding does not so his record doesn’t count.
That actually works for me.
Roger Clemens was 20-1 after 145 team games in 2001.
Then got out-pitched by
Tanyon Sturtze
and rookie Joe Kennedy
of the 100 loss Tampa Bay DevilRays.
And Clemens’ earlier loss that year was to Aaron Sele, who started off 12-1, before finishing 15-5.
Face was 17-0 at one point of the ’59 season. His only loss that year came at the hands of the Dodgers in this game:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/LAN/LAN195909111.shtml
Going into the last game of the 1937 season Indians P Johny Allen was 15-0. He started the last game of the season on two days rest to try to tie the AL record of 16 straight wins during the course of a season. Jake Wade of the Tigers out-pitched him with a 1-0 one-hitter. In the first inning Pete Fox of the Tigers reached on a hard-hit grounder that 3B Odell Hale could not handle and then scored on Hank Greenberg’s single, his 183rd RBI of the year. Allen later almost came to blows with Hale. Allen had already set the AL record for consecutive wins overall with 17 over two seasons. Earlier in 1937 Carl Hubbell set the ML record with 24.
The following year Allen lost his first game, but then won his next twelve. Counting the two games he won at the end of ’36, Allen went 29-2 over a 31 decision stretch.
Richard already mentioned his 1-0 loss. In his other loss during that period, the Indians outhit the Browns 11-6 and also drew 5 walks. But they only scored 2 runs and lost 6-2. With a few breaks, Allen could have won 31 straight games. Here’s the box score for his other loss:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CLE/CLE193804190.shtml
Other similar reliever seasons.
Face pitched 57 times, all in relief, finishing 47 but saving only 10.
Ron Perranoski went 16-3 for the 1963 Dodgers, with 69 appearances, 47 games finished and 21 saves.
Another Dodger, Phil Regan went 14-1 in 1966, pitched 65 games, all in relief, finished 48 and saved 21.
Ron Davis went 14-2 for the 1979 Yankees, despite appearing only 44 times (all in relief) and finishing only 21, nine of them for saves.
Bob Stanley went 15-2 for the 1978 Red Sox (2-0 in 3 starts, 13-2 in 49 relief games), with 35 games finished and 10 saves. Two of those three starts came down the stretch with the Sox battling the Yankees. That is interesting because the Sox were hot then (finished 12-2), and it also wasn’t because of a buildup of games (last double-header was Aug 30). It was in the first half of September (3-13) when the Sox might have used a spot start by Stanley to shake things up and break their slide.
And, don’t forget Jim Konstanty of the Whiz Kid Phils of 1950. Jim went 16-7 in 74 appearances, all in relief. Those were the records at the time for games and relief appearances, breaking Ace Adams’ marks. But, still don’t know how that adds up to an MVP season, especially since Konstanty was 0-2 with a blown save in the last week of the season.
To someone of my generation, these three players are quite well known. Sam Jones was sort of a lesser Dazzy Vance, a strikeout artist who came to the bigs at an advanced age but performed well from the start. For six years he was a real force. Roy Face was a late-comer, too, but he went on to be the Pirate’s bullpen anchor for fourteen years. He was a small, slightly built guy, who made his teammate of five years, Harvey Haddix, seem like a husky. At 5’8″ and 5’9″
they were quite possibly the shortest pair of World Series pitching heroes (1960) in history. Wally Moon batted .295 or better seven times in eight years, was ROY, and was the key new player in the Dodger rebound to the 1959 pennant after they fell to 7th place in 1958.
I have to mention a fave of mine even though I never saw him play, Eddie Lee. 5th in NL WAR that year, 2nd in OPS, a top level career up to that point, and future COGs member.
It seems to me that “Roy” Face was called “Elroy” at least as often when he was playing. I remember a game in the old Jarry Park in Montreal where Face was pitching to Henry Aaron – Aaron hit about 5 balls over the left field fence but foul; before adjusting his timing and hitting one fair -nothing reached the catcher — it sticks in my mind as one of the greatest batter-pitcher mismatches i ever saw ( at least until Pedro in 2000)
Well, to be fair, Face was pitching in his last year, at age 41.
Aaron was still in his prime at 35, leading the NL in total bases, EXBH, and second in HRs, SLG, OPS, OPS+, adjusted batting wins (all to McCovey- he totally dominated that year…).
That must’ve quite an amazing at bat. I remember Carlton Fisk as someone who would pull a lot of pitches just foul down the LF line at Fenway in the 70s. He might hold the unofficial record for most foul balls like that at Fenway.
Right – the expos didn’t have a closer , i don’t think they even knew what one was , but Face was expected to pitch a couple innings without getting killed when the starter ran out of gas. All he had left was guile , not enough against Henry
What’s the back story for the 1958 AL MVP award? Mickey Mantle finished 5th and really had the best year, what’s the scoop?
1) He’d won the two previous years. 2) his BA had fallen from .365 to .304. 3) his RBI total was viewed as suspect. 4) the Yankees, though winning the pennant, had tanked badly the last two months of the season.
NSB,
Sorry for the duplication, I was typing #42 when you posted #41.
How badly did the Yankees “tank” the last two months? I see they were 27-28 from August 1st on, but they still won the pennant by 10 games.
That Yankee “tank” carried over into the 1959 season. They started out with a record of 27-29 and were in last place as late as May 29. When they first hit the cellar the New York Daily News ran it on their front page. They recovered enough to stagger to a third place finish.
As far as Turley is concerned he had the most wins, most CG and best W-L% on the pennant winner. IMHO that alone accounted for his high finishes in the MVP and CYA voting.
They had a 17 game lead on August 2, which dwindled to 9 games on Sept. 29. The slump went on through the entire 1959 season, in which they finished a poor third at 79-75. I guess you had to be there, but, for the 1950s Yankees, this was tanking.
RC:
Great minds think alike, but yours is quicker.
NSB,
Thanks for filling me in. Their 92 wins in 1958 was their worst since 1946.
One thing I noticed was that they were incredibly consistent from 1947 to 1957 – over those 11 years, they had 94-99 wins EVERY year but one, and 103 W in 1954, when they were eight games behind the Indians.
Even though the Yankees played poorly down the stretch, Mantle played quite well. His first half OPS was .977. Second half was 1.091, 129 points higher. His OPS for August was 1.126, for September/October it was 1.024.
And it’s a bit odd that Turley finished ahead of Mantle since Turley was a part of the collapse: 2.41 ERA in the first half, 3.57 in the second.
Course I’m sure those stats weren’t available in ’58….
Hard to imagine , but sports illustrated was promoting a stat in those days they called “runs Produced” (I think) which was R+RBI-HR ( not to double count the solo HR , I guess) – they would publish the leaders ever week – Mantle was never there – he hit too many home runs. RBI men were highly regarded, and while it may be obvious to you and I that an offensive counting stat that SUBTRACTS HR may be slightly flawed , I think iti helped baseball “insiders” prove that Mantle was overrated
Scratch that , even on that stupid basis Mantle led the league , 182- 170 over Jensen — should’ve checked first, not gone by memory — goes to show my memory isn’t what it was 55 years ago.
Yeah, it does seem odd – maybe it’s as simple as the writers not wishing to give the award three times in a row to _any_ player, no matter how good a season that player had. Plus, Mantle had a bit of a “down” year by his own lofty standards – “He only hit .304, he and didn’t even drive in a 100 runs!” they might have said. Ridiculous, but that may be the way that they thought.
Looking over the actual voting for the 1958 AL MVP, it was by no means a decisive win for Jackie Jensen. Four players got first-place votes, and their total votes were also fairly close:
- Jackie Jensen, Bos (9)/ 233 total points
- Bob Turley, NY (7)/ 191
- Rocky Colavito, Cle (4)/ 181
- Bob Cerv, KC (3)/ 164
- Mackey Mantle (0)/ 127 total points
Even if just look only at the conventional Triple Crown stats, it’s hard to see what real advantage Jensen has over Mantle; he had 25 more RBI than Mantle (122/97), but Mantle beat him in BA (.304/.286) and HR (42/35).
Plus, there’s the matter of the Yankees winning the pennant rather handily (10 games), while the Red Sox finished a respectable but mediocre third (79-75, 13 GB).
I’m glad Jensen did win an MVP, because I’m a Red Sox fan and Jensen was an excellent player for a few years, keeping alive the Red Sox streak of having an MVP every decade of the modern MVP award. But I’ve gotta agree with you, Mantle should’ve won it that year.
If they didn’t want to give it to Mantle again, they could’ve given it to his team mate Bob Turley. Getting back to the subject of several above posts, if they didn’t wish to give it to a Yankee again (six of the previous eight AL MVP awards had gone to Yankees), they could’ve given it to Rocky Colavito, or to Bob Cerv (the NL gave the award to a player {Banks} whose team record was about as bad as the KC A’s).
Turley would have been as bad a pick as Jensen. He wasn’t even the best pitcher on his own team (Whitey Ford, as usual, was).
Well, I didn’t say that Turley _deserved_ to be the MVP, merely that by the writers standards of the time, and the actual writer’s vote that I listed above, the writers did consider him a very strong MVP candidate.
I agree, Ford had a better year than Turley in 1958.
However, Turley was the only 20-game winner in the AL; 21, four more than anyone else. I’m sure that made a big impression on the writers at the time. Plus, he led the AL in W/L% (.750), CG (19), H/9 IP (6.53). On the negative side, he also led in walks.
Bill James once wrote that the very greatest players whose careers started since the modern MVP awards voting started in 1931 (Williams, Musial, Mantle, Mays, Morgan, Schmidt) deserved to win MVPs many times during their careers, but the writers limited any one player to two/three MVPs.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that you endorsed Turley. Although I don’t agree w/the voters I do see why some would vote for him. I think it’s crazy though that Turley finished a fairly close second and won the Cy Young award while Ford didn’t register a single for either.
Ford’s seasonal stats were good, but 1) he was on the disabled list for 15 days in September; 2) he went from 13-4 to 14-7 over the last two months and the team lost 6 of his last 7 starts. Turley kept pitching well and getting wins. They both burned up the league during the first half of the season.
I remember when 7 players had 3 MVPs: DiMaggio (sorry Ted), Foxx, Musial, Campanella, Mantle, Berra, and Schmidt. Bonds, Rodriguez, and Pujols were next. Obviously Bonds broke through the 3 barrier. Highly unlikely Rodriguez has another in him. Pujols may get to 4, perhaps, but I doubt it. I don’t see anyone else getting 3 for quite a while. It’s for a few special players.
Pujols, Williams and Musial also came in 2nd four times. Not sure if anyone has more than that.
And somewhat oddly, Hank Aaron finished 3rd six times, but NEVER finished 2nd.
I think you’re right. I was going to say Mantle but he had 3 2nds and a 3rd. And Aaron’s 6 3rd place finishes always got me, but then, I guess it goes along with his insane consistency, easy to overlook, I suppose. 13x in the top 10, though except for one 17th place finish, I see Mays came in the top 6 every year from 54 to 66, and Musial came in the top 10 14x, Bonds also 13x.
Manny Ramirez had 9 top ten finishes without ever winning. Likely a record.
Kaline also had 9 top ten finishes without winning. And Jeter currently has 8.
Conversely, Yount had 2 top 10 finishes and 2 awards (Campanella had a 10th place finish to go with his 3), so that’s also likely a record. Only 3 all star games for Yount. In his MVP year in ’89 Ripken and Fernandez were the SSs, Yount was out, and from the splits it looks to me like Yount had a much better 1st half than both of them and a very consistent year overall.
Yount played centerfield in ’89, not shortstop. The all-star outfielders that year were Bo, Kirby, and Ruben Sierra, with Devon White, Mike Greenwell, and Canseco as the backups.
Actually it looks like Canseco was selected to start the ’89 All-Star game but was replaced due to injury. (Canseco didn’t play that year until the second half).
What I can’t figure out is why Devon White was on the team and not Yount. White was batting .259 with 9 home runs and 39 RBIs. And he was in the midst of a terrible slump. Yount was hitting .299 with 10 home runs and 54 RBIS. On top of that, Yount was an established star and White wasn’t.
It’s not like the Angels needed a representative. Chuck Finley was on the team. Though even that’s a bit odd. Why Finley and not teammate Bert Blyleven? Finley was 8-7 with a 2.23 ERA. Blyleven was 8-2 with a 2.15 ERA. Plus, Blyleven had made two more starts and pitched 12.2 more innings than Finley. Weird. Just another reason why all-star appearances should NOT be used in assessing whether someone’s worthy of the HOF!
Aha, dang, I forgot all about that. OF, CF, DH that year. Well in that light he was having an okay 1st half, and from the looks the MVP voting and WAR totals that year, and that the Brewers were a 500 team, I’m a bit surprised he won.
Mantle also should have won in ’61, even though Maris broke the HR record. But as Ed says below, there was no availability to “non traditional” stats back then. The vote was split more than I would have guessed. Gentile got 5 first place votes, Maris 7 and Mantle 6. The other two went to Arroyo and Cash. Interesting that another Yankee besides Mantle and Maris got a 1st place vote that year. He had a good season, but…
#46/Howard,
Apology accepted, not that anything you wrote was actually _wrong_ , or that I would disagree with.
As for Ford not getting any CYA votes – you’re right, that is rather astonishing, since Ford led all of MLB in ERA by almost half a run in 1958. Then I realized:
- the CYA was for ALL of MLB in 1958, not just the AL
- there was only the first-place vote for the CYA, no 2nd/3rd etc…
This is what I love about this site, that someone can make a post about an old book they found, “Baseball Stars of 1960″, then Timmy Pea brings up the 1958 MVP award, then myself and other people bat that back and forth, till we cover the 1958 CYA award also.
I still think that’s part of baseball’s golden era. When the best athletes in the US spent their entire youths trying to become baseball players over the other sports. When semi-pro baseball was a religion. The period between integration and baseball’s fall out of favor in the late 70s gave us some remarkable talents. I think today we have Latin America with it’s baseball farms giving us plenty of talent but I’ll always go back to the earlier era to see baseball’s “peak”.
I still wonder of Joe Morgan or Hank Aaron would have become football players if they were born a few decades later.
I think that for most people their “Golden Age” for sports/ music/ movies/ TV/ whatever else, is the period from whenever they first discovered it, to whenever they became adults and could no longer follow their avocation with the same passion as before.
This would probably correspond in baseball to ages 9-10 to 18-21. Some people (like the majority of the posters here?) continue their passion well into adulthood. To me, the “Golden Age” for anything is when you happened to have the most interest in it.
I think that the level of overall talent in MLB is as high as it has ever been. However, I think that there was definitely more parity between teams in the 1970s/80s than today.
Who were the last 2 MVP’s to lead the league in triples in consecutive years?
I’m pretty sure Jimmy Rollins in 2007 was the last MVP to lead his league in triples. Not sure yet about your actual question, Tim.
How about Rod Carew and Jim Rice in ’77/’78 in the AL, Tim?
Looks like Rollins is one of them. He led in ’01 and ’02 plus a few other times.
I think the other guy is from the same era as Carew and Rice (Carew led twice, non-consecutively; Rice led once)
I read Tim’s question differently than you did, Ed. To me, it’s answered @59.
I’m guessing you’re looking for a guy who won an MVP and led his league in triples in any two consecutive years of his career, whether or not those years were MVP years. That’s a different question.
I agree the question is somewhat open to interpretation. For the Rice/Carew answer though the question should be something like:
Who were the last two consecutive MVP’s to lead the league in triples?
Stan Musial actually led the league in triples every year when he won his 3 MVP’s. None of them were consecutive however.
The closest he came was in ’48 & ’49 when he led the league in triples both years, won the MVP in ’48 and finished 2nd in ’49.
Willie Mays led the league in triples in ’54 & ’55, won the MVP in ’54 and finished 4th in MVP voting in ’55.
George Brett would be another guy, Ed. Won the MVP in ’80, led in triples in ’75 and ’76.
Ty Cobb was MVP in 1911 and led the league in triples in 1917 and 1918
If we’re doing MVP’s and triples…who’s the only MVP winner to lead the league in triples three straight years?
Zoilo!
And I’m predicting he’ll be joined this year when Austin Jackson has a huge breakout season…
I hope.
Zoilo is correct!
How about Sandberg and McGee?
Sandberg hit 19 triples that year. His next highest was 8 which he did twice.
I understand fully that triples are biased toward left-handed batters, but I still find it odd that Rickey Henderson’s career high in triples is only seven.
I guess part of the reason is that Rickey just hit the ball too hard a lot of the time (triples are often hit more weakly than doubles), plus despite great speed Rickey was never that quick getting out of the box. He was momentarily distracted by what Rickey had just done with the bat.
Of the 22 players with 500 or more stolen bases, Rickey has the fourth-fewest number of triples. His career total of 66 is ahead of only Otis Nixon (27), Davey Lopes (50), and Cesar Cedeno (50).
Henderson’s rate of one triple every 202 at-bats is second-worst among this group of base-stealers (Nixon is first).
That is weird Bstar, I would figure Henderson for more triples. On a separate note, look at the hitting stats for Ozzie Guien, he was terrible.
Here are a couple of articles re: Rickey’s “missing” triples. For the second article, you need to scroll down near the bottom.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=neyer_rob&id=1542089
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/endangered-species-the-three-base-hit/
A shout out for Roger Metzger who might be the worst hitter to lead his league in triples more than once.
Ozzie Guillen’s -296 Rbat is the second worst of all-time. Only Larry Bowa (-306) is worse. Of course, they both had long careers which is one of the reasons they were able to accumulate so much negative Rbat.
Thanks for the links, Ed. I find this quote from Rickey in the first article very interesting:
“I don’t claim to be the fastest runner in baseball. I don’t think I’ve ever been the fastest.”
Odd for Rickey to admit something like that, but I guess in a backhanded way he was trying to compliment his artistry at stealing bags.
I would agree, though. Willie Wilson, Tim Raines, Willie McGee, and a young Juan Samuel were possibly all faster than Henderson, although I don’t think this would have anything to do with Rickey’s low triples total.
The second article makes a great point about the stadiums in Oakland and New York not being triples havens, especially for right-handed hitters. Fangraphs lists the park factor for RH triples in 2011 to be 84 in NY and 92 in Oakland.
Ricky was dead pull and righty. Where is he going to hit his triples to? A lot of successful right handed bats work the whole field, Ricky basically gave the right fielder the AB off when he was up. NY and Oakland are indeed pretty tough to hit a down the 3b line triple in.
Also, Ed, thanks so much for those links.
That would be the great baseball years of 1984 and 1985. Let’s not forget the all time triples leader is Wahoo Sam Crawford who hails from my home town of Wahoo, Nebraska.
I looked at Mcgee but forgot to even consider Ryno, good call Tim.
It looks like Wahoo Sam is the only guy with six triples crowns. Lance Johnson, Willie Wilson, and Musial have five apiece.
Lance Johnson is also the only player to lead his league in triples for four consecutive years.
Since this has become somewhat of an open thread, here’s some good news coming from the SABR conference in Arizona. Rawlings has introduced a saber element into their Gold Glove process and will send out saber info to all voters. Here’s the link and the relevant quote:
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/gold-glove-awards-take-another-step-forward/
“Rawlings Sporting Goods Company, Inc. [...] announced today during the Society for American Baseball Research’s annual SABR Analytics Conference in Phoenix a new collaboration with SABR. This collaboration will add a new sabermetric-based component to the Rawlings Gold Glove Award® and Rawlings Platinum Glove Award™ selection processes.
As part of the multi-year collaboration beginning with the 2013 season, SABR will develop an expanded statistical resource guide that will accompany the Rawlings Gold Glove Award ballots sent to managers and coaches each year. In addition, SABR will immediately establish a new Fielding Research Committee tasked to develop a proprietary new defensive analytic called the SABR Defensive Index™, or SDI™.”
But it’s so entertaining when the give a Gold Glove to a Designated Hitter…
This post got me going down memory lane, so I broke out some of my old cards. I always liked the “special series” cards — you know, the 10 or so cards each year that are part of the complete set, but that commemorate milestones, do flashbacks, etc.
Anyway, I was looking at my 1961 Topps cards and zoomed in on the “special series” cards, or, what they were then calling them, “Baseball Thrills.”
Card #403 [Brooklyn-Boston Play 26-Inning Tie] is about the May 1, 1920 game at Braves Field that went 26 innings and finished in a 1-1 tie.
Ten players had 10 or more at bats, including Brooklyn hurler Leon Cadore, who went the full 26 innings, along with Boston counterpart Joe Oeschger. Imagine that! Two pitchers combine for 52 innings of 2-run ball on a Saturday afternoon!
It boggles the mind to think that each pitcher faced 90+ batters in a single outing. I wonder how many pitches that translated to?
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BSN/BSN192005010.shtml
The players begged the umpire not to call the game due to darkness when he did because they wanted to get in the equivalent of three games. The ump said no-go.
Cadore declined pretty quickly after that game, but Oeschger didn’t. But in fairness, Oeschger wasn’t that good to begin with. Cadore was pretty good before he pitched the 26-inning game.
However, even Oeschger gave up 19 earned runs in 19 innings pitched (3 games) after his 26-inning performance. Then he went back to his usual mediocre self for five more major league seasons. In fact, in 1921 he had a 20-14 record although his numbers weren’t otherwise great.
Cadore basically went from a 2 point something ERA pitcher to a 4 point something ERA pitcher. I guess the birth of the live-ball era had something to do with that. But Cadore was finished in 1924 after pitching four innings in the majors that season, and also getting his ass kicked in the minors that year.
Lesson: You can ruin a pitcher’s career by letting him throw too many pitches in one game. But many managers have made the same mistake since.