Luke Appling was a solid second in the voting in each of the past three rounds, his first three rounds on the ballot. He finally broke through to the top spot this round, becoming the 83rd inductee into the High Heat Stats Circle of Greats. More on Luke and the voting after the jump.
Most Career Wins Above Replacement (WAR, Baseball-Reference version) By A Hitter With a Higher Career OBP Than SLG
1. Ozzie Smith 76.5
2. Luke Appling 74.5
3. Willie Randolph 65.5
4. Richie Ashburn 63.4
5. Billy Hamilton 63.3
6. Brett Butler 49.4
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Most WAR by a Non-Pitcher, Age 39 Season To Career End
1. Luke Appling 19.2
2. Barry Bonds 18.6
3. Cap Anson 17.5
4. Carlton Fisk 15.4
5. Honus Wagner 14.7
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Highest Career On-Base Percentage By an AL Hitter With at least 100 Games Played at Shortstop
1. Luke Appling .399
2. Johnny Pesky .394
3. Joe Sewell .3909
4. Joe Cronin .3906
5. Buddy Myer .3894
6. Eddie Joost .3893
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Most Hits By A Batter Hitting Fifth in the Batting Order, 1921-2014
1. Luke Appling 1,132
2. Harry Heilmann 1,071
3. Pie Traynor 993
4. Jimmie Foxx 986
5. Chick Hafey 963
6. Ernie Banks 960
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Notes on this round’s voting:
–It has been unusual recently for a candidate to receive more than 20 votes in each of his first three rounds on the eligible list while falling short of induction each time. Luke Appling did that in his first three rounds before winning induction in this, his fourth, round. The most recent guys to top 20 votes in each of their first three COG voting rounds, without winning induction in any of the three, have been Bob Gibson and Gaylord Perry.
–Appling is the third hitter born in 1907 to be inducted into the COG, joining Bill Dickey and Jimmie Foxx. So far only 1931 (Mantle, Mays, Mathews and Banks), 1934 (Aaron, Clemente, Kaline) and 1968 (Piazza plus the co-birthday first basemen Jeff Bagwell and Frank Thomas) have matched or exceeded that size haul of Circle of Greats hitters. We’ve got a long way to go though.
–Somehow voters continue to keep 18 holdovers on the eligible list. All of the guys “on the bubble” reached the 10% support level required to survive to the next round, although Wes Ferrell made it by the thinnest possible margin, hitting 10% on the nose.
–The one holdover who fell below 10%, Roy Campanella, was not on the bubble, as he went into this round with a round of eligibility to spare. Having used that up now, though, Campy will be on the bubble next round. That will make a whopping total of ten guys on the bubble next round.
–We remain at 18 holdovers because Luke Appling, who ascends to the Circle, is replaced on the holdover list by this round’s most popular newcomer, Joe Cronin, who not only topped the 10% support level needed to come back, he hit the 25% level (albeit with no room to spare) that allows him to stay off the bubble next time.
–We appear to have gone this round without ballots from one or more of our regular voters, disappointed in being unable to vote for the 1906-born Satchel Paige. Paige didn’t meet the minimum requirement of major league participation for standard entry on to the birth year ballot. That Paige was not permitted to play in the majors until he was into his 40s surely robbed not only Paige but major league fans of what could have been an amazing MLB career. Another reminder that bigotry hurts not only the excluded (though of course it hurts them most grievously), but the wider population as well. Those who do think it appropriate to bring Satchel Paige into the COG despite his short MLB career are welcome to vote for him in the next Redemption Round — if he gets enough votes there, he will be included in the following induction round.
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The full spreadsheet showing this round’s vote tally is here: COG 1906 Vote Tally.
Three spreadsheets provide past vote totals for previous COG rounds, and related information about past COG voting. The newest such spreadsheet, which will collect votes from this current 1906 round (Round 83) and all our subsequent COG balloting from now on, is here: COG Vote Summary 3 . Spreadsheets showing results from previous COG rounds are here: COG Vote Summary/Rounds 1 through 37 and here: COG Vote Summary Rounds 38 through 82 . In all three of these archive spreadsheets, raw vote totals for each past round appear on Sheet 1; click on the Sheet 2 tab to see the percentage vote totals for each past round.
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A spreadsheet listing the full membership to date of the Circle of Greats, along with some stats for each member, is here: Circle of Greats Membership . Hitters are on Sheet 1, pitchers are on Sheet 2. You can also find that same link any time by clicking on “Circle of Greats” at the top of the High Heats Stats home page.
Another COG data spreadsheet showing each season a COG member played in the majors, along with the team he played for that season and his baseball-reference WAR (overall WAR for everyday players, pitching WAR for pitchers) for the season, is here:
Circle of Greats Seasons
Highest single-season batting average, qualifying seasons 1933-2014
1. T.Williams .406 (1941 BoSox)
2. T.Gwynn, .394 (1994 Padres)
3. G.Brett, .390 (1980 Royals)
4. T.Williams, .38809 (1957 BoSox)
5. R.Carew, .38799 (1977 Twins)
6. L.Appling, .38783 (1936 Sox)
Apropos of nothing, really, except that I was thinking about the Brett season recently:
Of these six high average seasons, only one, Carew’s, involved more than PAs in the low 600s, and only Carew’s and Appling’s generated more than 200 hits. Gwynn’s was in a truncated season, Brett was injured for quite a bit and had only 515 PAs, and Appling and Williams missed a fair amount of playing time.
I’d give Williams credit for 1941 and Carew and Appling for their years, but the other three I have to wonder about a little.
@2/nsb;
What are wondering about? As long as they meet the minimum standards to qualify for The Batting Title, one BA is as valid as another. It is not surprising that it would be easier to hit for a higher BA with more games missed and fewer official AB’s.
I’m sure there have been at least a few cases where if you removed the first/last month of a player’s season, their high BA would be even higher. For instance, in 2013 Miguel Cabrera was hitting .360 on Aug 25th, but finished at .348.
I kinda get where he’s coming from. If you’re asking from the “what’s more impressive, Carew or Gwynn?” perspective.
For what it’s worth, the Baseball-Gauge has a “Hits Above Average” tool (http://seamheads.com/baseballgauge/history.php?tab=5b). Of the six seasons mentioned in obs’s original post:
1. Carew (1977), 74.0
2. Williams (1941), 58.5
3. Brett (1980), 55.2
4. Gwynn (1994), 55.1
5. Williams (1957), 48.6
6. Appling (1936), 48.2
As you see, Carew’s edge is ABSURD (#9 overall from 1901-today).
Among players since 1912, Ichiro’s 2004 is tops, when he recorded 77 more hits than an average player would have, given his PAs.
I looked at the season where John Olerud was hitting .400 into August. From August 3, 1993, through the end of the regular year on October 3, the Ole hit .290, which brought his season average down to .363. On August 11, 1993, which was the date of his last game in 1994 with the labour troubles (he was playing in Canada), Olerud was hitting .392 .
I just looked at Boggs’ gamelogs to see if he’s in this conversation. Found something else.
1995 Home/Away
.379 / .459 / .502 / .961
.256 / .355 / .324 / .679
Must’ve been some good chicken at Yankee Stadium.
All-Time Vote update!
Craig Biggio – 763
*Roberto Alomar – 704
*Eddie Murray – 660
John Smoltz – 658
Kenny Lofton – 608
Ryne Sandberg – 607
Edgar Martinez – 507
Lou Whitaker – 493
*Harmon Killebrew – 431
Whitey Ford – 382
Bobby Grich – 376
Sandy Koufax – 375
Tony Gwynn – 346
Willie McCovey – 336
*Kevin Brown – 301
Juan Marichal – 268
Tom Glavine – 262
Alan Trammell – 239
Mike Mussina – 233
*Minnie Minoso – 230
Curt Schilling – 224
*Roy Campanella – 220
Nolan Ryan – 220
Ron Santo – 217
Lou Boudreau – 216
*Dennis Eckersley – 215
Tim Raines – 213
Larry Walker – 197
*Dave Winfield – 195
Barry Larkin – 188
Frank Thomas – 181
Paul Molitor – 152
Bob Gibson – 147
*Rick Reuschel – 146
Gaylord Perry – 142
*Luis Tiant – 136
Jim Palmer – 133
Al Kaline – 132
Duke Snider – 130
Joe Gordon – 126
Ernie Banks – 119
Eddie Mathews – 115
1. The other holdovers: Richie Ashburn (83), Dwight Evans (41), Wes Ferrell (40), Graig Nettles (23), David Cone (23), Don Drysdale (21), Joe Cronin (15), Jim Edmonds (14).
2. 700 votes for Robbie Alomar! He’s the second member of that club.
3. 300 votes for Kevin Brown!
4. Luke Appling (95) will not make the list. I think he’d rather be on the list of inductees, though. 🙂
5. Jim Edmonds is hanging on. Joe Cronin, in one round, has surpassed Edmonds’ two-round vote total.
I don’t know if runoff election vote totals count towards a players total but IF they do that would give Alomar another 58 votes (21 in the regular election & 37 in the runoff)… which means he would fall 1 vote shy of Biggio.
Murray looks to be the only one left with a shot at the record.
I have not counted runoff votes in the past, for a couple of reasons.
1. It’s an extra round that not everyone has a chance of participating in. It’s limited right off the bat.
2. The choices for the voters are limited in such a way as to be unfair. If a voter thinks that neither player is worthy, s/he is still likely to vote for the lesser of two evils, since ONE of them has to get in. In a regular round, you are never forced to vote for just one player or another; you can leave ANY given player off a ballot. That’s not fair.
3. The rules for these rounds have changed. Whether they’re concurrent with another round AND the length of time they’re up has changed. I don’t think it’s fair to act as if Nolan Ryan’s runoff and Robbie Alomar’s were the same.
Those are my thoughts, so that’s how I’ve been conducting things. Robbie will be short; but he made a DARN good run of it!
I made the summary! Thanks birtelcom. I hope there are no hard feelings. I just thought it was the best way for me to express my thoughts and maybe convince some people to vote in the redemption round.
And Ferrell apparently didn’t need my vote… barely.
Congrats to a more than worthy winner this round, may he rest in peace.
Thing I forgot to note but wanted to: Who was the oldest living player we got a chance to vote for in the COG? Anybody know?
It might be Bobby Doerr.
Absolutely no hard feelings. To the contrary, I completely respect your approach.
I remember watching this live.
The 1982 Cracker Jack old-timers game in DC.
Luke Appling touched them all…
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7jHV7-y5MWk