Wins Above Replacement 6X (14th All-Time) | On Base Plus Slugging 10X (2nd All-Time) All Rights Reserved by Baseball Almanac, Inc.Hosted by Hosting 4 Less. Back with the Red Sox in 1946, Williams hit the first spring training pitch he saw for a home run on February 26 and then led the team to the World Series. By clicking Accept All, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. So he was worried about this.. I can do this by playing ball this year. He actually led MLB with a .333 batting average the very next season, only playing in 40 games. The strike halted play in mid-August, denying Gwynn the opportunity to try and keep the four-plus months hot streak going. Free shipping for many products! 2. He played his entire 19-year Major League Baseball (MLB) career, primarily as a left fielder, for the Boston Red Sox from 1939 to 1960; his career . Javascript is required for the selection of a player. MVP Season 142 Runs, 38 HRs, 123 RBIs, 156 BBs, 343 TBs, .342 BA (1946) Beerball: A History of St. Louis Baseball. Ted Williams hit .406 in 1941, going 6-for-8 on the season's last day to raise his average from .3995. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Christy Mathewson, 6. The next morning, Sept. 28, Williams and roommate Charlie Wagner, a 28-year-old pitcher, took a cab to the ballpark. He later said it was the hardest he had hit a ball to that point in his career. Other factors in Gwynns favor that season:He was hitting at least .300 since the first game,and his average had been steadily climbing since mid-May. Williams was 20 years old when he broke into the big leagues on April 20, 1939, with the Boston Red Sox. True, he only played in 117 games and registered 449 at-bats, but thats still a mighty impressivechunk of the year to be on fire for. Ted Williams hits .406 in 1941 . As mentioned above, Carew hit for .388 in 1977 and actually led the league in hitting on six different occasions. 'Ted Williams was the best pure hitter I ever saw,' Mays said. Much of the play-by-play, game results, and transaction information both shown and used to create certain data sets was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by RetroSheet. But more importantly, his average was now at .406593 or .407. Except for a stretch from July 11-24, when his batting average dipped as low as .393, he'd been hitting above .400 since May 25. These batting averages cannot be compared directly because the distribution of major league batting averages has changed over the years. I am going to play ball this season, he announced. Join our linker program. 20 hits shy of .400.It's been 16 years since we've even seen a hitter sit above .380 at the All-Star break, signifying that the chances of seeing anyone break the .400 barrier in a season may be getting slimmer and slimmer. To put it politely, the team didn't have talent like Ted Williams or Jackie Jensen blocking Pearson's path in the outfield. The two faced off again in the seventh. "I'm tickled to death and I'm hoping I'll get into the air quick to start some slugging against the Axis," he told reporters. He had a career batting average of .344, which is the sixth highest in Major League Baseball history. Williams struck out one batter, Rudy York, on three pitches. "If I had known hitting .400 was going to be such a big deal, I would have done it again.". document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. .. an .800 batting average is good. He was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1966. The achievement of a .400 batting average in a season is recognized as "the standard of hitting excellence", in light of how batting .300 in a season is already regarded as solid. Williams hit .356 in 1955 and .345 in 1956. The 38 year old Williams fell just 5 hits short of the elusive .400 mark in 1957. Williams had one more at-bat coming, in the ninth. August 30, 1918 he also finished with two of the most amazing . According to Baseball-Reference, Bill Bergen has the worst career batting average in terms of points. But after a red-hot summer, Brett woke up on the morning of Sept. 20 with an even .400 average -- the latest date that anyone on this list was at or above the magical mark. In the first game at Philadelphias Shibe Park on Sept. 27, 1941, right-handed knuckleballer Roger Wolff, 30 years old and playing in just his second Major League game, held him to one hit in four at-bats, dropping his average further to .39955, rounded up to .400 in some observers eyes (and the official record books). Let's break down the highest batting averages in a MLB season of all-time. As a member of the American League, these achievements have been achieved. Stan Musial, one of the finest players in the majors during the late 1940s and in history, ended his holdout 75 years ago Saturday. Seven hits shy of .400.T3. So he was a very active combat pilot, and he was an excellent pilot and I give him a lot of credit.". "By luck of the draw, we went to Korea at the same time," said future astronaut, John Glenn. All images are property the copyright holder and are displayed here for informational purposes only. Walker would win the title the very next year however, but clearly 1997 was the best hitting year for seasonal batting average leaders Tony Gwynn and Larry Walker. This was his fourth appearance, and the first against Boston. He had a career batting average of .344, which is the sixth highest in Major League Baseball history. It was during this discussion that I asked him, How do you want to handle it? Cronin said. Albert Pujols ranks 11th with a career batting average of .296 although he is retiring. Ted Williams Rookie Card | 1939 Play Ball Baseball Card (#92 | Checklist)Baseball Almanac Research Library. On a given day, a player would hit three of every ten at bats if they hit 300 with a 300 average. Mel Ott), and sixth all-time in batting average (1. He also had a career slugging percentage of .634, which is the third-highest of all time. I have as much right to be exempted as anyone else. A lifetime .298 batting average he hit a home run every 15.11 at bats. To put it in perspective, Cobb hit .366 and it is the best of all-time. Facing Fowler to lead off the second, Williams singled to right. Plenty of headlines the next day looked beyond the third decimal: Sox Top As; Williams Falls to .399Teds Average to .39955; Last Try at .400 TodayWilliams Batting Average Now .39955; Chips Down TodayTed Williams Slumps Below .400 With Two Games LeftWilliams Average Drops Below .400Ted Williams Slips Below .400 MarkRookie Drops Ted Williams To .399 MarkTed Williams Batting .399. 'Ted Williams was the best pure hitter I ever saw,' Mays said. For the casual baseball fan, you may unfortunately remember George Brett best fromwhen he went bonkers during the pine tar game. Aside from that, the career-long Kansas City Royal was one of the best hitters in baseball through the 1970s and 80s, taking the proverbial baton from Carew. Ted didnt drink, so from time to time Id run into a bar room to get a drink, and hed wait outside until I got finished, drinking a soft drink. Become a Stathead & surf this site ad-free. [Answer]. Indeed, Gwynn was heating up, hitting .420 (50-for-119) in his last 30 games before the strike. Luke Appling (94.0% in 1964), 3. Nine hits shy of .400.5. Standard Batting; Year Age Tm Lg G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS OPS+ TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB Pos Awards; 1936: 17: BOS-min: AA: 42: 107: 107: 18: 29: 8: 2: 0: 11: 2 . Ted Williams was known by the nicknames "Teddy Ballgame . But not others. He said, I want to play it out. But perhaps there is no better bridge to the legendary past of Ted Williams than the Red Sox hitter who won back-to-back AL batting titles in 1999 and 2000 . Only Robinson Cano and Trea Turner represent the other two of five active players with a career batting average above .300. He was the last player to hit .400 in Major . Exceeded rookie limits during 1939 season, Nicknames: So Ted and I were scheduled together. The best Murphy has ever hit over a full second half of a season was .307 in 2013. Did you know that Joe Glenn, who caught Babe Ruth last pitching appearance in 1933, was Williams's catcher? Did you know that Carney Lansford and Will Clark each lost the batting championship on the last day of the season in 1989, the first time the batting title was decided in both leagues on the last day? Between the two, the Yankee Clipper's record-setting 56-game hitting streak and the Splendid Splinter's .406 season batting average have stood the test of time . Ted Williams hit .406 with the Boston Red Sox in 1941. . (Sunday was also scheduled to be Lefty Grove Day as Philadelphia feted the 41-year-old Red Sox hurler who had spent his first nine seasons with the Athletics. Even then he got to know more about the pitcher than the pitcher knew about himself. The Splendid Splinter posted the highest single-season batting average in the modern era by a player 38 years of age or older -- 10 points higher than 38-year old Ty Cobb's .378 in 1925. However, the press and the fans were not happy and he enlisted in the Navy on May 22, 1942. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. 22 - Ted Williams was an inaugural inductee into the Boston Red Sox Hall of Fame, one of twenty-two enshrined in 1995. Significant homerunsIn the second game of a doubleheader against Kansas City.Williams knocks the ball six rows deep in the right-field grandstand and gives the Red Sox a 1-0 victory. Total Zone Rating and initial framework for Wins above Replacement calculations provided by Sean Smith. A brief excerpt from Ted Williams biography appears below (we highly recommend you visit his page [Link] for the full story along with dozens of historical photographs): Williams had been classified 3-A in the military draft due to the fact that his mother was totally dependent on him. But its not quite so simple as a choice between Sit or Play. With the season complete, Williams led the Majors in batting average, on-base percentage (.553), slugging (.735), OPS (1.287), runs (135), home runs (37) and walks (147). Williams.553 on-base percentage in 1941 was also a Major League record that stood for 61 years until Barry Bonds topped it in 2002 (.582), then again in 2004 (.609). Walter Johnson, 3. For hitters though, the home run or bust approach has taken over which has seen a decline in batting averages as a result. The southpaw had pitched two innings against the Red Sox in 1940 but had spent most of 41 in the Minors. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Gwynn spent his entire career with the San Diego Padres and was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2007. Ted Williams served as a Naval Aviator during World War II and the Korean War. His average was up to .40089. Ted Williams MLB Stats - Official Site for "The Splendid Splinter", MLB Hall Of Famer Ted Williams #9, Boston Red Sox . Copyright 1999- The Boston left fielder entered the last game of the season that year with a .3995 batting average. 8 - Ted Williams was ranked eighth by The Sporting News when they released their list of the 100 Greatest Baseball Players in the history of baseball. Ted Williams had 2,654 hits over his career. Sunday marked the 75th anniversary of the culmination of Joe DiMaggio's record 56-game hitting streak, as the Yankees star went 0-for-3 against Cleveland pitchers Al Smith and Jim Bagby on July 17, 1941.But while Joltin' Joe's record run captured the imagination of the American public, his friendly rival, Ted Williams, may have set an even more untouchable mark when he finished that 1941 season with a .406 average.Consider this: While DiMaggio batted .409 during his streak, Williams actually bested him with a .412 average during that same span. Musial is the best all around hitter.'" Last day at .400: July 10How short was he? It is appropriate to place Williams among the greatest hitters of all time, as his career numbers demonstrate his greatness. .406 Batting Average (1941) | .388 Batting Average (1957) Ted Williams, 1957: .388 A full 16 years later, Williams proved he had plenty of magic left in his bat in 1957. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". In 1958, the year Kubek played with him in the All-Star game, he won his sixth American League batting championship. by Handedness. But getting to know him a little later, the quote would be full . Williams was on first with a 4-for-5 day, but his average slid to .404. 1941-05-02 MLB player Ted Williams' lowest average (.308) in year he hit over .400. 17 hits shy of .400.T6. When the pair returned to the team hotel, Cronin and a coach were sitting in the lobby. "It was something that required a kind of nonstop consistency," Williams said of his .406 season in 1991. In the last three-quarters of a century, no player has had the same kind of consistency needed reach just the .400 plateau, let alone tie Williams' .406.To put it in contemporary terms, think of it this way: If Daniel Murphy, the Majors' current batting average leader at .348, were to finish with 584 at-bats this season (his average over the last three years), he would have to hit roughly .472 (117-for-248) the rest of the way to join Williams in the .400 club. Homer off the blooper pitch . Ted Williams . In 1977 Carew played in 85 total games and is the only player to have multiple league-leading batting average seasons with over 85 games played. To picture just how tough a time hitters have had trying to match Teddy Ballgame's .406, here's a look at the 10 players who have come the closest to reaching .400, in order of their season-ending average, over the last 75 years:1. It is no surprise, then, that Williams lifetime batting average remains one of the most impressive accomplishments in the history of baseball. His 120 RBIs were five shy of Joe DiMaggio's MLB-leading total and thus five short of the Triple Crown, something Williams would accomplish in 1942 and 1947. Lou Gehrig, 3. View Ted Williams's Page at the Baseball Hall of Fame (plaque, photos, videos). Required fields are marked *. Ted Williams was born on August 30, 1918. Updated: Saturday, March 4, 2023 4:51 PM ET, Park Factors As well, he was the youngest player in the history of the game to achieve 1,000, 2,000, and 4,000 hits. Statistics courtesy of MLB.com, Baseball-Reference, and Baseball-Almanac. Again, yes. But while he won the American League batting title by a whopping 47 points that year, his efforts fell short in the league's Most Valuable Player Award voting. Ted Williams. Join Baseball Almanac as we take a look at some additional numbers of interest as they relate to Ted Williams, easily (one of) "The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived": 1 - Ted Williams has the highest on base percentage ever put together by any Major League ballplayer in history! Note: Ted Williams served in the Armed Forces (WWII & Korea) for almost 5 full seasons during his career, which makes his career stats all the more remarkable. Create your own MLB fantasy pools & contests with RYP! Sign up to receive our daily Morning Lineup to stay in the know about the latest trending topics around Major League Baseball. Ted Williams once said it was his goal in life to "walk down . The Splendid Splinter led the league in walks eight times. Yankees outfielder Paul ONeill actually finished 1994 with a .359 batting average and was hitting .400 later into the season too. Win Expectancy, Run Expectancy, and Leverage Index calculations provided by Tom Tango of InsideTheBook.com, and co-author of The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball. copyright=new Date(); His .408 batting average in 1911 will likely stand forever as the rookie record. In the last 80 years, the highest career batting average RH 324.6, Joe DiMaggio. Three innings later, Williams started the fifth with his 37th home run; he was now batting .402. He played his entire 19-year career with the Boston Red Sox and is often referred to as the greatest hitter who ever lived. 2. 6' 3" / 205. In 1957, the season in which he turned 39, that .388 average won the batting championship by more than 20 points over Mickey Mantle's career-best .365. All Win Expectancy, Leverage Index, Run Expectancy, and Fans Scouting Report data licenced from TangoTiger.com. Average hits per week: 6.7 Extra hits needed per week: 0.2 T3. The Splendid Splinter answered when his country called For WWII, 4 years - 1942-1945; for the Korean War, he effectively lost 1952 and 1953. . These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads. Williams also had a batting average of .388 in 1942, .356 in 1947, .328 in 1948, .345 in 1949, and .317 in 1960. Ted wanted to play in the worst way.. "If I had known hitting .400 was going to be such a big deal, I would have done it again. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1966. He was also a marine fighter pilot in Korea in 1952-1953. He won 2 MVP awards. If you're wondering, Ted Williams is the last player to hit over .400, doing so in 1941 with a .406 batting average. Copyright 1999- We'll never know how many total at-bats Gwynn would have ended up with if his 1994 season had gone to completion, but he would have needed just three more hits to finish at .400 during his strike-shortened campaign.2. He then returned to Pensacola where he served as an instructor with the United States Marine Corps Reserve at Bronson Field. Ted Williams impressive career totals are a testament to his skill as a hitter and his legacy as one of the greatest hitters in the history of baseball. Lou Gehrig, 5. Despite his.170 batting average, Bill Bergen is regarded as one of the all-time great players. In his best year with . Ted Williams' 0.406 in 1941, and George Brett's 0.390 in 1980. . The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. Did you know that in both of those historic seasons, The Kid did not win the Most Valuable Player Award (losing to Joe Gordon in '42 and Joe DiMaggio in '47)? In the fourth, with the Sox now down 4-0, Williams smoked a double that slammed into the right-field wall, leaving a hole in a speaker mounted there. Ted Williams lost 6 years to military service in the prime of his career. Did you know that Tony Cuccinello (.30845) lost the batting championship in 1945, to Snuffy Stirnweiss (.30854), by .00009 - the closest finish in baseball history? Scores from any date in Major League history, Minor, Foreign, College, & Black Baseball, Frequently Asked Questions about MLB and Baseball, Subscribe to Stathead Baseball: Get your first month FREE. "Giant centerfield Willie Mays compared (Ted) Williams and ( Stan) Musial to sportswriter Roger Kahn. Highest Batting Average in a Season. But with a full season at his disposal this time, Gwynn tailed off down the stretch, batting .328 over the final two months of the season.Last day at .400: July 14How short was he? Copyright 2000-2023 Sports Reference LLC. OF. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience. But Williams was locked in, leading off the second inning with a single to pull his average back up to .405. Ted Williams, who has a lengthy career that spans two decades, is widely regarded as one of the greatest hitters in history. Ted Williams 4. Did you know that when Willie McGee won his 1990 batting title, he started the season in the National League, was traded to an American League team on August 29th, and became the first player in baseball history to win a batting a title in a league that they were not currently playing in? Stan Musial, 1948: .376Vin Scully once said that Musial was "good enough to take your breath away," and in 1948 he reached perhaps his most dizzying heights. 1941 was a streaky year for the American League, literally. Ty Cobb is considered to be the greatest hitter of all-time, although that point is often argued to this day. In the second game Williams went 2-for-3 to finalize his average for the season at .406. Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. Thanks to the MLB strike of 1994, we never got the chance to see if the late Tony Gwynncould reach .400 that year. Do you have a blog? Between games, the 41-year-old Grove was honored before taking the mound to start the nightcap. He'd gone 2-for-5 with a run scored in a rout of the Chicago White Sox, but all that did was improve his batting average . Where what happened yesterday is being preserved today. Ted Williams played for 1 team, the Boston Red Sox. Tony Gwynn, 1994: .394Many who watched Mr. Padre during the 1994 season will still argue that he could have topped .400 if his season hadn't been cut short by the players' strike in mid-August. Statistics and Probability questions and answers. The aging Red Sox star saw his average fall below .400 for the final time on June 6, and his .295 average in June remarkably was his lowest of any month that season. Regardless of your Barry Bonds opinion, the man hit for .370 in 2002 and also won the batting title in 2004 batting .362. Most baseball fans know that Ted's last season was 1960 when he famously hit a home run in the last at bat of his legendary career. Ted Williams weighed 205 lbs (92 kg) when playing. Williams returned to the United States in December and was discharged from the Marines on January 28, 1946. Major League and Minor League Baseball data provided by Major League Baseball. George Brett, 1980: .390The greatest hitter in Royals history actually began the 1980 campaign 1-for-7, and did not see his average rise above .300 until his last game of May. var pfHeaderImgUrl = '';var pfHeaderTagline = '';var pfdisableClickToDel = 0;var pfHideImages = 0;var pfImageDisplayStyle = 'right';var pfDisablePDF = 0;var pfDisableEmail = 0;var pfDisablePrint = 0;var pfCustomCSS = 'https://www.baseball-almanac.com/css/print.css';var pfBtVersion='2';(function(){var js,pf;pf=document.createElement('script');pf.type='text/javascript';pf.src='//cdn.printfriendly.com/printfriendly.js';document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(pf)})(); Did you know that Ted Williams and Andre Dawson are the only two Major League ballplayers to have hit a home run off a father/son pitching duo? Ted Williams once commented about those that fail 'only' seven times out of ten attempts will be the greatest in the game. As mentioned above, Gwynn won the batting title in 1997 but Walker still led the majors in OPS and won the MVP. copyright=new Date(); Never much of a power hitter, Carew was still one of the most lethal offensive weapons in all of baseball through the late 1960s, all of the 70s, and into the early- and mid-80s. In 1911 he led the AL in runs, hits, RBIs, batting average and slugging percentage and saw 400 hits in a season on three different occasions. First, lets back it up to the start of the season-ending three-game series in Philadelphia. Data Provided By In 1936 the 18-year-old posted an impressive .271 batting average on 107 at bats in 42 games for the Padres. document.write(update);
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