Thursday, June 18, 2009

Splinter, Splendid

In a thread over at Sons of Sam Horn, poster OilCanShotTupac notes the following, from the incomparable Baseball Reference's page of Red Sox top ten batting rankings:


just went over to the Sox all-time leaders page for hitters at b-r to do some poking around for this, and this is so incredible, I have to post it.


This is the list of single season leaders for OBP in Red Sox history:

On-Base%
Rank Player OBP Year
1. Ted Williams .553 1941
2. Ted Williams .526 1957
3. Ted Williams .513 1954
4. Ted Williams .499 1942
5. Ted Williams .499 1947
6. Ted Williams .497 1946
7. Ted Williams .497 1948
8. Ted Williams .496 1955
9. Ted Williams .490 1949
10. Ted Williams .479 1956

That's right:

-Ted's tenth-best year is better than anyone else's best single season ever in Red Sox history.
-Dude had three years where he got on base HALF THE TIME OR MORE (and six more years where he got on base 49% of the time).

That's just ridiculous.

Ridiculous indeed, especially given that the Red Sox have almost always had dominant lineups. As awesome as Ted Williams was, if he played in this era when on base percentage is properly valued (Williams was often criticized for his walks) he would be worshiped as a God among men.

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