Everyone knows that the Tigers slugger is closing in on a Triple Crown. He is currently leading the American League in batting average and Runs Batted In and is just one behind Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton in homers. Winning the Triple Crown would be a rare event. It has been accomplished only 13 times since 1901, nine in the AL and four in the NL. The only Tiger to do it was the legendary Ty Cobb who batted .377/9/107 in 1909.
I think it would be really cool if Cabrera won the triple crown, but most of you know that those are not my preferred statistics. I'll start by using the OPS+ statistic. If we compare a batter's OPS to league average and adjust for home ballpark, we get his OPS+. An OPS+ of 100 is league average. An OPS+ of more than 100 is better than average and an OPS+ of less than 100 is worse than average. Cabrera currently leads the league with a 170 OPS+.
The Tigers single-season leaders are shown in Table 1 below. As of today, Cabrera is 16th on the Tigers all-time list. Interestingly, this is only his third best season as a Tiger as he posted marks of 181 in 2011 and 178 in 2010. Three consecutive years with an OPS+ of 170 or better would be quite remarkable. The only other Tiger to do that was Cobb from 1909-1912.
As is always the case, Cobb dominates the leaders appearing nine times in the top 20. Other Tigers showing up multiple times are the great Hank Greenberg (four), Cabrera (three) and the under appreciated Harry Heilmann (three). For someone who grew to love the game in 1970s, it's pretty exciting to finally see a modern Tiger finally making a top twenty list more than once.
Table 1: Tigers Single-Season OPS+ Leaders
Player | Year | PA | OPS+ |
Ty Cobb | 1917 | 669 | 210 |
Ty Cobb | 1910 | 590 | 206 |
Norm Cash | 1961 | 673 | 201 |
Ty Cobb | 1912 | 609 | 200 |
Ty Cobb | 1911 | 654 | 196 |
Harry Heilmann | 1923 | 627 | 194 |
Ty Cobb | 1909 | 651 | 193 |
Ty Cobb | 1915 | 700 | 185 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2011 | 688 | 181 |
Harry Heilmann | 1927 | 596 | 180 |
Ty Cobb | 1916 | 636 | 180 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2010 | 648 | 178 |
Al Kaline | 1967 | 550 | 176 |
Hank Greenberg | 1937 | 701 | 172 |
Hank Greenberg | 1940 | 670 | 171 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2012 | 646 | 170 |
Hank Greenberg | 1935 | 710 | 170 |
Hank Greenberg | 1938 | 681 | 169 |
Ty Cobb | 1922 | 613 | 169 |
Harry Heilmann | 1922 | 526 | 169 |
Ty Cobb | 1908 | 635 | 169 |
Data Source: Baseball-Reference
A limitation of OPS+ is that it weights OBP and slugging equally. In actuality, OBP is more important than slugging and should carry more weight. It also does not give a batter credit for playing time. So, I'll also take a look at Batting Runs. It has been determined from the results of thousands of games that the following linear weights are most appropriate:
single 0.47
double 0.77
triple 1.04
home run 1.40
walk 0.31
HBP 0.34
Based on that, we can arrive at a player's Batting Runs (BtRuns). Cabrera currently has 57 BtRuns which means that he has contributed 57 runs beyond what you would expect from an average player. As shown in Table 2, that ranks him 18th on the Tigers all-time single-season list. Cabrera still has 13 games to go, so he has a chance to move up the list. As with OPS+, Cabrera had even better seasons in 2011 (71) and 2010 (64).
First baseman Norm Cash is the Tigers all-time leader with 85 BtRuns in 1961. Beyond that, we see the same familiar names populating the table - Cobb, Cabrera, Geenberg and Heilmann.
Table 2: Tigers Single-Season Batting Runs Leaders
Player | Year | PA | BtRuns |
Norm Cash | 1961 | 673 | 85 |
Ty Cobb | 1911 | 654 | 76 |
Ty Cobb | 1917 | 669 | 75 |
Harry Heilmann | 1923 | 627 | 74 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2011 | 688 | 71 |
Ty Cobb | 1915 | 700 | 70 |
Ty Cobb | 1912 | 609 | 69 |
Hank Greenberg | 1937 | 701 | 67 |
Ty Cobb | 1910 | 590 | 66 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2010 | 648 | 64 |
Hank Greenberg | 1940 | 670 | 64 |
Harry Heilmann | 1927 | 596 | 64 |
Ty Cobb | 1909 | 651 | 62 |
Hank Greenberg | 1935 | 710 | 62 |
Magglio Ordonez | 2007 | 679 | 61 |
Hank Greenberg | 1938 | 681 | 61 |
Harry Heilmann | 1921 | 672 | 60 |
Miguel Cabrera | 2012 | 646 | 57 |
Ty Cobb | 1916 | 636 | 56 |
Ty Cobb | 1922 | 613 | 56 |
Data Source: Baseball-Reference
What I find most interesting about these compilations is Cabrera's three-year run of 191 Batting Runs which is surpassed only by Cobb's 211 in 1910-1912. Cabrera's 2012 season has certainly been outstanding, but his consistent greatness over three years has been even more impressive.
No comments:
Post a Comment