One of the formative baseball cards of my youth was the #5 card from the 1986 Topps set of “Major League Leaders.” This was a strange set: the cards were smaller than ordinary cards (about 2’ x 3’). On the front of each card was a ‘high gloss’ photograph surrounded by white and the player’s name….it’s very minimalist without being at all aesthetically interesting. The back showed the player’s batting line from the previous season, and the category in which they were a ‘Major League Leader.’
#5 was Dwight Evans….here’s what the back of the card says:
* Runs #4 110
Dwight Ranked #1 in Bases on Balls with 114, #7(tie) in GW-RBI with 13, #8 in On-Base Pct. with .378 and #9(tie) in Home Runs with 29.
This card played a rather significant role in shaping how I came to understanding of baseball. As Evans was my favorite player, I looked for any evidence that he was a great player.
Evans excelled in categories that were only listed in the Sunday sports section of the Boston Globe: he scored a lot of runs, hit a lot of doubles, drew walks, and typically had an excellent on-base percentage. Since Evans excelled in these ‘lesser’ categories, I gave them considerable weight over flashier stats like batting average, stolen bases, and home runs.
I had the idea – this was yesterday, mind you – that it’d be interesting to have some sort of alternative Triple Crown for these lesser categories.
The real Triple Crown is something of a genius invention….maybe it doesn’t always identify the best player in baseball, but the three categories that it considers are an almost perfect blend of statistics. You have:
-Batting Average: A rate stat that measures a player’s tendency to do something good.
-RBI: A counting stat that connects a player’s hitting with the work of his teammates.
-Home Runs: An exciting event that gets people cheering in the stands.
It’s a great balance: the inventors of the Triple Crown picked three categories that speak to different aspects of hitting. Stat geeks like me have tended to disparage the Triple Crown recently, but it’s a really beautiful idea. Whoever came up with the idea could’ve screwed it up. They absolutely didn’t.
That said, I’d like to propose an alternative Triple Crown. In deference to the genius of the original, I thought that a parallel Triple Crown should consider the following categories:
-On-Base Percentage: A rate stat that measures a player's tendency to do something good.
-Runs Scored: A counting stat that connects a player's hitting with the work of his teammates.
-Doubles: An exciting event that gets people cheering.
These stats parallel the stats in the original Triple Crown: you have a rate stat, a team-reliant stat, and a get-the-crowd-cheering stat. This might be a Fenway thing, but I really love doubles; they’re as exciting to see as homers. Clank off the wall, watch it bounce around.
Anyway, I thought of these categories last night, and I immediately went to find out if anyone has ever won this alternative Triple Crown. I half expected that no one would’ve won it. This would've made for a terrible article.
Fortunately, a few players have won this Alternative Triple Crown. We’ll count ‘em down.
* * *
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1873 (NA)
|
Ross Barnes
|
Boston Red Stockings
|
0.465
|
31
|
125
|
|
1886 (NL)
|
Ross Barnes
|
Chicago Cubs
|
0.462
|
21
|
126
|
Ross Barnes, a master of the ‘fair-foul’ hit, was perhaps the best player in the National Association, and carried over his dominance during his first year in the NL. A long fever in 1887 sapped him of strength, and essentially ended his career at twenty-seven.
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1887 (NL)
|
Dan Brouthers
|
Detroit Wolverines
|
0.426
|
36
|
153
|
Dan Brouthers was a big power hitting first-baseman, the original version of Boog Powell or Mo Vaughn or Jim Thome.
Once, while playing semi-pro ball, Brouthers was involved in a collision at home plate where the catcher was knocked unconscious and later died. A thorough account of this incident appears in the book “Death at the Ballpark”: if you are squeamish, I recommend you turn away. The catcher, a nineteen year old player named John Quigley, remained conscious, but it became rather evident that the collusion had broken bones of his skull, knocking them in. Emergency surgery was performed, which Quigley remained conscious and talking throughout. Quigley lived (the word used in the book is ‘lingered’) for more than a month and Brouthers visited frequently; when Quigley died Brouthers considered quitting baseball for good.
Brouthers was an all-time great. WAR, which does not make a timeline adjustment for the improved level of play, credits Brouthers as having the same approximate value as Jeff Bagwell. SABR rated him as the sixth best player of the 19th century.
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1901 (AL)
|
Nap Lajoie
|
Philadelphia Athletics
|
.463
|
48
|
145
|
This was Nap’s first year in the American League, a fact that he shares with every other player who played in the Junior Circuit that year. His signing with the American League, along with the court case that passed a judgment that favored the Athletics, is a significant reason the AL lasted: you can essentially blame Nap Lajoie for the existence of DH.
Ross Barnes lived to be 64, which is impressive for the era. Dan Brouthers lived to be 74. Napoleon Lajoie lived to the ripe old age of eighty-four…notice a trend?
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1918 (NL)
|
Heinie Groh
|
Cincinnati Reds
|
.395
|
28
|
86
|
This website has some photographs of Heinie Groh’s ‘bottle-bat’…it’s really worth checking out. Groh was prototypical leadoff hitter: a small guy who stood at the top of the box, bunted frequently, drew walks, and made excellent contact.
Talking about lopsided trades….Groh came up with the New York Giants, but was traded to the Reds after two games of the 1912 season for a pitcher named Art Fromme. Fromme lasted two half-seasons for the Giants, not pitching exceptionally well. Groh played nine years for Cincy, hitting about .300 and posting an average WAR of 4.3. Groh was traded back to the Giants after a salary dispute and hit .474 during the 1922 World Series.
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1921 (NL)
|
Rogers Hornsby
|
St. Louis Cardinals
|
.458
|
44
|
131
|
|
1922 (NL)
|
Rogers Hornsby
|
St. Louis Cardinals
|
.459
|
46
|
141
|
Hornsby won consecutive alternative Triple Crowns, the second coming in his first real Triple Crown season. From what I understand, he’ll finally be elected to the Hall of Fame this summer. About time, really.
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1948 (NL)
|
Stan Musial
|
St. Louis Cardinals
|
.450
|
46
|
135
|
|
1949 (AL)
|
Ted Williams
|
Boston Red Sox
|
.490
|
39
|
150
|
Like Hornsby, Ted and Stan had many seasons where they won two legs of the (Alternate) Triple Crown, and came within a hair of winning it. I always think of these players in tandem.
Continuing on a morbid track: all of the Alternative Triple Crown winners lived very long lives, when compared to life expectancy at birth:
|
Name
|
Year Born
|
Age of Death
|
Avg Life Expectancy
|
|
Ross Barnes
|
1850
|
64
|
38.3
|
|
Dan Brouthers
|
1858
|
74
|
38.3*
|
|
Nap Lajoie
|
1874
|
84
|
41.1*
|
|
Heinie Groh
|
1889
|
84
|
42.5
|
|
Rogers Hornsby
|
1896
|
66
|
45.3
|
|
Ted Williams
|
1918
|
83
|
36.6
|
|
Stan Musial
|
1920
|
92
|
53.6
|
The interesting count is Musial and Williams: Williams was born at the dawn of the Spanish Influenza pandemic, which killed off somewhere between 1 and 3% of the world population (and Ms. Lavinia Swire, which got Matthew off the hook so he could marry Lady Mary). If you somehow survived the pandemic, you had World War II to look forward to after high school. 1918: maybe the worst birth year ever.
The average of the life expectancy of these players was 42.2; they’re average life was 78 years long….almost twice what you’d expect.
This is a misreading of the data, of course: Musial and Williams won their Alternative Triple Crowns after the end of WWII, a moment when their life expectancy would have drastically increased. Ross Barnes and Dan Brouthers survived infancy when that was drastically more touch-and-go than it is now. Just getting to one-year old, or five-years old, spiked their rates up.
Still….these guys lived long lives; only Hornsby would’ve been perceived as not-too-old. It’s interesting….the next player to win the Alternative Triple Crown might see two hundred.
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1962 (NL)
|
Frank Robinson
|
Cincinnati Reds
|
0.421
|
51
|
134
|
Frank Robinson missed a second Alternative Triple Crown by five doubles in 1966.
Robinson must have the least Black Ink of any great player. Black ink is when you lead the league in an important category: Robinson led his league in runs scored three times, doubles, HR, RBI, and batting average once….and that’s it. The rest of his Black Ink comes in rate categories like on-base percentage and OPS+, and Hit-By-Pitches and Intentional Walks.
Another way to put that: Robinson has just seven Black Ink marks that would show up on the back of a Topps baseball card.
The five ‘modern’ Alternative Triple Crowns won in the NL have all gone to Cardinals or Reds…
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1989 (AL)
|
Wade Boggs
|
Boston Red Sox
|
0.43
|
51
|
113
|
This was, incredibly, a slump year for Boggs: he hit just .330 after four consecutive batting titles where he hit .368, .357, .363, and .366. I’m going to reserve commenting on Boggs for another article. Which brings us to our last Alternative Triple Crown winner…
|
Year
|
Name
|
Team
|
OBP
|
2B
|
Runs
|
|
1995 (AL)
|
Edgar Martinez
|
Seattle Mariners
|
.479
|
52
|
121
|
Perhaps the most surprising player on the list, Edgar tied Albert Belle in runs scored and doubles, and finished third in the AL MVP race behind Mo Vaughn and Belle, in one of the closest MVP races in history. More proof that Edgar was an extremely great hitter.
In an unrelated note, this was the year Dante Bichette finished second in the NL MVP vote, on the back of a monster .340-40-128 season. Bichette’s WAR for that year? 1.0, according to baseball reference. Barry Bonds (12th in the vote) out-walked Bichette 120 to 22…
* * *
Why am I calling this the Stan Musial Triple Crown, instead of the Hornsby Triple Crown? Is it because I have something against the Cardinals? Or again weirdly pluralized names? Certainly, that’s a part of it.
There’s a case for Hornsby, who is the only player to win it twice in one of the two ‘major’ major leagues. There is also a case for calling it the Ted Williams Triple Crown, as Ted actually won more legs of the Alternative Triple Crown anyone else:
|
Name
|
Times Leading a Category
|
|
Ted Williams
|
20
|
|
Rogers Hornsby
|
18
|
|
Stan Musial
|
18
|
|
Babe Ruth
|
18
|
But Williams really dominated one category: he led the league in on-base percentage a staggering twelve times, but he only led in doubles twice. The same is true for Ruth: he led in on-base percentage ten times and runs scored eight times, but never led the league in doubles.
The Alternative Triple Crown should be named for the player who rates the best across the three categories. That player is Musial, by a hair over Hornsby:
|
Name
|
Runs
|
Doubles
|
OBP
|
Adjusted Score
|
|
Musial
|
5
|
7
|
6
|
34
|
|
Hornsby
|
5
|
4
|
9
|
31
|
|
T. Williams
|
6
|
2
|
12
|
30
|
|
Ruth
|
8
|
0
|
10
|
26
|
|
Cobb
|
5
|
3
|
6
|
25
|
|
Wagner
|
2
|
7
|
4
|
21
|
|
Gehrig
|
4
|
2
|
5
|
19
|
|
Rose
|
4
|
5
|
2
|
19
|
|
Boggs
|
2
|
2
|
6
|
16
|
|
Bonds
|
1
|
0
|
10
|
12
|
|
Mantle
|
5
|
0
|
3
|
11
|
|
F. Robinson
|
3
|
1
|
2
|
10
|
|
Pujols
|
5
|
1
|
1
|
10
|
|
Aaron
|
3
|
4
|
0
|
10
|
|
Mays
|
2
|
0
|
2
|
6
|
|
Morgan
|
1
|
0
|
4
|
6
|
The Adjusted Score follows a simple equation:
Best Category + (2*2nd Best Category) + (3 * 3rd Best Category).
Putting it another way: if Musial had aligned his league-leading seasons perfectly, he’d win five Alternative Triple Crowns. Hornsby would win four. Cobb would win three. Williams, Wagner, Gehrig, Rose, and Boggs would win two. I’m sure I’ve missed someone.
So we’re naming it after Stan Musial: lead the league in doubles, runs scored, and on-base percentage, and you win the Musial Triple Crown.
Dave Fleming is a writer living in Wellington, New Zealand. He welcomes comments, questions, and suggestions here and at dfleming1986@yahoo.com.