Jose Reyes Leads NL in Doubles and Triples through May 29
Posted by John Autin on May 30, 2011
Jose Bernabe Reyes currently leads the NL with 17 doubles and 8 triples. The last player to lead the NL in both categories was Lou Brock in 1968.
After a 4-hit, 2-triple Sunday, Reyes has what would be career highs with a .335 BA, .382 OBP and .493 SLG.
Reyes also leads the NL with 19 SB; Brock in '68 also led the NL in SB.
Reyes is on pace for 53 doubles 25 triples. No MLB player has ever reached both those totals in a season. Stan Musial is the only one with 50 doubles and 20 triples, hitting both on the nose in 1946.
I'm going to be sad when the Mets trade him.
May 30th, 2011 at 7:24 am
He also leads the N.L. in hits.
Hopefully (At least for Jose) if he gets traded he stays in the N.L. so he could still be on the N.L. leader-board.
May 30th, 2011 at 7:54 am
Your post piqued my interest.
Here are some players since 1919 with at least 17 doubles and 8 triples in their team's first 52 games.
Generated 5/30/2011.
Also:
Generated 5/30/2011.
and:
Generated 5/30/2011.
The maybe others, but my PI search (most games with an XBH in team's first 52) ran out.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:00 am
@2 (or anyone): How do you use PI to search for this sort of thing? Players with more than 17 doubles and 8 triples in the team's first 52 games?
Thanks... I'm trying to learn more about PI.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:27 am
Here's what I did:
Using the batting game finder:
(1) Select "Find Players with Most Matching Games in a Season"
(2) On the bottom right of the form "In team's first gm" fill in 52.
(3) Fill in XBH>= 1
After that it was basically a manual search through the results. Sorting by triples made it much easier, but I still had to check every page and like I wrote it may not include every player.
May 30th, 2011 at 11:28 am
Addendum to Reyes's triples total:
Yesterday was his 3rd 2-triple game of the year, in just under 1/3 of a season.
Since 1919, the most multi-triple games in a season is 4, shared by Carl Crawford (2004), Barney McCosky (1940) and Bill Terry (1931). They finished with 19, 19 and 20 triples, respectively.
Alas, we can't search games before 1919, when triples were more prevalent. I don't think it's likely that Owen Wilson had at least five 2-triple games in 1912, when he hit 36 triples. But there were 32 seasons of 20+ triples in 1901-18, as many as in all the years since then.
Reyes had but 4 multi-triple games before this year.
May 30th, 2011 at 11:37 am
@4: Thanks!
So now my PI-related question is this -- why doesn't the 1929 Frankie Frisch season show up in the primary search? I just did the same search, and got the same results... But then I look at game logs for Frisch's 1929 season, and he seems to qualify.
May 30th, 2011 at 11:51 am
@6 The search is only an indirect method of finding the players. It actually measures players with the most games with at lease one extra base hit. Since Frisch only had 21 such games, his name does not come up until the 3rd page of the results. Carl Reynolds does not appear until the sixth page. There may be others beyond that, but that is as far as PI goes.
May 30th, 2011 at 12:34 pm
@5
Speaking of Owen Wilson it is odd that he has a ML record of 36 triples in a season but no more than 14 in any other season.
May 30th, 2011 at 2:18 pm
@8, Richard, re: Owen Wilson's 36 triples -- I believe Forbes Field in that era was very conducive to triples; CF and right-center were very deep, 462 feet at one point. Wilson hit 24 of his 36 triples at home in 1912. The Pirates hit 129 triples, 63% more than the average of the other 7 teams. Even without Wilson's 36 triples, they still would have led the league.
In 1919, the first year of home/road splits on B-R, the Pirates hit 58 triples at home, 24 on the road. It was 57-33 in 1920, 61-43 in '21, 79-31 in '22, 78-33 in '23. That's a 5-year span at 333-164 -- more than twice as many triples at home as away.
From 1901-30, there were 23 seasons of 20+ triples in the NL. The Pirates accounted for 9 of those 23, or 39%; the Reds had 6, the Cards 3, the Cubs and Giants 2 each, and Brooklyn 1; the Phillies and Braves had none.
http://www.ballparks.com/baseball/national/forbes.htm
http://research.sabr.org/journals/triples-pirates-and-forbes-field
May 30th, 2011 at 2:26 pm
Further to #9 -- Of course, Forbes Field alone doesn't explain why Wilson never had more than 14 in any other season. But 1911 and 1912 were his only really good hitting seasons, as he hit .300 both years, but no better than .276 any other year.
Part fluke, part peak season.
But it's worth noting that in his 6 full seasons, Wilson would have had a very impressive triples total even if he had only hit the dozen or so in 1912 that he averaged in his other years. With just 12 triples in 1912, he still would have ranked 10th in total triples for 1909-14, right behind Eddie Collins and Shoeless Joe.
May 30th, 2011 at 3:10 pm
@5 John - your SABR link in #9 has all of Wilson's triples in 1912. He had 4 multi-triple games that season.
May 30th, 2011 at 3:54 pm
@11, Raphy -- I guess there are none so blind as they who will not read their own links! Thanks for pointing out the list of Wilson's triples.
It's fascinating to see that Wilson had 33 triples through game #118, but only 3 in the team's last 34 games. It wouldn't surprise me to find that the triples rate generally declines in the last month of the season.
May 30th, 2011 at 5:28 pm
It's so silly that the Mets owner said Reyes won't get Carl Crawford money. Not only will he get it, he might get more. He's hitting free agency around the same age and plays a much more important position. As a Phillies fan though, I'm glad he decided to lower his own player's trade value.
May 30th, 2011 at 8:18 pm
I hope the Mets keep him.Would be a big mistake to get rid of just about the only exciting offensive player on the team.
May 30th, 2011 at 8:25 pm
@9
Early in the 20th century Boston Braves owner James Gaffney deliberately had Braves Field built with long dimensions so as to be conducive to inside-the-park home runs. Perhaps the Pirates owner at the time had the same philosophy in mind.
May 30th, 2011 at 10:04 pm
@9
to John Autin:
Since adding my #15 post I read This Day in Baseball on Baseballlibrary.com and read that on 5/30/25 in the second game of a split admission double-header at Forbes Field the Pirates and Cardinals combined for 9 triples, 8 by the Pirates. The reason was that there was an overflow crowd and there were fans on the far reaches of the outfield behind a rope. (This was common in those days especially for a large park like Forbes Field.) On that day the rule for ground-rule doubles for balls hit into the crowd was expanded to make them ground-rule triples. It made me wonder if this was a common experience there and was partially a reason for the large number of triples.
May 31st, 2011 at 1:29 am
@16, Richard -- Wouldn't it be a great idea for one of MLB's "throwback" games to resurrect the practice of on-field accommodation for the "overflow crowd"? And definitely with ground-rule triples.
May 31st, 2011 at 2:51 am
Owen Wilson hit 36 triples for the major league record. The next highest total in ML history is 26. No minor leaguer ever hit that many triples in a year. Every other single season baseball hitting record was held by a minor leaguer, until Bonds broke the home run record by one (Joe Baumann hit 72 one year).....I assume some of Bonds's other records may hold up as well (OBP, SLugging, HR's per at-bat)...Anyone know?
May 31st, 2011 at 8:25 am
This Mets maven, too, will be sad when Jose is traded.
May 31st, 2011 at 10:21 am
On the topic of single season hitting flukes. I find it odd that Chief Owens hit 36 triples to set the major league record, never hitting above 14 in any other season and the single season record holder in doubles, Earl Webb, hit 67 in 1931 and never hit above 30 in any other season. Only in baseball can relative no-name players hold single season records that have stood for 99 and 80 seasons, respectively.
May 31st, 2011 at 11:23 am
@20, Jared -- I don't know about that "only in baseball." Do you know who holds NFL season records for most field goals, interceptions, return yardage, return touchdowns, fumbles recovered, etc.?
I would guess that the NFL is at least as prone to "fluke" seasonal accomplishments as MLB. I would guess that, of the 3 major U.S. pro leagues, the NBA is the least prone to such flukes. But I'm just guessing.
May 31st, 2011 at 12:40 pm
I love Reyes and hope he gets Carl Crawford money;-)
May 31st, 2011 at 12:50 pm
@21, John - I guess I should have clarified my statement by saying something like 'significant offensive categories'. In general, I wouldn't consider a special teams record in the same category as doubles or triples. I would equate special teams to something like pinch hitting in baseball. A pinch hitter can definitely impact a game with a homerun, much as a punt returner can impact a game by returning one for a touchdown, but special teams performers are rarely considered stars (and if they are, it's usually primarily because of their other roles on the field), because they are on the field for such a small period of time. So, besides special teams records, I would also consider fumbles recovered to not be a major statistical category. Plus, when I looked up the record, it's dominated by quarterbacks, who are usually making up for a botched handoff or getting the ball knocked out of their hand.
I would consider interceptions a significant statistical category, and that record happens to be held by a hall of famer - Night Train Lane - so this definitely doesn't fit the description of a fluke.
A good parallel for football would be to find a significant offensive category, such as rushes in a season for a running back who was a relative no-name and had no other significant seasons to speak of. Or maybe it's a quarterback with the highest single season completion percentage in history and never really started much outside of that season.
You just don't see that sort of thing happen outside of baseball. Another good example is the pre-steroids era home run record. Maris had 61 and never hit more than 39 in any other season. One could argue Hack Wilson's 191 RBI in 1930 could fit the bill, as well. He drove in almost one-sixth more runs than in any other of his seasons. Granted, he's a hall of famer, but I don't think he's a deserving one. He basically had 6 good seasons.
The other side of my original post is how long these records have been held. Not only are they held by relative no names, but the length of time they have been held will soon be approaching a century.
May 31st, 2011 at 1:05 pm
Since the subject of triples came up, I'm obliged to mention the all time triples leader, and that is Wahoo Sam Crawford, a native of Wahoo, Nebraska. Sam was not allowed into the HOF until he was a senior citizen and that was a crime.
May 31st, 2011 at 1:14 pm
Speaking of Reyes and "Carl Crawford money," I hadn't noticed before how similar their career averages are per 162 games. Can you tell which is which?
BA 0.288 0.294
OBP 0.338 0.335
SLG 0.437 0.441
OPS 0.774 0.775
OPS+ 104 106
R 111 99
H 198 192
2B 35 28
3B 15 14
HR 12 14
RBI 66 77
SB 58 52
CS 15 12
BB 51 38
SO 81 102
TB 300 289
GDP 7 7
May 31st, 2011 at 2:31 pm
@23, Jared -- I see your point. At the same time, either baseball has far more "significant offensive categories" than football, or else not all of our traditionally recognized categories are truly "significant."
For instance, triples: I mean them no disrespect, but with just a few exceptions, our understanding of current MLB players would suffer very little if we completely stopped counting triples. The MLB average last year was 2.8 triples per 600 PAs. Only 8 hitters last year reached double-digits in triples.
And that's one reason that Wilson's record has stood for so long: The game has changed. There are no more 460-foot power alleys, and outfielders play deeper nowadays because there's so much more "long hitting" than in the dead-ball era.
May 31st, 2011 at 2:33 pm
@24, Timmy -- Maybe the Mets will offer Reyes Sam Crawford money?
P.S. Are you really and truly from Wahoo, NE?
May 31st, 2011 at 3:41 pm
@26
In 2010 only 5 teams had as many as 36 or more triples
May 31st, 2011 at 4:37 pm
@24 Well with the way the Mets ownership situation is now, they may only have Sam Crawford money to offer. I am from Wahoo Nebraska. Wahoo is all most a suburb of Omaha now, but not quite.
May 31st, 2011 at 4:41 pm
I should say born and raised in Wahoo, moved away about the same age Sam did. Reyes is the most exciting player in baseball, and you could all most say he's underrated. Even though he plays in NY I don't think he gets the attention he deserves, that's strange and makes to sense to me.
May 31st, 2011 at 5:42 pm
I think he'd get more attention if he didn't have braids.
May 31st, 2011 at 6:01 pm
I think he'd get more attention if he hit this well every year. We haven't seen this Reyes since 2008, due mostly to injuries I guess.
I'm not ragging on Jose, nor do I believe in the "walk year, big year" canard. But the longer he keeps up this hitting, the more resigned I get to seeing him go. If he ends up with numbers like these, someone will give him a Crawford-type deal. And it won't be the Mets, and I guess I'm OK with that.
At least it will spare us the possibility of seeing the home crowd turn against him if he doesn't "live up to" the deal ... and who does live up to that kind of deal?
May 31st, 2011 at 8:01 pm
@31 Great point!