Most multi-hit games, first 8 games of the season
Posted by Andy on April 15, 2009
There is a changing of the guard in Boston. Manny is gone and David Ortiz has hit poorly for more than half a season (hopefully due to nagging injuries that will heal.) Pedroia, Youkilis, and Bay are the new men in town.
Last night, Kevin Youkilis had his 7th multi-hit game of the season, putting him on this short list:
Year Games Link to Individual Games +-----------------+----+-----+-------------------------+ Barry Larkin 1990 8 Ind. Games Kevin Youkilis 2009 7 Ind. Games Bobby Murcer 1969 7 Ind. Games Garry Maddox 1973 7 Ind. Games Ray Knight 1987 7 Ind. Games Bob Allison 1960 7 Ind. Games Hank Aaron 1959 7 Ind. Games
These are the most multi-hit games in a team's first 8 games of the season, going back to 1954. Only Barry Larkin had 2 or more hits in all 8 games, coming in 1990, the year the Reds won the World Series.
This is a recurring theme with Youkilis--it's not the first post I've written about his multi-hit games. The guy is, as advertised way back in Moneyball, an on-base machine.
A couple of side notes. I, like many of you I'm sure, was terribly saddened by the death of Harry Kalas. I recounted the story of the day I met Mr. Kalas on my blog over here. Also on that blog, I'm running a weekly contest about predicting winning pitchers and home run hitters in certain games. You can enter this week's contest right here. There are prizes!
April 16th, 2009 at 9:01 am
A Hall of Fame case for Barry Larkin, using Play Index, follows. Each of these shortstops played at least 2000 games and hit for at least 3000 total bases. In hitting, Larkin ranks third. Stolen base rate and fielding add to his value.
http://www.bb-ref.com/play-index/shareit/w7Ua
April 16th, 2009 at 9:21 am
Larkin's Reds won all 8 of those games, too. They stretched it to 9 games in a row to start the season a few days later, on their way to their most recent World Series title.
April 16th, 2009 at 10:01 am
David, but how much advantage in stealing and fielding do you think Larkin deserves compared to the others on that list, considering they're all shortstops?