Hank Aaron's 15th Best Season | Baseball Bits

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That's code 50FOOLISH at Factor75.com to get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box. There are no Hank Aaron video essays from reputable video essay dealers and I think I know why. Legendary ballplayers tend to be talked about in terms of their peak. As a content consumer, you're far more likely to hear about the 73 homers Barry Bonds hit Or Greg Maddux's 1.56 ERA in 1994 rather than 4.02 in 2004. But what is there to say about Henry Aaron's production? What's the angle, other than he was really good? In 1955 he was really good, in 1964 he was still really good, and in 1973 he was somehow still really good at the end. His remarkable consistency is a double-edged sword. Ted Kwaszewski hit more homers in 1954 than Aaron ever did in a season, Norm Cash topped his best season OPS in 1961, and teammate Rico Carty beat his best batting average in 1970. Those are just some players who overlapped with Henry Aaron, none of whom are in the Hall of Fame much less Inner Circle, yet they all peaked higher than Aaron one way or another. The best way to appreciate Hammer and Hank's consistency is to embrace the fact he essentially had the same great campaign over and over and over again for 23 years. This video isn't about his best season, it's about his 15th best season, because there really isn't that much of a difference between the two. Whether Henry Aaron is the greatest ballplayer of all time is up to interpretation, but nobody filled out the back of a baseball card like him, ignore that. Just so many numbers, so much production. In order to determine which of these 23 seasons is his 15th best, we must first determine which one is the best and work our way down. The problem is, that could very well be his age 23 season, or age 37 season, not to mention all the others in between. And before all this, he also played professionally for the Indianapolis Clowns of the then-deteriorating Negro American League. Basic trivia number one, he was originally a shortstop. Despite his questionable infield glove and originally cross-handed swing, gross, Brave Scout Billy Southworth still recommended signing the skinny teenager in 1952. He eventually made his home in right field, where he graded out as a top 10 defender at the position in the history of the game. He also stole 240 bases, including the first 40-30 season in 1963, a feat that wouldn't be equaled for another 25 years. The point is, he was a well-rounded ballplayer rather than a one-dimensional slugger for almost all of those 23 seasons. But which one was the best, and then 15th best? We'll have to create an amalgamation, mixing and matching from his whole career. The Hammer qualified for the batting title in 20 different seasons, so for rate stats like batting average, we'll take his 15th best qualified performance into account. For counting stats like home runs, just take the 15th most homers he ever hit in a season. In this video, we'll go through the major stat categories and build Henry Aaron's 15th best season piece by piece, creating a portrait of the man not at his absolute best, but at his absolute meh, and here's what I'm calling it. 292 in 1960, that was Henry Aaron's 15th best qualified batting average. In today's decidedly less batting average-centric league, that has only been accomplished 25 times across the last two regular seasons, and only two qualified hitters, Luis Arias and Shohei Otani, were able to repeat the feat. Of course, by taking the 15th best out of 20 qualified and 23 total, this isn't even an average year for Hammer and Hank. This is below median. He was a career .305 hitter. A .365 on base percentage in 1956 is the least impressive output we'll look at, and it's still pretty darn good. Very close to the 15th best performance of Barry Bonds in that regard, but only, scare quotes, only, 14th all-time and 6th post-integration among all 93 hitters with at least 15 qualified seasons. Aaron beats Bonds handily in 15th best slug, which is interesting because Bonds of course eclipsed his career home run record, and the only hitter who bests Aaron is Babe Ruth, appropriately, or ironically, I don't know, either way it shouldn't be surprising considering his career lead in extra base hits. Although his .365 OBP from 1956 and .539 slug from 1966 add up to .904, his 15th best OPS is .906 from 1955. You'll just have to humor me on the math. It bears repeating, but what this really means is that he OPSed .900 or better at least 15 times, and in actuality 16 times, the only hitter since integration to do so. Watching old footage of Aaron punishing baseballs, it's easy to be struck by his forward stride. He really stepped into his swing. You've definitely seen this clip, number 715 from 1974, but the standout trait of his power was his otherworldly wrist strength, best demonstrated by this homer off the flagpole in Shea Stadium from the 1969 NLCS. Just a simple flick of the wrist, yet the ball effortlessly clears .410 in straightaway center, the definition of easy power. Basic trivia number 2, 23 seasons played, 25 all-star games, that's because MLB experimented with two all-star games per season between 1959 and 1962, and of course, Aaron made the National League roster in all of them. Despite having the most all-star selections in any Big Four American Sports League, he didn't perform well in those exhibitions, but that didn't mean he couldn't handle tough competition. Aaron crushed the National League's premier lefty of the first half of his career, Sandy Koufax, and the second half, Steve Carlton. In 1957, he walked off the Phillies in late September to win the National League pennant. His braves would go on to defeat Casey Stangle's Yankees in seven games, with Aaron contributing three home runs, one of which was at about eye level. It was Aaron's only World Series win, but it still gives him something that a couple of the game's best hitters don't have, a ring. Although Henry Aaron's 15th best season by OPS ranks highly, it doesn't quite tell the full story of his place among the game's best hitters. Take stand-in man Muziel, for example. He edges Aaron in 15th best OPS, but not OPS+, a metric that adjusts for the ballpark and offensive environment. Even though they overlapped each other, beginning with Aaron's debut in 1954 and ending with Muziel's last season in 1963, offense was higher in the National League in the 40s and early 50s when Muziel put up his best seasons and won three MVPs. His National League averaged 4.4 runs per game to Aaron's 4.2, revealing a trend. The American League of Ted Williams averaged 4.5 runs per game, not counting the years lost to his military service, of course. Barry Bonds, 4.5, steroid era, and Babe Ruth, 4.7, the live ball era that he himself kicked off. The point is, among greatest-of-all-time hitter contenders, Aaron had to deal with the environment least conducive to offense. Everyone else played in leagues scoring around 10% more runs per game. Only Willie Mays, who almost completely overlapped with Aaron, can relate. Even Ty Cobb, who started in the dead ball era, played well into the live ball era for his American League to average 4.4 runs per game throughout his career. He lasted long enough to make a mockery of Babe Ruth's homerun-centric approach, hitting three in a game simply to show it's not so hard, and voters of the first Hall of Fame class actually agreed. 1968, the year of the pitcher and the height of the second dead ball era, occurred during Aaron's age 34 season, the 15th of his career. He was still in his prime. His 8.52 OPS was the 18th best of his career, and worst besides the very beginning and very end of it, but it's simultaneously tied for his 11th best effort in terms of OPS+, so very much a factor. Aaron handled lefties like Koufax and Carlton, but prime Bob Gibson proved to be a nightmare matchup for him and just about anyone. His advice to teammate Dusty Baker? Don't dig in against Bob Gibson. He'd knock down his own grandmother if she dared challenge him. Speaking of family, basic trivia number 3, Henry and Tommy Aaron share the MLB record for most homeruns hit by a pair of brothers, 768. Tommy hit 13, the Hammer hit 755, and he did so when offense league-wide was struggling across the board. A hitter chasing down records in an otherwise pitching-centric era, a man out of time. We're on to the counting stats, 164 hits in 1969, which leads us to basic trivia number 4. If you take away all 755 of Henry Aaron's home runs, he'd still have over 3,000 hits. Aaron comfortably leads all right-handed hitters in hits across MLB history. We know of his homers, but did you know he hit more singles than Tony Gwynn? Okay, fine, he didn't, but it's pretty darn close, and he did hit more singles than Wade Boggs, Lou Brock, or Ricky Henderson. Now for the big one, the 15th most home runs Henry Aaron ever hit in a season, 30 in 1958. Surprisingly, there is one other hitter who can claim 15 30-homer seasons. It's not Ruth or Bonds, rather Alex Rodriguez, who like Bonds had a little help to beat the aging curve. Aaron had no such help, unless you hold a one-off with amphetamines in the same regard, though maybe this is evidence he would have turned to more potent chemical assistance if it was widely available in locker rooms. Aaron evenly distributed his homers throughout his career. Through his age-25 season, he hit 179, tied for 15th all-time, trailing power prodigies like Bryce Harper and John Carlos Stanton. From ages 26-30, he hit 187, putting him in 26th place. Those are the prime years, but Alfonso Soriano and Cecil Fielder were more prolific at the same ages. Andrew Jones had more homers by his 30th birthday than Aaron, but Aaron just kept going, finally creeping into the top 10 of a 5-year window between ages 31-35. From 36 onward, only Barry Bonds has him beat. He made up a late-career 60-homer deficit on Aaron to take the all-time crown, albeit with a little help. That consistency and even distribution even goes down to the game-to-game level. Aaron still has the most career games with a home run. They just didn't come in bunches for him. Shockingly, Hammer and Hank only had one career 3-homer gain. Jesse Winker has more such games, for crying out loud. Aaron does still maintain the all-time lead in another triple crown stat. Runs batted in, but 2nd place overall Albert Pujols actually has him beat when it comes to the 15th most RBI in a season. Perhaps the most shocking result is Aaron's lead in runs scored. His 15th best total was 100 in 1969, meaning he clears the actual all-time run scoring leader Ricky Henderson in that regard, not to mention everyone else in MLB history. Another more obvious win is total bases, with 302 in the year of the pitcher. Aaron has 15 seasons of 300 or more total bases, while the next best group tops out at 13. Another way of putting it, at 90 feet per base, he ran, or at least jogged, 11 more miles than anyone before him or since. It's not quite a back-of-the-baseball-card stat, but the only metrics on a hitter's baseball reference page with more impressive career leads would have to be Ricky Henderson's dominance in career stolen bases, and Barry Bond's in walks, but especially intentional walks. It's just pure volume year after year across Aaron's career, and that really shows in his most impressive 15th best stat, more. Wins above replacement takes into account Henry Aaron's skills with the glove and on the base pass. His best single-season war came in 1961, when he led the National League with 9.4. As strong a season as that is, it's been topped 217 times by hitters and pitchers alike. Babe Ruth had 9 better seasons, Aaron's peer Willie Mays had 7 better seasons, and even active hitters like Mike Trout, Mookie Betts, and Aaron Judge have peaked higher on multiple occasions recently. Yet, Henry Aaron still ranks 7th all-time in career baseball reference war, and moves up to 5th on the leaderboard when it comes to E-War, an attempt at adjusting the stat based on era by Illinois professor Daniel J. Eck. War is a comparison between a player and a hypothetical replacement-level player from that year, which means it's easier to accrue war in times when replacement-level players are bad, like during World War II, and harder when they're good, like now, the early stages of World War III. E-War attempts to alleviate that. Take Aaron's 9.4 war in 1961, for example. Not only was the National League in its final year of a 154-game season, rather than the 162 played today, it was right in that sweet spot of post-integration, but pre-expansion. Everyone was allowed to play regardless of skin color, but there were still only 8 teams in the league, so competition was fierce. Seven of the top 10 NL MVP finishers that year would have been playing in the Negro Leagues if they were born a generation earlier. In fact, the game has seen as many 10-war seasons from hitters in the four decades prior to integration than the eight decades since. So what about Aaron's 15th best war? His best was 9.4, and his 15th best was 6.8. That is nothing less than unparalleled consistency. Yogi Berra, Harman Killebrew, Paul Molitor, Fred McGriff, David Ortiz, these guys never had a season with 6.8 war. Henry Aaron did it 15 times, and yes, that is, including pitchers, the highest 15th best mark in the history of the game. Plenty of ballplayers have peaked higher than Aaron, but his 15th best season is better than anyone else's 15th best season. 292 average, 365 on base, 539 slug, 149 OPS+, 164 hits, 30 homers, 95 RBI, 100 runs, 302 total bases, 6.8 war. Hankenstein's monster. Here are the last 20 players to reach or exceed all those marks in a season. Of those 20, all of them were MVP finalists, and the majority of them won the award outright for their respective league. So that's the blueprint. If you're playing in MLB today and want to win MVP, all you have to do is be better than Hank Aaron in his 15th best season. Thank you to William Cage for the music.