Monday, January 12, 2009

Top 10 Baseball Hitters of All Time


Top 10 Baseball Hitters of All Time

There are basically two types of batters in professional baseball. On one hand, you have the sluggers; the home-run hitters that thrill the crowd by tearing the cover off the ball. Then on the other hand, you have the hitters: the guys who constantly make contact and seem to get on base almost every time they get up to the plate. This article is about a list of the top 10 hitters based on the total number of hits they amassed in their careers. I decided to take things a step further and reorganized the list based in order of who was the best contact hitter, not who had the most hits. My reasoning for setting up the list this way was simple. In order to judge the best hitter, it needs to be based on quality not quantity. According to the record books, these are the top ten hitters listed by name, rank, and total career hits ---

1. Pete Rose 4,256 (Pictued)
2. Ty Cobb 4,189
3. Henry Aaron 3,771
4. Stan Musial 3,630
5. Tris Speaker 3,514
6. Carl Yastrzemski 3,419
7. Honus Wagner 3,415
8. Paul Molitor 3,319
9. Eddie Collins 3,315
10.Willie Mays 3,283

These are remarkable numbers when you initially look at the list. I used a system that I designed for the purposes of this article in order to rate these 10 hitters based on the quality factor. There were nine key statistics that I used in order to accomplish what I set out to do in this article --- games played, at bats, hits, batting average, average hits per season, average at bats per hit, average hits per game, number of seasons with 200 or more hits, and number of seasons with over 100 or more hits. Hits per season, at bats per hit, and hits per game required simple division in order to calculate the answer. Number of seasons with 200 or more hits and 100 or more hits required simple addition in order to calculate the answer. The other four stats were self-explanatory. Each of the player's statistics has been ranked 1 through 10 with 1 being the highest.

I simply added up each category rank and divided the total by nine (the number of categories) in order to calculate the true ranking index.

Pete Rose played for the Cincinnati Reds (1963-78), the Philadelphia Phillies (1979-83), the Montreal Expos (1984), and the Reds once again (1984-86) finishing his career where his career started. The numbers and their respective rankings for his 24 year career are as follows: 3,562 games played (1) --- 14,053 at bats (1) --- 4,256 hits (1) --- .303 career batting average (8) --- averaged 177 hits per season (1) --- averaged a hit for every 3.3 at bats (7) --- averaged 1.19 hits per game (6) --- had 10 seasons with 200 or more hits (1) --- had 21 seasons with 100 or more hits (2). Hitting index = 3.11

Ty Cobb played for the Detroit Tigers (1905-26) and the Philadelphia Athletics (1927-28). He held the record for most hits in a career for 57 years (1928-85) when Pete Rose broke the record. The numbers and rankings for his 24 year career are as follows: 3,035 games played (4) --- 11,434 at bats (4) ---4,189 hits (2) --- .366 career batting average (1) --- averaged 175 hits per season (2) --- averaged a hit for every 2.73 at bats (1) --- averaged 1.38 hits per game (2) --- had nine seasons with 200 or more hits (2) --- had 22 seasons with 100 or more hits (1). Hitting index = 2.11

Hank Aaron played for the Milwaukee Braves (1954-65), the Atlanta Braves (1966-74), and fittingly ended his career with the Milwaukee Brewers (1975-76). His numbers and their rank is as follows: 3,298 games played (3) --- 12,364 at bats (2) --- 3,771 hits (3) --- .305 career batting average (7) --- averaged 164 hits per season (3) --- averaged a hit for every 3.28 at bats (6) --- averaged 1.14 hits per game (8) had three seasons with 200 or more hits (5) --- had 22 seasons with 100 or more hits (1). Hitting index = 4.22

Stan Musial played his entire career with the St. Louis Cardinals (1941-63). In those 23 seasons, his stats and their ranks are as follows: 3,026 games played (5) --- 10,972 at bats (6) --- 3,630 hits (4) --- .331 career batting average (4) --- averaged 158 hits per season (6) --- averaged a hit for every 3.02 at bats (4) --- averaged 1.2 hits per game (5) --- had five seasons with 200 or more hits (3) --- had 19 seasons with 100 or more hits (3). Hitting index = 4.22

Tris Speaker played with the Boston Americans (1907), the Boston Red Sox 1908-15, the Cleveland Indians (1916-26), the Washington Senators (1927), and ended his 22 year career with the Philadelphia Athletics (1928). His numbers and their rankings are as follows: 2,789 games played (9) --- 10,195 at bats (9) --- 3,514 hits (5) --- .345 career batting average (2) --- averaged 160 hits per season (5) --- averaged a hit for every 2.90 at bats (2) --- averaged 1.54 hits per game (1) --- had four seasons with 200 or more hits (4) --- had 19 seasons with 100 or more hits (3). Hitting index = 4.44

Carl Yastrzemskispent his entire 23 year career with the Boston Red Sox (1961-83). His numbers and their rankings are as follows: 3,308 games played (2) --- 11,988 at bats (3) --- 3,419 hits (6) --- .285 career batting average (10) ---averaged 149 hits per season (8) --- averaged a hit for every 3.51 at bats (10) --- averaged 1.03 hits per game (10) --- never had a season with 200 or more hits (8) --- had 22 seasons with 100 or more hits (1). Hitting index = 6.44

Honus Wagner whose tobacco company's baseball card is the rage of collectors everywhere played with the Louisville Colonels (1897-99) and the Pittsburgh Pirates (1900-17). His numbers and their ranks for his 21 year career are as follows: 2,792 games played (8) --- 11,430 at bats (5) --- 3,415 hits (7) --- .327 career batting average --- averaged 163 hits per season --- averaged a hit for every 3.35 at bats (9) averaged 1.22 hits per game (4) --- had two seasons with 200 or more hits (6) --- had 19 seasons with 100 or more hits (3). Hitting index = 5.67

Paul Molitor played for the Milwaukee Brewers (1978-92), the Toronto (1993-95), and the Minnesota Twins (1996-97). His numbers and their rankings for his 21 year career are as follows: 2,683 games played (10) --- 10,835 at bats (8) --- 3,319 hits (8) --- .306 career batting average (6) --- averaged 158 hits per season (6) --- averaged a hit for every 3.26 at bats (5) --- averaged 1.24 hits per game (3) --- had 4 season with 200 or more hits (4) --- had 19 seasons with 100 or more hits (3). Hitting index = 5.89

Eddie Collins played for the Philadelphia Athletics (1906-14), the Chicago White Sox (1915-26), and returned to the Athletics (1927-30) for the remainder of his 25 year career. His numbers and their ranks are as follows: 2,826 games (7) --- 9,949 at bats (10) --- 3,315 hits (9) --- .333 career batting average (3) --- averaged 133 hits per season (10) --- averaged a hit for every 3.0 at bats (3) --- averaged 1.17 hits per game (7) --- had one season with 200 or more hits (7) --- had 18 seasons with 100 or more hits (4). Hitting index = 6.67

Willie Mays played for the New York Giants (1951-57) and relocated the San Francisco Giants (1958-73). His numbers and their rankings for his 23 year career are as follows: 2,992 games played (6) --- 10,881 at bats (7) --- 3,283 hits (10) --- .302 career batting average (9) --- averaged 143 hits per season (9) averaged a hit for every 3.31 at bats (8) --- averaged 1.11 hits per game (9) --- had one season with 200 or more hits (7) --- had 19 seasons with 100 or more hits (3). Hitting index = 7.56

The Baseball Almanac lists the top 100 hitters in baseball history based on total career hits (current through the 2007 season). Bear in mind that there are a total of 26 players on the list having 3,000 or more career hits with Roberto Clemente being #26 with exactly 3,000 hits. Most of your sports websites have the list if you ever want to see it in its entirety. I would love to rearrange that list in its entirety using my hitting index, but there's not enough time for now and I have to watch the length of articles that I submit for publishing. So taking just these players into consideration, here's the original list and the new, improved list for your perusal. The current order of the top 10 hitters based on number of career hits is as follows:

1. Pete Rose
2. Ty Cob
3. Hank Aaron
4. Stan Musial
5. Tris Speaker
6. Carl Yastrzemski
7. Honus Wagner
8. Paul Molitor
9. Eddie Collins
10. Willie Mays

The new order of rank for the top 10 hitters using the hitting index would be:

1. Ty Cobb
2. Pete Rose
3. Hank Aaron and Stan Musial
5. Tris Speaker
6. Honus Wagner
7. Paul Molitor
8. Carl Yastrzemski
9. Eddie Collins
10. Willie Mays

I have to agree with ranking Ty Cobb as number one on the list, and it has nothing to do with the fact that Pete Rose was indicted for gambling and banned from baseball. Personally I think it's more of a crime that he's been denied his rightful place in the Hall of Fame, when players like Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, and even the great Mickey Mantle were not the stellar personalities off the field that they were on it. But with any luck, Pete will get into the Hall. For me the three stats that convinced me that Cobb was the real number one were batting average, the hit per so many at bats average, and average hits per game. These are the stats that qualify the best contact hitter.

Sources: Baseball Almanac http://baseball-almanac.com/

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