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"Amid eight reels of 16-millimeter film recently discovered in excellent condition in an Illinois cellar are three and a half minutes of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig wearing the uniforms, but not the caps, of their barnstorming teams. The film is believed to have been shot with a high-end home movie camera in or around Sioux City, Iowa, on Oct. 18, 1927 — 10 days after the Yankees completed a four-game World Series sweep of the Pittsburgh Pirates."
"Jose Bautista was the AL home run king in 2010, while the second-place HR leader (Paul Konerko) had 15 homers less. Is that the biggest difference in history of HR kings?"
Not quite. While the 15-HR gap between Bautista and Konerko is impressive, it actually pales in comparison to some of the leads Babe Ruth had in his HR races.
In 1920, the same year he famously had 4 more HR by himself than any other AL team, Ruth also placed a 35-HR gap between himself and runner-up George Sisler. And the following year, Ruth repeated that feat, hitting 35 more HR than Ken Williams. All told, Ruth owns 5 of the 6 biggest differences between a league HR leader and the runner-up. Here's the full list of biggest disparities between #1 and #2:
Chances "When the fielder loves his record
More than victory for his team
Doubtful chances miss his glances
For his caution is extreme.
Going after every grounder
Means a slip-up here and there,
And in terror of an error
He will choose the chances fair.
Spotless records are enticing
In a ball game as in life,
And the cunning pick their running
To avoid the stony strife.
Many a mortal swaggers slowly
Down the years in proud parade,
Boasting to the meek and lowly
Of the slips he never made.
Well it is that wise commanders,
When they call for sterling men,
Place the workers o'er the shirkers
Though they err and err again.
Men who try and fall when trying
Try again and win at last,
Never brooding, never sighing
O'er the errors of the past."
-- William F. Kirk
Stevens says there's "no doubt" Ruth called the shot.
Then again, that's just one man's opinion, even if he was on the Supreme Court bench. As the TV Squad post notes,
"Ruth's called shot wasn't televised, but a pair of home movies recorded by other spectators at the game suggest Ruth may have really been pointing at the pitcher, or at the opposing team's bench. Much like the Supreme Court rulings, a unanimous verdict is hard to come by."
As Andy noted yesterday, King Felix won the AL Cy Young after also leading the AL in Wins Above Replacement. I was wondering how often pitchers have pulled off this double feat of winning the CYA and the WAR crown in the same season, so I called up our year-by-year WAR leaders and cross-referenced that list with the Cy Young winners file at Baseball-Databank.org. Here were the results:
Consider this a retro-bloop, since I didn't catch it the first time around, but here's a great piece at ESPN about the most valuable World Series HRs of all time by "series WPA".
What's series WPA, you ask? It's basically like regular WPA, except it also take into account the probability of winning the series (using a process similar to this). In essence, these home runs are the blasts that most swung the probability of winning the entire World Series, rather than just changing the probability of winning a given game.
As for the #1 HR? Well, it came in this famous game... but it might not be the exact homer you're thinking of.
As you probably know, the 2010 Giants won the World Series after leading the majors in Earned Run Average during the regular season. So here's a recent question from B-R reader Joshua Rosenstock:
"How many times has the team that led the MLB in ERA won the World Series?"
Here's an interesting question sent to us by B-R reader Phil:
"I've been a Mets fan since 1967, when, as the youngest kid in my neighborhood, I needed something to differentiate myself from the older kids who grew up Yankees fans at the tail end of the dynasty. In 1969, God performed his last certified Miracle. As I've learned more about baseball over the last 40 years, I've come to wonder: did the Mets 1969 pitching staff have the best 'potential' of any staff? By that I mean, did they have the most wins left in them?"
The 2010 Yankees-Twins ALDS represents just the 8th time in the WS era (1903-2010) that the same two teams faced each other in a postseason series 4 times in 8 seasons... The Dodgers & Yankees played each other in 4 world series from 1946-53, 48-55, and five times (!!!) from 1949-56. The Yankees and Royals faced off in 4 series from 1973-80, and the Braves & Astros had two different 8-year stretches with 4 playoff showdowns in the late nineties/early 2000s (1997-04 and 1998-05). The Red Sox and Angels capped off a 4-series-in-8-years stretch last season, and now the Yankees and Twins have joined that group with ALDS faceoffs in 2003, 2004, 2009, and 2010.
