Nap Lajoie Stats
How good was Poli every time he stepped up to the plate in the major leagues?
Post Comment|14 Liked It
Presented in this article are Nap Lajoie ’s real baseball stats per official at bat. How many runs, RBI’s and home runs (HR’s) did Poli get per official at bat? Presenting the stats in this manner is meant to give you a clearer picture of what, on average, Nap Lajoie accomplished for each official at bat he had in the major leagues.
How are the stats calculated out? Simply by dividing each stat listed by official at bats. Just like you do with hits for batting average. Here we are dividing total runs scored by total official at bats to get a player’s run average, total RBI’s by total official at bats for a player’s RBI average and total HR’s by total official at bats for a player’s HR average. For example: if a player has scored 1,000 runs in 5,000 official at bats his run average would be .200. If the player had 900 RBI’s his RBI average would be .180. And if he had 200 HR’s his HR average would be .040. So on average this player would have scored a run 20% of the time, driven in a run 18% of the time and hit a HR 4% of the time he recorded an official at bat in the major leagues.
Obviously the higher the averages the better the player was. Here is a rough guide to determine how a players averages stack up.
Run Average and RBI Average – anything over .150 is good. Anything above .200 is excellent, and the very best players in history have occasionally gone over .300 in some seasons.
HR Average – anything over .055 is good. Anything above .065 is really good and anything above .075 means one of the best HR hitters of all time.
Here are Nap Lajoie’s raw numbers (AB’s/runs/HR’s/RBI’s) 9589/1504/83/1599.
Nap Lajoie’s Career Numbers
Run Average – .157
RBI Average – .167
HR Average – .009
So on average Nap Lajoie scored a run 15.7% of the time, drove in a run 16.7% of the time and hit a HR .90% of the time he stepped up to the plate and had an official at bat in the major leagues.
Lajoie had over 3,000 hits in his career(3,242) and batted over .400 in 1901 (.426) and won 5 batting titles (1901-1904 and 1910). He was the best average hitter in baseball until Ty Cobb arrived on the scene.
Lajoie started his career playing for the Philadelphia Phillies but jumped to the crosstown Philadelphia Athletics when the National League imposed a salary cap of $2,400 per player. A year later the Phillies got an injunction barring Lajoie from playing for any other team but them. However the injunction was only enforceable in Pennsylvania so the A’s traded Lajoie to the Cleveland Bluebirds who were just about the worst team in baseball. Lajoie revived the team, drawing 10,000 fans in his first game. The next season the team name was changed to “Naps” in honor of their star player. In 1902 and 1903 Lajoie did not travel with the team to Pennsylvania games but then the issue was resolved when the two leagues made peace in late 1903. Lajoie played for the Cleveland Naps until 1914 and after he left the team name was changed to what it remains today the Cleveland Indians. Lajoie went back to the A’s for the final two seasons of his 21 year career.
Nap Lajoie was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1937.
Realted Articles:
