It’s Really Not A Bad Thing
Posted by Steve Lombardi on January 28, 2008
The 1934 season was Babe Ruth’s last productive year in baseball as a player. Then, the Big Bam was 39-years old - and truly on his last legs. But, he managed to come to the plate 471 times and post an OPS+ of 161. This got me wondering as to what modern players have put together a season like Babe Ruth’s last good season - so, I went to Baseball-Reference.com’s Play Index Batting Season Finder and set it for: “For single seasons, From 1996 to 2007, (requiring OPSp>=160, PA>=450, PA<=499, and OPSp<=170), sorted by name” and this is what I got:
Cnt OPS+ PA Year Age Tm Lg G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF GDP SB CS BA OBP SLG OPS Positions +----+-----------------+---+----+---+----+---+---+--+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+ 1 Javy Lopez 169 495 2003 32 ATL NL 129 457 89 150 29 3 43 109 33 5 90 4 0 1 10 0 1 .328 .378 .687 1.065 *2/D 2 Ellis Burks 163 458 2000 35 SFG NL 122 393 74 135 21 5 24 96 56 5 49 1 0 8 10 5 1 .344 .419 .606 1.025 *9/D 3 Barry Bonds 170 477 2007 42 SFG NL 126 340 75 94 14 0 28 66 132 43 54 3 0 2 13 5 0 .276 .480 .565 1.045 *7/D
I had a feeling that Barry would show up on this list - somehow. But, Javy Lopez and Ellis Burks, well, I did not expect to see them here. I wonder, during 2000, for Ellis, and 2003, for Javy, what if someone had yelled out to them “Hey, you’re playing like Babe Ruth on his last legs!” - would they have thought that was a bad thing?
