Ted Williams: the Splendid Splinter

There will never be a hitter like Ted Williams. In his 21-year big league career, he twice won the American League MVP, led the league in batting six times, and twice won the Triple Crown (most home runs, most runs batted in, and highest batting average). He had a career batting average of .344, with 521 home runs, and was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1966.

Also of note, Williams holds the highest career batting average of anyone with 500 or more home runs, and his record .551 on base percentage, set in 1941 (the same year he batted .406) stood for 61 years, bested by Barry Bonds in 2002. He is the last player in Major League Baseball to bat over .400 for a single season. Williams in 1949 set the record for reaching base for most consecutive games ─ 84 ─ and also holds the third longest such streak of 69, set in 1941. Williams successfully reached base in 16 consecutive plate appearances in 1957,  a major-league record that still stands.

His .406 batting average, in my mind, is the most impressive accomplishment in any sport. Consider that today’s hitters spray the ball to all fields; yet Williams was a dead pull hitter, hitting consistently against the Williams Shift opposing defenses deployed against him. Consider also that the pitcher’s mound was 10 inches higher in Williams’s day, which gave an edge to pitchers. Had he been blessed with more speed, Williams felt he could have hit over .400 for at least one more season over his career (he did it three times).

In today’s game, power hitters opt for heavier bats to generate more pop; yet Williams used a lighter bat to generate more bat speed. An obsessive student of hitting, Williams often stepped out of the batter’s box whenever a cloud momentarily obscured the sun to ensure himself the best opportunity to see the ball.

Perhaps the only low spot in Williams’s career was his performance in the 1946 World Series (his only appearance in the Fall Classic) in which, playing with a sore elbow, he managed just five singles in 25 at-bats, with just one RBI, as the Red Sox lost to the St. Louis Cardinals in seven games. 

Williams hit a home run off Rip Sewell’s notorious eephus pitch (noted for its high arc and slow speed ─ usually under 60 mph) during the 1946 All-Star Game at Fenway Park. He twice challenged Sewell to throw the pitch ─ the first was a called strike, but Williams hit the second pitch for a home run.

In a climactic ending to his career, Williams hit a home run in his very last at bat on September 28, 1960.

In this modern era of baseball, it’s unlikely that any player will eclipse Williams’s prowess with the lumber, and for that reason, his .406 batting average is the most impressive accomplishment in any sport.