With Murakami on the injured list, its a good time to look at how no other team has been hurt by losing HR leaders as much as the White Sox

Murakami was tied for the AL HR lead when he got hurt. Bill Melton led the AL in HRs in 1971 for the White Sox yet played only 57 games the next year because he got hurt. Then Dick Allen led the AL in HRs in 1972. He got hurt and only played 72 games the next year.

The table below shows what % of a team's games HR leaders played the year after they led. I sorted them from lowest to highest. The table shows the lowest 20 (I only looked at the years 1946-2025). All data generated by bases.chat, an AI baseball program created by Ted Ingram. I did not, of course, check last year's leaders since this year is not over yet. Cal Raleigh could make the list.

Notice that both Bill Melton and Dick Allen are in the lowest 8 (I will make some comments about the guys ahead of them after the table). They are the only teammates in consecutive years (or any years close to each other) in the lowest 20. No other team has been snake bitten like they were.

The White Sox lost a close divisional race to the A's in 1972. They were in first place as late as Aug. 28 and even with 17 games left they were only 2 games out. Melton played his last game on June 23 and his performance was plagued all year by an ailing back (he only managed 7 HRs). He played only 37% of the White Sox games that year.

In 1973, Allen go hurt on June 28. The White Sox were only 1 game out. He played 3 games later in the season but only had a total of 5 PAs. He had also been the AL MVP in 1972 while having a 199 OPS+. He had a 176 OPS+ in 1973. That was higher than the league leader Reggie Jackson who had 161. Allen did not have enough PAs to qualify. He played only 44% of the White Sox games that year. CFer Ken Henderson also got hurt in May (he was hitting .311 at the time) and ended up playing only 73 games.

Player	Lead Yr	% of Games
Fernando Tatis	2021	0.00%
Marcell Ozuna	2020	29.81%
Bill Melton	1971	37.01%
Ryan Braun	2012	37.65%
Chris Carter	2016	38.27%
Jose Canseco	1988	40.12%
Luke Voit	2020	41.98%
Dick Allen	1972	44.44%
Giancarlo Stanton	2014	45.68%
Joe DiMaggio	1948	49.03%
Ken Griffey	1994	49.66%
Dave Kingman	1979	50.00%
Matt Williams	1994	52.78%
Mark McGwire	1999	54.94%
Jose Bautista	2011	56.79%
Ted Williams	1949	57.79%
Harmon Killebrew	1967	61.73%
Dave Kingman	1982	61.73%
Howard Johnson	1991	61.73%
Tony Armas	1984	63.19%

Tatis was hurt in 2022. But he got supsended on Aug. 12 for 80 games for PED use. Even without the suspension, his % would be very low.

Ozuna and Voit were leaders in the Covid year and their leadership is not on a par with other hitters. The season was only 60 games.

Ryan Braun got suspended for PED use on July 22, 2013.

Carter became a free agent and signed with the Yankees, leaving the Brewers. He had a poor season and that was his last year in MLB 

Players who hit 3 HRs in a game including a walk off HR

Here are the guys who hit 3 HRs in a game including a walk off HR that I found in the Stathead data base

Max Muncy LAD (he did this last nite)

Jack Suwinski

Brendan Rodgers

Eddie Rosario

Manny Machado

Albert Pujols

Todd Hollandsworth

Jack Clark

Otto Vélez

Cecil Cooper

Willie McCovey

Don Demeter

Héctor López

George Kelly

Khris Davis (walk off was a grand slam)
Joey Votto (walk off was a grand slam)
Walt Moryn (walk off against Sany Koufax) 

 

This link has the search results: 

https://www.sports-reference.com/stathead/tiny/EWynh

I searched all 3 HR games where the team won and it was a walk off. There were 30 cases and I went thru them to find all the cases where the 3 HR guy hit a walk off HR. Those are the ones I listed above.  I did not list Butch Henline from 1922. He hit a game tying HR in the 9th (his third of the game) and the next guy hit a walk off HR. 

Baseball Reference and Retrosheet don't have play-by-play for all games. But there probably are not too many more of these games. There were no 3 HR games between 1900-1919. I also looked at all 3 HR games from 1920-40 where the said player's team won the game and checked the box score to see if the winning run was scored in the bottom of the 9th inning or bottom of an extra inning. I found no such cases.

So we have 17 cases of this happening. It is rarer than a 4 HR game which has happened 21 times. 

The correlation of runs per game and strikeouts per game

Last week the announcers during a Phillies game mentioned that a couple teams that had poor records had also struck out alot. One of them said "there's got to be a correlation."

The correlation between runs per game and strikeouts per game was -0.14 for all 150 team/seasons from 2021-25. So it was negative but not very strong.

Then I ran a regression with runs per game as the dependent variable and OBP, SLG, and strikeouts per game as the independent variables. Here was the equation

R/G = .22*SO + 10.57*SLG + 15.41*OBP - 4.86 

R-squared = .901 (90% of the variation across teams in runs scored per game is explained by the model)

Standard error = .147 (about 24 runs per season)

 

T-values & p-values

 

SO = 1.18 & 0.24

SLG =  12.24 & < 0.0000001

OBP = 8.29 & < 0.0000001

 

Strikeouts are not significant. SLG & OBP are significant. There is an extremely low chance that we could have gotten the coefficient values in the equation if the true value is zero. But the result for SO would be likely.

 

Strikeouts are also positive. Runs increase with strikeouts, but not much. 1 more strikeout per game increases runs by 0.22 per game. 

 

Here is the regression equation without strikeouts. The coefficient values are about the same, so adding in strikeouts does not change things much. 

R/G = 10.80*SLG + 14.67*OBP - 4.53 

R-squared = .900  

Standard error = .147   

The number of shortstops and 2B men hitting 30+ HRs in a season has increased greatly from the 20th century to the 21st

The table below shows all the shortstops who hit 30+ HRs thru 1999. All data from Baseball Reference and Stathead. Click here to see the search results for this table. There are 16 cases. But 7 came during 1995-99. So the SS power surge started a bit early (This is for guys who played 50%+ of their games at the position).

Player	HR	Season
Vern Stephens	39	1949
Vern Stephens	30	1950
Ernie Banks	44	1955
Ernie Banks	43	1957
Ernie Banks	47	1958
Ernie Banks	45	1959
Ernie Banks	41	1960
Rico Petrocelli	40	1969
Cal Ripken Jr.	34	1991
Álex Rodríguez	36	1996
Barry Larkin	33	1996
Nomar Garciaparra	30	1997
Álex Rodríguez	42	1998
Nomar Garciaparra	35	1998
Álex Rodríguez	42	1999
Tony Batista	31	1999

Now for 2000-25. Click here to see the search results for this table. There are 41 cases. That is about 2.5 times as many in the 20th century. Now there were not many HRs before 1920, but the 25 year period is far ahead of the 80 year period.

Player	HR	Season		Player	HR	Season
Álex Rodríguez	41	2000		Gleyber Torres	38	2019
Miguel Tejada	30	2000		Trevor Story	35	2019
Álex Rodríguez	52	2001		Xander Bogaerts	33	2019
Rich Aurilia	37	2001		Marcus Semien	33	2019
Miguel Tejada	31	2001		Francisco Lindor	32	2019
Álex Rodríguez	57	2002		Paul DeJong	30	2019
Miguel Tejada	34	2002		Fernando Tatis Jr.	42	2021
Álex Rodríguez	47	2003		Javier Báez	31	2021
Miguel Tejada	34	2004		Corey Seager	33	2022
José Valentín	30	2004		Willy Adames	31	2022
Bill Hall	35	2006		Corey Seager	33	2023
Jimmy Rollins	30	2007		Francisco Lindor	31	2023
Hanley Ramírez	33	2008		Bobby Witt Jr.	30	2023
Troy Tulowitzki	32	2009		Gunnar Henderson	37	2024
J.J. Hardy	30	2011		Francisco Lindor	33	2024
Troy Tulowitzki	30	2011		Willy Adames	32	2024
Brad Miller	30	2016		Bobby Witt Jr.	32	2024
Francisco Lindor	33	2017		Corey Seager	30	2024
Francisco Lindor	38	2018		Francisco Lindor	31	2025
Manny Machado	37	2018		Willy Adames	30	2025
Trevor Story	37	2018

The table below shows all the 2Bmen who hit 30+ HRs thru 1999.  Click here to see the search results for this table. There are 11 cases.

Player	HR	Season
Rogers Hornsby	42	1922
Rogers Hornsby	39	1925
Rogers Hornsby	39	1929
Joe Gordon	30	1940
Joe Gordon	32	1948
Davey Johnson	43	1973
Bobby Grich	30	1979
Ryne Sandberg	30	1989
Ryne Sandberg	40	1990
Jeff Kent	31	1998
Jay Bell	38	1999

Now for 2000-25. Click here to see the search results for this table. There are 40 cases. Almost 4 times as many.

Player	HR	Season		Player	HR	Season
Marcus Semien	45	2021		Jorge Polanco	33	2021
Brian Dozier	42	2016		Dan Uggla	33	2010
Robinson Canó	39	2016		Chase Utley	33	2008
Brandon Lowe	39	2021		Ian Kinsler	32	2011
Alfonso Soriano	39	2002		Ketel Marte	32	2019
Alfonso Soriano	38	2003		Jonathan Schoop	32	2017
Bret Boone	37	2001		Dan Uggla	32	2008
Jeff Kent	37	2002		Chase Utley	32	2006
Aaron Hill	36	2009		Jose Altuve	31	2021
Ketel Marte	36	2024		Jose Altuve	31	2019
Alfonso Soriano	36	2005		Jazz Chisholm Jr.	31	2025
Dan Uggla	36	2011		Ian Kinsler	31	2009
Bret Boone	35	2003		Brandon Lowe	31	2025
Max Muncy	35	2019		Dan Uggla	31	2007
Javier Báez	34	2018		Dan Uggla	31	2009
Brian Dozier	34	2017		Chase Utley	31	2009
Ozzie Albies	33	2023		Ozzie Albies	30	2021
Robinson Canó	33	2012		Rougned Odor	30	2019
Jeff Kent	33	2000		Rougned Odor	30	2017
Rougned Odor	33	2016		Brandon Phillips	30	2007

 

For all batters, regardless of position, here are the totals for each time period:

 

Thru 1999)  806
2000-2025)  757  

 

There is no total increase. So something much different has happened for these 2 positions than the general trend. 

 

If we take out the SS/2Bmen it would be

 

Thru 1999)  779
2000-2025)  676  

 

That ratio is about .87, far lower than the 2.5 for SS or the 4 for 2Bmen.