Hank Greenberg vs. The Yankees

I got interested in this recently when David Ortiz became the sixth player to hit 50+ career HRs vs. the Yankees. It turns out that Greenberg is the only one of the six who never played for the Red Sox (Hat tip to Ryan Pollack for that info). Also, if anyone asks who hit the most career HRs by a guy who attended NYU, Greenberg is the answer.

Greenberg hit 331 career HRs and 1/7 of those would be 47.29. He had 53 against the Yankees. So a bit more than you would expect. The Yankees allowed a HR% of 1.52% over the years 1933-46 (he was in the military from 42-44 and good chunks of 41 & 45 so this is not quite right, but I hope it is close). The league average was 1.56%. So the Yankees were about average in terms of allowing HRs. Also, the Yankees and Tigers were just about tied for the lowest SLG allowed in the AL over these years, .351 (Tigers were 0.00064 lower-what teams allowed is in a table at the end of the post). They Yankees allowed the lowest average of .254. So against what might have been the best pitching staff of these years in the AL, Greenberg upped his game. Of course, the Yankee fielders might have helped.

He had a career HR% of 6.37% but against the Yankees it was 7.26%. So he did especially well against them. Here are his AVG-OBP-SLG against them: .333-.409-.667. His whole career was .313-.412-.605 (if we take out 1947, his year in the NL, they were .319-.412-.616). So he really hit alot better against them than other teams (probably walked less frequently)

In Yankee Stadium he had .319-.375-.608. Pretty good for a righty with that death valley they had, over 400 to left center. His HR% there was 5.45%. He probably had an SLG of over .700 against them at Tiger Stadium.

Why did he hit so well against them? Was it because he was from New York? Who knows.

Here are the top 25 guys in SLG vs. the Yankees since 1913 with 250+ PAs (from the Baseball Reference Play Index). SLGtot is their career SLG. Then the difference between their career SLG and what they did against the Yankees. Then how many PAs vs. the Yankees along with their BA and OBP.

Rk	Player	SLGvNY	SLGtot	Diff	PA	BA	OBP
1	Hank Greenberg	0.667	0.615	0.052	826	0.333	0.409
2	Miguel Cabrera	0.665	0.570	0.095	255	0.335	0.412
3	Alex Rodriguez	0.651	0.581	0.070	374	0.334	0.386
4	Manny Ramirez	0.617	0.589	0.028	861	0.322	0.413
5	Albert Belle	0.611	0.564	0.047	503	0.301	0.366
6	Ted Williams	0.608	0.633	-0.025	1351	0.345	0.495
7	Ken Griffey	0.595	0.549	0.046	572	0.311	0.392
8	Curt Blefary	0.592	0.410	0.182	257	0.313	0.414
9	Jim Rice	0.582	0.506	0.076	714	0.330	0.387
10	Mike Napoli	0.580	0.482	0.098	299	0.300	0.418
11	Rafael Palmeiro	0.579	0.519	0.060	820	0.311	0.396
12	Jay Buhner	0.578	0.496	0.082	409	0.283	0.379
13	Jimmie Foxx	0.577	0.616	-0.039	1260	0.303	0.400
14	Jose Bautista	0.576	0.509	0.067	425	0.253	0.402
15	David Ortiz	0.576	0.550	0.026	1003	0.307	0.395
16	Mo Vaughn	0.569	0.526	0.043	484	0.285	0.380
17	Nomar Garciaparra	0.556	0.544	0.012	404	0.326	0.360
18	Ramon Hernandez	0.553	0.420	0.133	300	0.333	0.403
19	Paul Konerko	0.551	0.491	0.060	443	0.306	0.378
20	Ken Williams	0.544	0.543	0.001	763	0.303	0.380
21	Edgar Martinez	0.542	0.516	0.026	594	0.317	0.423
22	Larry Parrish	0.542	0.453	0.089	314	0.301	0.354
23	Magglio Ordonez	0.541	0.502	0.039	407	0.301	0.369
24	Rusty Staub	0.541	0.437	0.104	255	0.320	0.369
25	Earl Averill	0.540	0.535	0.005	1070	0.323	0.395

It was not until the 1990s and 2000s that anyone came close to what Greenberg did (Rodriguez and Cabrerra). Tiger's pitcher Frank Lary (from the 1950s and 60s) was called "The Yankee Killer." But maybe Greenberg should have had that nickname.

Here are the top 10 in terms of how much better they did against the Yankees

Rk	Player	SLGvNY	SLGtot	Diff	PA
1	Curt Blefary	0.592	0.410	0.182	257
2	Jim Spencer	0.516	0.379	0.137	335
3	Ramon Hernandez	0.553	0.420	0.133	300
4	Ernie Whitt	0.530	0.418	0.112	274
5	Rusty Staub	0.541	0.437	0.104	255
6	Jonny Gomes	0.531	0.428	0.103	290
7	Mike Napoli	0.580	0.482	0.098	299
8	Miguel Cabrera	0.665	0.570	0.095	255
9	Larry Parrish	0.542	0.453	0.089	314
10	Dick Wakefield	0.530	0.447	0.083	349

Now those leaders with 400+ PAs

Rk	Player	SLGvNY	SLGtot	Diff	PA
1	Jay Buhner	0.578	0.496	0.082	409
2	Ruben Sierra	0.529	0.453	0.076	531
3	Jim Rice	0.582	0.506	0.076	714
4	Jose Bautista	0.576	0.509	0.067	425
5	Paul Konerko	0.551	0.491	0.060	443
6	Rafael Palmeiro	0.579	0.519	0.060	820
7	Chili Davis	0.526	0.471	0.055	476
8	Charlie Maxwell	0.505	0.452	0.053	549
9	Hank Greenberg	0.667	0.615	0.052	826
10	Vernon Wells	0.516	0.467	0.049	730

Here are all the right-handed batters with a .500+ SLG and 200+ career PAs in Yankee Stadium (I think this includes only the original park but both before and after the renovations of the 1970s when LF center was brought in from like 450 to 400 or so). Again, Greenberg is up there and no one passed him until Jim Rice in the 1970s and 80s, after the wall got closer.

Rk	Player	SLG	PA
1	Jim Rice	0.661	308
2	Albert Belle	0.645	258
3	Jay Buhner	0.623	235
4	Hank Greenberg	0.608	421
5	Manny Ramirez	0.605	440
6	Alex Rodriguez	0.597	1878
7	Mike Stanley	0.560	877
8	Harry Heilmann	0.557	315
9	Joe DiMaggio	0.547	3789
10	Edgar Martinez	0.545	303
11	Gary Sheffield	0.532	856
12	Al Simmons	0.532	646
13	Red Kress	0.520	439
14	Mariano Duncan	0.509	247
15	Ben Paschal	0.506	389
16	Shane Spencer	0.506	570
17	Roy Sievers	0.503	426

Here is what each AL team allowed opposing hitters from the years 1933-46. The league averages were BA .270, OBP .342, SLG .368

Team	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
DET	0.263	0.335	0.351	0.686
NYY	0.254	0.325	0.351	0.676
CLE	0.265	0.339	0.359	0.699
BOS	0.271	0.344	0.365	0.709
WSH	0.273	0.344	0.365	0.709
CHW	0.269	0.336	0.371	0.706
SLB	0.285	0.357	0.386	0.743
PHA	0.278	0.353	0.397	0.750