Here is the definition Power-Speed# from Baseball Reference:
"2 x (Home Runs x Stolen Bases)/(Stolen Bases + Home Runs). The harmonic mean of HR and SB. To do well you need a lot of both. Developed by Bill James."
Here are the top 3 single seasons:
| Alex Rodriguez | 43.91 | 1998 |
| Alfonso Soriano | 43.36 | 2006 |
| Eric Davis | 42.53 | 1987 |
AROD is first but his edge over the next guy is not very large. But as we will see in the first table below, Eric Davis has a large lead over the next best two year period. In fact, there are only two cases that are within 10 and none within 5.
To find the best cases, I used Stathead to call up all the cases of players getting 50+ HRs and 50+ SBs over a two year period starting at ages 20-21 up to 32-33 (Power-Speed# is not one of their searchable stats so it has to be calculated from HRs & SBs). There were no cases before or beyond that. The 50-50 cutoff should be enough to find the best seasons.
The table below shows the highest PS#s for each age group. It also includes the second highest for ages 24-25 to see how close that was to Eric Davis.
|
Age |
Player |
HR |
SB |
PS# |
|
20-21 |
Mike Trout |
57 |
82 |
67.25 |
|
21-22 |
Alex Rodriguez |
65 |
75 |
69.64 |
|
22-23 |
Alex Rodriguez |
84 |
67 |
74.54 |
|
23-24 |
Hanley Ramirez |
62 |
86 |
72.05 |
|
24-25 |
Eric Davis |
64 |
130 |
85.77 |
|
24-25 |
Willie Mays |
87 |
64 |
73.75 |
|
25-26 |
Willie Mays |
71 |
78 |
74.34 |
|
26-27 |
Rickey Henderson |
52 |
167 |
79.31 |
|
27-28 |
Barry Bonds |
80 |
68 |
73.51 |
|
28-29 |
Barry Bonds |
83 |
58 |
68.28 |
|
29-30 |
Alfonso Soriano |
82 |
71 |
76.10 |
|
30-31 |
Barry Bonds |
75 |
71 |
72.95 |
|
31-32 |
Barry Bonds |
77 |
65 |
70.49 |
So Davis's 85.77 is 6.47 higher than the second best PS# of 79.3, belonging to Rickey Henderson. Davis accomplished this in 1986 (27 HRs & 80 SBs) and 1987 (37 HRs & 50 SBs).
Over those two years, Davis had a .286 AVG, .389 OBP and a .560 SLG. He was only caught stealing 17 times, for an 88.4% success rate.
Here is the top 10 in OBP in the NL from 1986-87 for guys with 1,000+ PAs. Davis was 6th.
| Tim Raines | 0.421 |
| Tony Gwynn | 0.413 |
| Keith Hernandez | 0.395 |
| Von Hayes | 0.391 |
| Mike Schmidt | 0.389 |
| Eric Davis | 0.389 |
| Ozzie Smith | 0.385 |
| Dale Murphy | 0.382 |
| Darryl Strawberry | 0.379 |
| Bill Doran | 0.367 |
Now the top 10 in SLG. Davis is first.
| Eric Davis | 0.560 |
| Mike Schmidt | 0.547 |
| Darryl Strawberry | 0.547 |
| Andre Dawson | 0.528 |
| Dale Murphy | 0.526 |
| Will Clark | 0.521 |
| Tim Raines | 0.500 |
| Kevin McReynolds | 0.499 |
| Tony Gwynn | 0.488 |
| Andy Van Slyke | 0.484 |
Now OPS. Davis is first.
| Eric Davis | 0.949 |
| Mike Schmidt | 0.936 |
| Darryl Strawberry | 0.927 |
| Tim Raines | 0.921 |
| Dale Murphy | 0.908 |
| Tony Gwynn | 0.901 |
| Will Clark | 0.880 |
| Von Hayes | 0.868 |
| Andre Dawson | 0.860 |
| Kevin McReynolds | 0.837 |
Now OPS+. Davis was 2nd
| Darryl Strawberry | 151 |
| Eric Davis | 149 |
| Mike Schmidt | 148 |
| Tim Raines | 147 |
| Tony Gwynn | 147 |
| Dale Murphy | 139 |
| Will Clark | 139 |
| Von Hayes | 131 |
| Keith Hernandez | 130 |
| Andre Dawson | 127 |
Here is the top 10 in SB%, minimum of 40 attempts. Davis is 2nd.
| Tim Raines | 89.55 |
| Eric Davis | 88.44 |
| Vince Coleman | 85.71 |
| Bob Dernier | 82.69 |
| Milt Thompson | 82.28 |
| Ozzie Smith | 82.22 |
| Tony Gwynn | 81.58 |
| Ryne Sandberg | 80.88 |
| Tracy Jones | 80.85 |
| Mariano Duncan | 80.82 |
Davis only played 132 games in 1986 and 129 in 1987, for a total of 261. The next lowest total number of games for anyone else listed in the second table is 271 for Barry Bonds for ages 28-29. But Bonds only had a 68.28 PS#, far below what Davis had.
Per 324 games, Davis would have a PS# of 106.48. Henderson would have 86.81. Soriano would have 79.28. These huge gaps show how great Davis was in 1986-87.
What if a player had 49 HRs over a two year period with a large number of SBs? It would not be enough to beat Davis. The most SBs ever over two seasons is 238 by Rickey Henderson. If a player had 49 HRs & 238 SBs, it would be a PS# of 81.27, still below Davis (in fact, Henderson hit only 19 HRs in the two years when he had 238 SBs which gives him a 35.19 PS#).
If a player had 49 HRs and 160 SBs, he gets a PS# of 75.02. Did any player ever do that? No. To get 160 SBs over two seasons, requires at least one of them with 80+ SBs. I looked at all such seasons and none of those guys reached 49 HRs over two seasons that included the 80+ SBs.
The most HRs over two seasons is 135 (by Mark McGwire). What if a player had 49 SBs and 135 HRs? His PS# would be 71.9. So again, not very close to Davis and I think any player who hit 100+ HRs over 2 seasons did not steal very many bases.
Henderson's best two year PS# with under 50 HRs was 66.96 over 1990-91 with 46 HRs & 123 SBs.
