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List of Major League Baseball batting champions
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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In the sport of baseball, batting average is a measure of a batter's success rate in achieving a hit during an at bat. A batting average is calculated by dividing a player's hits by his at bats. In Major League Baseball, a player in each league[L] wins the batting title for having the highest batting average each season.[1] This article presents a list of players who have been so recognized as "batting champions".
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Rod Carew (left) and Tony Gwynn
Awards
The American League (AL) winner is known as the "Rod Carew American League Batting Champion", while the National League (NL) leader is designated the "Tony Gwynn National League Batting Champion". At the 2016 MLB All-Star Game, MLB announced that the AL and NL batting champions would henceforth be named in honor of Rod Carew and Tony Gwynn, respectively.[2] Gwynn won all eight titles in the NL with the San Diego Padres, while Carew was a seven-time AL batting champion.[3]
Criteria
Since 1957,[4] a player must have 3.1 plate appearances (PA) per scheduled game in that league (for a total of 502 over the current 162-game season) to qualify for the batting title in Major League Baseball (MLB).[5]
If a player's lead in average (AVG) is sufficiently large that enough hitless at bats (ABs) can be added to reach this requirement and the player still would have the highest batting average, he wins the title.[5] Tony Gwynn, for example, had 159 hits in 451 ABs in 1996 (.353 average) but only 498 PAs.[6] Gwynn's batting average would have dropped to .349 (159 hits in 455 ABs) with four hitless ABs added to reach the 502 PA requirement—as such, Gwynn's average would still have been higher than other eligible players (Ellis Burks finished second, with a .344 average), thus Gwynn was awarded the 1996 batting title for the National League.[7]
Other recognized leagues
There are several other historical leagues that are also considered to have had "major" status by MLB, and their statistics are recognized as such. Three such leagues operated in the late 19th century: the American Association (1882–1891), Union Association (1884), and Players' League (1890). A fourth, the Federal League, operated during 1914 and 1915.
In December 2020, MLB announced that the records of Negro league baseball from 1920 to 1948 would be designated as major-league status.[8] From 2020 to 2024, MLB and the Elias Sports Bureau completed a comprehensive review of the Seamheads.com database in coordination with Retrosheet. The MLB database combines statistics from the Negro leagues with existing data from the AL, NL, and other historical major leagues.[9] MLB officially incorporated relevant Negro league statistics into its record book in 2024.[9]
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History
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The first batting average champion in the NL was Ross Barnes; in the league's inaugural 1876 season, Barnes batted .429 for the Chicago White Stockings.[10] The AL was established in 1901, and Hall of Fame second baseman Nap Lajoie led that league with a .426 average for the Philadelphia Athletics.[11]
Ty Cobb of the Detroit Tigers led the AL in average in 11 (or 12) seasons.[12] Honus Wagner and Gwynn are tied for the second-most titles, with eight apiece in the NL.[6][13] It is unclear whether Lajoie or Cobb won the 1910 AL title, with some sources attributing the title to each man.[1910] If Cobb is credited with the 1910 title, he won 9 consecutive titles from 1907 to 1915 and 12 total titles for his career. Otherwise, Rogers Hornsby won the most consecutive titles, with six from 1920 to 1925. Without the 1910 title, Cobb still led the league in five consecutive seasons from 1911 to 1915. Cobb holds the record for highest average in two and three consecutive seasons (.414 from 1911 to 1912 and .408 from 1911 to 1913), but Hornsby holds the record for four and five consecutive seasons (.404 from 1922 to 1925 and .402 from 1921 to 1925).[14] Wagner, Rod Carew, Wade Boggs, and Gwynn each won four consecutive titles. Lajoie also had a streak of four league-leading seasons from 1901 to 1904, if he is credited with the contested AL title in 1902.[1902]
Under the current 3.1 PA qualification, players have posted a .400 batting average for a season 28 times.[15] Ted Williams' .4057 in 1941 is the most recent such season, one of 13 to occur since 1900.[15] George Brett in 1980 is the only player to maintain a .400 average into September since 1941.[16] Additionally, only Brett and John Olerud in 1993 maintained such an average into August.[16] With the modern scarcity of .400 hitters, recent players who have been above .400 early in the season, such as Chipper Jones in 2008, have drawn significant attention in the media.[16][17] Brett's .390 in 1980 and Gwynn's .394 in 1994 are the only seasons in which a player reached .390 since 1941.
Carl Yastrzemski's .301 in the 1968 American League was the lowest batting average ever to lead a league. Only three batting champions accomplished the feat without hitting a home run: Willie Keeler in 1897, Zack Wheat in 1918, and Rod Carew in 1972.[18][19] Joe Mauer's 2006 title made him the first catcher to ever win an AL batting title, and his third title in 2009 surpassed Ernie Lombardi's previous record of two titles for a catcher in any league.[20][21][22][23]
Winning margins
The closest finish in a batting race came in 1945 when Snuffy Stirnweiss batted .309, topping Tony Cuccinello's .308 average for the American League title by .00008.[24][25] George Kell beat out Williams in 1949 by .00015.[24] The closest race in the National League came in 2003 when Albert Pujols held off Todd Helton on the last day of the season by .00022.[24][26] The closest National League race before that was in 1931 with Chick Hafey edging out Bill Terry by .00028.[24]
Lajoie's .426 average in 1901 was 86 points higher than runner-up Mike Donlin's .340, the largest margin of victory for a batting champion. Cap Anson's .399 in 1881 was 71 points higher than Joe Start in 1881, the widest margin in the National League.
Champions of two leagues
In 2020, D.J. LeMahieu of the New York Yankees won the AL batting title, thereby becoming the first player to definitively win batting titles in both the American and National Leagues; he had also won the NL batting title in 2016 as a member of the Colorado Rockies. However, Ed Delahanty would have that distinction if he is credited with the disputed 1902 American League title, as he was also the 1899 National League champion.
The only other player to win titles in multiple leagues was Pete Browning, who won American Association titles in 1882 and 1885, along with the lone Players' League championship in 1890. Barnes and Deacon White each won National Association and National League titles, but the National Association is not regarded as an official league.[L] In addition, Oscar Charleston won batting championships in the Negro National League and Eastern Colored League. In 1921, Charleston posted a career-best batting average of .434 with the St. Louis Giants.[27]
Champions with multiple teams
In 1990, Willie McGee posted a .335 average over 542 at-bats in the NL for the St. Louis Cardinals before being traded to the Oakland Athletics of the AL on August 29.[28] Although McGee finished the season in the AL, he had enough PA's in the NL to qualify for the NL batting title, which he won narrowly over Eddie Murray's .330. However, McGee batted .274 that season in the AL, bringing down his overall average to .324; this allowed Murray to lead the major leagues in batting average, yet he did not win a batting title.[28][29]
In 2024, Luis Arráez became the first player in major-league history to win a batting title with three different teams, and in three consecutive seasons: Minnesota Twins (AL) in 2022; Miami Marlins (NL) in 2023; and San Diego Padres (NL) in 2024.[30] Arráez played 33 games with the Miami Marlins and 117 games with the San Diego Padres in 2024, resulting in a .314 average, with a combined 200 hits in 637 at-bats.
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List of batting champions
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Key
| Winner | Player with the highest batting average (AVG) in the league |
| AVG | The winner's batting average |
| Runner-up | Player with the second-highest batting average in the league |
| 2nd AVG | The runner-up's batting average |
| League | Denoted for players in the Negro leagues table |
| † | Member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum |
National League
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American League
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Other recognized leagues
American Association
Union Association
Players' League
Federal League
Negro leagues
In the 28-year major-league history, nine players won a league batting title multiple times: Oscar Charleston (3), Josh Gibson (3), Monte Irvin (3), Oscar Johnson (2), Buck Leonard (2), Jud Wilson (2), Mule Suttles (2), Ted Strong (2) and Turkey Stearnes (2).
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Footnotes
- L Recognized "major leagues" include the current American League and National League and several defunct leagues—the American Association, the Federal League, the Players' League, the Union Association—along with seven leagues of Negro league baseball: the Negro National League (1920–1931), the Eastern Colored League (1923–1928), American Negro League (1929), East-West League (1932), Negro Southern League (1932), Negro National League (1933–1948), and Negro American League (1937–1948).[364][365]
- 1902 Sources differ whether Nap Lajoie or Ed Delahanty won the American League batting title in 1902 and differ slightly over Lajoie's precise statistics that season. The Hall of Fame credits Lajoie with 129 hits in 352 at bats (.368)[366] while MLB and Baseball-Reference.com show 133 hits in 352 at bats (.378).[367][368] According to Baseball-Reference, a player qualified for a batting title prior to 1920 by appearing in 60% of his team's games—82 games in the 136 game schedule in 1902—and Lajoie appeared in 87 team games.[367][369][370] As such, Baseball-Reference credits Lajoie with the 1902 title, with Delahanty's .376 batting average placing second.[371] MLB's historical statistics leaderboards, however, use the modern standard of 3.1 plate appearances per team game (422 in that season) which Lajoie fell 37 short of.[367] Thus, MLB credits Delahanty with the 1902 title with his .376 average.[372] Similarly, the Hall of Fame lists the 1902 title on Delahanty's plaque and not Lajoie's.[366][373]
- 1910 See 1910 Chalmers Award.
- 1954 Rules in 1954 required 2.6 at bats per team game, 400 for a 154-game schedule (the rule was changed in 1957 to the current requirement of 3.1 plate appearances per team game), to qualify for the title and hitless at bats could be added to reach this total.[369] Ted Williams posted a .345 average in 1954 over only 386 at bats, and the required 14 hitless at bats dropped him to .3325, below Avila's league-leading .341 average.[230]
- a While Baseball-Reference.com lists both Yelich and Marte with a batting average of .329 in 2019, Yelich's average is higher (.3292) than Marte's (.3286) if extended to four decimal places.
- b The 2020 Major League Baseball season was less than half the length of a typical season, starting in late July and condensed into 60 games due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- s Suttles had 108 hits in 301 at-bats (.35880), while Wells had 113 hits in 315 at-bats (.35873)
- a Andrews played in 22 games and batted .398. However, among players with a minimum of 3.1 plate appearances / games, Baseball Reference lists Josh Gibson, who had batted .395 in 68 games in 1933, as leader among minimum qualifiers. In 2024, the MLB database lists Josh Gibson's 1933 season as having played 69 games with the Pittsburgh Crawfords.
- b David Whatley hit .396 in 27 games while Donald Reeves hit .384 in 40 games. Baseball Reference credits Whatley as having won the batting title.
- c Formerly, Johnny Washington was thought to have won the batting title.[374] Further research has moved Irvin up from .371 to .380 while moving Washington from .377 to .367
- d Formerly, Marshall Riddle was thought to have batted .377 and won the batting title.[375] Further research has found that Ed Mayweather batted .376 while Riddle batted .329
- e Cowan Hyde was once deemed the batting leader.[376]Bostock has been found to have batted .466 in 23 games while Cowan Hyde batted .387 in 15 games. Third place was Ted Strong, who batted .348 in 35 games. Baseball Reference considers Bostock to have won the batting title as of 2025.
- f Due to ongoing research, Baseball Reference labeled that Bob Harvey did not qualify for the batting title, having played 27 games and batted .430. Instead, Roy Campanella (34 games) and Bill Hoskins (30 games) were the top two finishers. Campanella collected 54 hits on 139 at-bats (.3884) that edged out Hoskins, who had 45 hits on 116 at-bats (.3879)
- g Wilson was formerly believed to have hit .421 in 22 games. However, he has now been found to have batted .379 in 31 games.[377]
- h Austin was thought to have batted .377 (in 47 games) while Campanella was at .385 (in 52 games).[378] However now Austin is thought to have batted .375 (in 50 games) while Campanella is now tabbed at having batted .369 (in 56 games)
- i At one point in time, Archie Ware was thought to be the batting champion with a .423 batting average.[379] Further research reveals Ted Strong batted .364 in 34 games, Clyde Nelson batted .361 in 19 games, and Ware batted .358 in 18 games.
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References
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