The Triple-Triple (From 1946-1968)

After the players started to return from the war there was a spike in ‘triple-triples.’ From 1946-54, there were 17 100 run/100 RBI/100 BB seasons the bulk of which came from Ted Williams, Stan Musial and Ralph Kiner who accounted for 13 of them. Mickey Mantle, Eddie Mathews, Al Rosen and Vern Stephens accomplished the rest over the nine years counting from 1946. After 1954 there were just eight occurrences of the ‘triple-triple’ and Mantle was the only player to do it more than once.

Not surprisingly, the great pitching era of 1963-68 that caused MLB to lower the mound saw just a single 100/100/100 season and that was Harmon Killebrew’s first of two ‘triple-triples.’ There were four seasons during the fifties (1952, 57-59) where nobody reached all three milestones. Unlike the 1969-1989 span examined below, five players (six of you count Killer’s 1969 campaign) did it multiple times. They were …

Ted Williams (five times including four straight from 1946-49)
Ralph Kiner (five times including four straight from 1948-51)
Mickey Mantle (three times)
Stan Musial (three times)
Eddie Matthews (twice)
Harmon Killebrew (once between 1945-68; twice overall)

…Norm Siebern, Norm Cash, Rocky Colavito, Duke Snider, Al Rosen, Vern Stephens did it once apiece. Here is the breakdown by year:

1968: None
1967: Harmon Killebrew
1966: None
1965: None
1964: None
1963: None
1962: Norm Siebern
1961: Mickey Mantle, Norm Cash, Rocky Colavito
1960: Eddie Mathews
1959: None
1958: None
1957: None
1956: Mickey Mantle
1955: Duke Snider
1954: Mickey Mantle, Eddie Mathews, Stan Musial
1953: Stan Musial, Ralph Kiner
1952: None
1951: Ted Williams, Ralph Kiner
1950: Ralph Kiner, Al Rosen
1949: Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Ralph Kiner, Vern Stephens
1948: Ted Williams, Ralph Kiner,
1947: Ted Williams
1946: Ted Williams

In other news…

Not surprisingly, the MLBPA are publicly concerned with possible collusion toward Alex Rodriguez. What Don Fehr has to recognize here that it is not collusion against A-Rod it’s against Scott Boras. As we discussed yesterday, Boras bargains in bad faith and clubs are wary of being ripped off by the agent and are looking to protect themselves. There would be no problem with simply telling a club “You have the highest bid but it is not enough to sway my client to signing with you. If you want Rodriguez, you’re going to have to dig a little deeper” but to lead an executive to think there’s another bidder when there is not, strikes me as dishonest.

Quite frankly, I’m surprised Boras doesn’t own a team of his own, he has the requisite sliminess and lack of honour for the job. If Fehr is truly concerned about A-Rod, he should recommend that firing Boras is the way to go. It’s the agent’s reputation that has teams skittish, not Rodriguez’s salary demands. While some of it may be simple professional jealousy, it is notable that Boras isn’t well regarded by the agent community or Marvin Miller for that matter.

If Rodriguez had different representation, probably none of this would be happening. Boras has been quite vocal in his salary/contractual goals for his client, so who can blame management for being cautious? Nobody wants to pay more than is truly needed to sign a player--especially at the levels Boras has been trumpeting. The bottom line is, clubs know full well that Boras plans on taking them to the cleaners and isn’t shy about using deceit to accomplish his ends. Bob Raissman has an excellent take on how bogus the agent’s claims are; put another way, if the class bully spends the entire morning telling anybody within earshot that he’s going to take your lunch money, allowance and grass-cutting pay at noon would you just sit idly by and do nothing?

Speaking of which…

I have to applaud Curt Schilling on his new contract. He probably could’ve gotten more had he hit the market ($8 million guaranteed--$13 million if he hits all his incentives) but he exercised the right fought for by Marvin Miller and self-sacrificing players during the union’s formative years. Miller wasn’t looking to create monster contracts. All he wanted to do was give the players an open marketplace where the value of arbitration and free agency rights could be exercised. Miller wanted a player to decide for himself where he desired to play and negotiate the best terms he possibly could. Schilling is happy in Boston and wished to finish his career there so he took the initiative and made it happen.

It’s probably Marvin Miller’s greatest achievement--player freedom. It’s nice to see its exercise.

Whine and pitching…

For the life of me I cannot fathom the angst about the possibility that A.J. Burnett may opt out of his five-year $55 million deal with the Toronto Blue Jays. He will have pitched three of the five seasons in Toronto and has all the motivation in the world to throw 200 quality innings. If he opts out it’s because his market value will be higher making him a Type A free agent. What’s the problem? Let A.J. pitch lights-out in 2008, offer arbitration, and get the draft picks a Type A free agent will generate. Meanwhile, with my other favourite team, the Philadelphia Phillies, G.M. Pat Gillick swung a deal to snag Astros’ enigmatic closer Brad Lidge. This puts last season's closer Brett Myers back in the rotation where he belongs. It gives the Phillies a solid No. 2 starter in a thin pitching market. As to Myers comments, all I can say is SHADDUP! The man is a cretin, cretins like he should be seen and not heard--even seeing is a bit much. I have little use for folks like Myers; he’s the type of person that inspires the ‘cheer for laundry’ sentiment. After all, there’s nothing to cheer inside that particular pile of dirty, smelly laundry.

Finally…

At times I wonder about the incongruity of certain things. I just had a link sent to me about a column I had written was cited on the online Wall Street Journal. It’s not the first time, by my count (and a little help from Google) it’s the fifth time they’ve linked to something I wrote. The tally: November 6, 2007, April 7, 2006, April 3, 2006, March 31, 2006 and December 23, 2005. I often wonder if my old high school teachers ever see that and wonder: “Is that … ? Naaah, it can’t be him. There’s just no way. The only thing he’d be saying is 'Want fries with that?’” I’m guessing that they thought the only way I’d be associated with WSJ would be using it as bed linens on a park bench.

It just goes to show …

…something anyway.

Speaking of which, TPoSGD received its first link courtesy of The Mockingbird (although I strongly suspect it was a pity link). At any rate, here is the lowdown, it was dealing with my post On bloggers and the blogosphere:

“While doing my daily, frantic rounds in search of the slightest scrap of Blue Jays information that might divert my attention from the fact that it is about to snow, I noticed that John Brattain has started his own blog. No longer willing to write watered-down summaries for the masses and be ripped by internet hacks, he has thrown his hat into the ring, quickly establishing his street cred with both the most awkward address and name of all time. Released from the shackles of a word limit, he has also staked his turf by throwing down the Longest. Post. Ever.”

Heh, actually this is my second foray into blogging. I had my own blog which I started back in the spring of 2004 called Synaptic Flatulence and there were some pretty long posts there as well. I think the longest went over 5,600 words. Of course the one of which he speaks indeed topped 7,700--however it was a recap of the Jays 2007 season. It's basically an online 'clip show' where I link to complete articles dealing with the Blue Birds and a cut and paste job of non-Jays articles that contained a blurb about them ("The Whine Cellar"). One cannot do justice to that level of mental anguish in a couple of paragraphs; testaments yes, paragraphs no.

I am confident I can top that with sufficient angst and caffeine. He continues:

But enough about the bunt thing we had going, heck- forget baseball altogether for a second. What I really take issue with is his continued and strident defense of the Blogosphere from the media outlets that know better. In classic Mockingbird fashion, I’m going to take a bunch of his quotes about the out of context and show you how much smarter I think I am. Because that’s what blogs are really all about!

The writer is a blogger and this is what he posts? Is he mad? Being held hostage by Richard Griffin? Was the pressure of patiently waiting for Sal Fasano and John McDonald to start carrying the offense with a series of three-run jacks too much for his psychological well-being? Can we blame it on the strain? As a blogger, is he going to pull an Onan and beat himself like crazy? What is motivating our enigmatic knight of the pre-formatted table: fear, paranoia, Jack Daniels, or a passionately insane jealous lust toward Rita McNeil? Does he not realize that the Hardball Times is simply a collection of bloggers who banded together to get chicks, bling and dough-ray-me? Well my dear reader, (whomever you are … mom?) if you truly wish to find out the answer to our paradox by the desk lamp light I would strongly suggest you check out Jon’s warning that fear, anger, aggression, as well as poor punctuation and grammar truly can lead to the dark side of the blogosphere.

Best Regards

John