Amazing but True

[Al Lopez's Ghost]

From 1916 to the present who has the most career RBIs in the 9th position in the batting order?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, the Ozzeroo, with 405.

 

And Ventura is 3rd in that time frame batting 5th with 615, according to HighHeatStats, who tweeted this stuff this morning.

[The Ultimate Champion]

Most players don't spend that amount of time in the 9 spot of an order and still stay in the game

 

It's like in Bull Durham? when the guy doesn't want to talk about being the MiLB HR leader

 

In Ozzie's case it's a tribute to his D though, so not so bad

[cabiness42]

Not that amazing. First of all, you have to be both really, really good at defense and really, really bad at offense to accumulate a lot of plate appearances batting 9th. Otherwise your are either batting higher in the order or out of a job.

 

Also, RBI is a worthless stat. However, Ozzie did have a career .285 AVG and .374 career SLG with RISP compared to his overall .264 AVG and .338 SLG so he did have that going for him.

[LittleHurt05]

Being a top RBI man from the 9th spot is like leading a team in 6th inning holds.

[ILMOU]

Not that amazing. First of all, you have to be both really, really good at defense and really, really bad at offense to accumulate a lot of plate appearances batting 9th. Otherwise your are either batting higher in the order or out of a job.

 

Also, RBI is a worthless stat. However, Ozzie did have a career .285 AVG and .374 career SLG with RISP compared to his overall .264 AVG and .338 SLG so he did have that going for him.

 

Even less impressive when you realize that the "since 1916" is purely misdirection - until 1973 it was almost exclusively pitchers who batted 9th, and none of those played everyday, obviously.

[SoIL]

I don't know, a .285 with RISP and .264 for a career are not terrible numbers. They're actually pretty decent. Especially with Gold Glove caliber defense at shortstop. Yeah, he probably has more ABs in the 9th spot the most players, but if he's the all-time leader in RBIs there, then something went right. It's not a guady or major stat, but it still shows nice production. Wasn't the idea to put Ozzie in the 9th spot to be another "leadoff" hitter and to have some speed at the bottom of the lineup.

[lasttriptotulsa]

I don't know, a .285 with RISP and .264 for a career are not terrible numbers. They're actually pretty decent. Especially with Gold Glove caliber defense at shortstop. Yeah, he probably has more ABs in the 9th spot the most players, but if he's the all-time leader in RBIs there, then something went right. It's not a guady or major stat, but it still shows nice production. Wasn't the idea to put Ozzie in the 9th spot to be another "leadoff" hitter and to have some speed at the bottom of the lineup.

 

.264 is pretty awful when it's made up of almost entirely singles. His career high in extra base hits is 36 and his next highest is 31. Combine that with the fact that he never walked more than 26 times in a season and you end up with a whopping .626 OPS. Fact of the matter is that Ozzie was a pretty decent player up until he had his collision with Raines and hurt his knee at age 28 and that was mostly due to speed and defense. After the injury his defense and speed suffered greatly and he became a pretty useless player. Case in point, his cumulative fWAR through his age 27 season (before the injury) was 14.6 through 7 seasons. Not great, but right around an average MLB player. After the injury, his cumulative fWAR was -1.7.

[sammy esposito]

.264 is pretty awful when it's made up of almost entirely singles. His career high in extra base hits is 36 and his next highest is 31. Combine that with the fact that he never walked more than 26 times in a season and you end up with a whopping .626 OPS. Fact of the matter is that Ozzie was a pretty decent player up until he had his collision with Raines and hurt his knee at age 28 and that was mostly due to speed and defense. After the injury his defense and speed suffered greatly and he became a pretty useless player. Case in point, his cumulative fWAR through his age 27 season (before the injury) was 14.6 through 7 seasons. Not great, but right around an average MLB player. After the injury, his cumulative fWAR was -1.7.

Ozzie's slap swing made for some unusual hit balls that sometime went for hits. He managed the Sox with the same notion of swing and see what happens.