Wednesday Pre-War Trivia
 

No cheating. Try this one off the top of your head.

In the history of major league baseball, what player has the most career at bats without ever having a single season with an OPS+ of 100 or greater?

Hint: Not a HOFer

Bonus: Who is second all time (not a pre-war player and also not a HOFer)

Probably Bill Bergen. He was terrible with a bat in his hands.

Not enough AB's

mark belanger?

The player in question is pre-war. And believe it or not, Belanger isn't in the top 5!!

Also Belanger somehow managed to have a year with an OPS+ of 100. Don't ask me how.

#5 on the list had over 7,300 AB's...just as a frame of reference Belanger had 5,784 AB's.

Looking for #1 and a bonus of #2.

Well I looked it up, so I'm not going to post the answer, or what I'm pretty sure is the answer, except to say that I could have sat here all day and tried naming every prewar player I could think of and probably wouldn't have thought of this guy.

Can you believe he had that many at bats???

Probably about twice as many as I would have guessed.

He appears on the "similarity score" top 10 with #2 on the list. Probably not surprising though they played 70+ years apart.

Maranville? Oh wait you said not HOFer NM.

Maranville had enough ABs but had three years of 100+ OPS+.

#3 on the list is a HOFer though...

For post-war, another light hitting SS like Eddie Brinkman? He played quite a while and no way he had a high OPS season.

I'm presuming single seasons means single, full seasons, right?

Aparicio or Mazeroski for that one?

Not enough at bats

Actually that qualifier doesn't even matter in this case

Maz is #3. Aparicio had a 100.

#1 and #2 both had more at bats than Maz did.

#1 has a high season of 93 OPS+. No other seasons of even 90. Haven't heard that he was some defensive genius either, so no idea why he got so many plate appearances.

#1 was in several of the top "tweener" pre WW1 sets.

Oh I forgot the ultimate light hitting SS, Larry Bowa. Him?

That's #2

No clue on 1.

He was in all three of the top pre-World War 1 tweener sets

Tommy Thevenow? He only hit two HRs in the majors, and they came in the same week.

He meets the OPS+ category but has less than half the career at bats of #1 on the list. Also note my hint above regarding #1 being in the three major tweener pre WW1 sets.

...
 

His rookie year he was a teammate of three Hall Of Fame players.

His final year he was a teammate of three Hall Of Fame players.

OPS+ did not exist when this dude played.

No doubt I will be the answer to some trivia question based on a contrived statistic developed after my demise.:eek:

As will we all Frank.

And if the baseline average is 100, I'm sure I will be much like this guy.....a career 83 mark and people questioning why I got so many times at the plate.

tweener
 

What in the hell is a tweener?

I don’t know, but if I had one, I would reach for my tweezers.

Most failed attempts at humor?
:eek:

The 20 year gap between the "big two" pre WW1 sets...N172 and T206...

He was in all three of the most collected sets from those years.

Cy Young also led the league in wins.:D

+1
Another one added to your total, that is. :cool:

At different points of his career, the player in question was a teammate of both of the greatest deaf players of the era.

Trivia answer:

Tommy Corcoran