So many dingers. And yet such horrors.

In which "0" is league average, and in which I am truly awed.

Beyond the Box Score has compiled a list of the worst 30-HR seasons of all time, and by all means head over there to see the whole article, but the above infographic is really the heart of it.  And, I mean, holy cow.  To hit thirty home runs and somehow be, on the whole, a below-average hitter is an epic feat; it's only happened twenty-five times in the history of major league baseball. A couple of these, I definitely would have guessed: Dave Kingman is the archetypal HR/K guy, at least in my mind, and it's no secret that Joe Carter (who doesn't owe me a damn thing) had some pretty shabby years despite HR and RBI totals that impressed you before you knew anything.  And yeah, I probably would have guessed Tony Batista, too, actually, but I never would have guessed that he was responsible for not only the worst +30-HR season ever, but the only below average +40-HR season in baseball history.  I never would guessed that because how is that even possible?

It's also worth noting that Jose Cruz Jr.'s appearance on the list comes in the same season as Batista's 41-HR nightmare campaign.  So that's two Blue Jays with a combined 72 HR, and below-average offensive value between them.  That's unreal.  


The obvious flip-side to surprisingly worthless +30-HR years -- that is, the very best no-homer seasons -- is explored today at FanGraphs.  It's awesome, too.  Matt Klaassen explains that he had totally intended to do the kind of study Beyond the Box Score did, but got scooped, and so went in the other direction.  Look at this, though, where he explains the motivation behind his original plan: "It was inspired by the 2010 efforts of the Toronto Blue Jays’ Aaron Hill and Adam Lind (each of whom managed a wRC+ below 90 while hitting more than 20 homers)."  The Blue Jays are all over this; what is going on here? I think the 2010 Blue Jays really do deserve some kind of special recognition for hitting a ton of home runs yet scoring basically no runs at all.  Of all the ways to have a bad offense, hitting a ton of solo home runs and really nothing else is far from the worst, though, so I tried not to complain. 


KS