Twins Greatest Hitting Seasons #41-50

Yes, this was supposed to be a continuing segment a few months ago and I left off at #45. My short attention span didn't get me very far the first time, so I will shorten the commentary and simply present the facts. What are the facts? I looked at the OPS+ numbers for each Twins season and simply ranked hitters from one to fifty since we are approaching the 50th season of Twins baseball. OPS+ is an effective way of gauging how effective a hitter is because it takes batting average and slugging percentage and puts it into a nice number that can be judged on how far it is away from 100, which is the number an average hitter would earn. The difficulty of hitting in a particular season or the inverse being how easy it was to hit in a season is factored in. This makes comparing how Harmon Killebrew hit in 1967 (OPS+ of 174) to Kirby Puckett in 1991 (OPS+ of 119) easy. Killebrew was a whopping 74% better than the average hitter in 1967 and Puckett, while great in 1991, was only 19% better than the average hitter. Killebrew crushes him in the comparison. Two final notes, I had 500 plate appearances as the minimum to qualify in these rankings and any OPS+ ties were resolved by looking at the regular OPS number which is the addition of the OBP and SLG.

• #41 Harmon Killebrew 1972/OPS+ 138: The last decent year the Killer had. Put up .231/.367/.450 along with 26 HR and 74 RBI. He did walk 94 times showing pitchers were still preoccupied with thoughts of clouts from his past.
  
• #42 Justin Morneau 2008/OPS+ 137: Hit 23 HR and had 129 RBI. His overall .300/.374/.499 line hides a .267 second half batting average. Did play in all 163 games.


• #43 Joe Mauer 2008/OPS+ 137: Rebounded from a subpar for him year in 2007 to have a .328/.413/.451 season. He walked 84 times, led the league in hitting and had a season that he'll probably duplicate many more times in his career.


• #44 Tony Oliva 1970/OPS+ 137: Tony had league leading 204 hits and 34 doubles. Had a rare injury free season in playing 157 games. Hit 23 HR and had 107 RBI with a .325/.364/.514. Twins won division and Oliva came in 2nd in MVP voting.


• #45 Jimmie Hall 1963/OPS+ 136: Forgotten Twin by many fans because this season was his best as a pro. As a rookie hit 33 HR and had 80 RBI to go along with .260/.342/.521. Despite this great year Hall finished just 3rd in the Rookie of the Year voting. His 33 HR in his rookie season without a single at bat in any previous season is still an American League record.
  
• #46 Tony Oliva 1966/OPS+ 136: Despite ranking high in many of the American League statistical categories and leading the AL in hits for the third year in a row, Oliva slumped down the stretch. He took a batting average in the .320s into August, but endured a 5 for 41 slump in August. 1966 was another year of personal accolades for Oliva. He won his first and only Gold Glove of his career for his play in right field, he was a member of the American League All Star team and came in 6th in the MVP voting. His final line was: .307/.353/.502.


• #47 Justin Morneau 2009/OPS+ 135: Despite batting just .201 in 174 at bats after the All Star break Justin Morneau still had the 48th best season at the plate in team history. Fans may disagree since they can still recall many disappointing at bats Morneau had in the second half of the season in addition with his missing the last three weeks of the season with a stress fracture in his back. With that said, his first half statistics are what carries his season into the top 50 in team history. In that first half Morneau batted: .311/.390/.575 with 21 home runs, 70 RBI and 44 walks, but ended with .274/.363/.516.

• #48 Bob Allison 1967/OPS+ 135: The statistics right handed batter Bob Allison put up in 1967 may not seem that remarkable in the offense orientated era baseball currently finds itself in, but they stand out in Twins' history. The Twins as a team in 1967 batted .240 and that was third best in the American League behind Detroit at .243 and Boston with .255. The average American League team batting average in 1967 was .236, a far cry from the AL average of .267 for 2009. 1967 was close to the bottoming out for hitters or the pinnacle for pitchers depending on how you look at it. In 1968 the American League average for batting was .230 and the result was the mound was lowered to reduce some of the advantage pitchers had and the strike zone was reduced. All of these considerations need to be looked at when analyzing Bob Allison's terrific .258/.356/.470 for the 1967 season.


• #49 Earl Battey 1963/OPS+ 134: The 1963 season is Battey's only appearance in the top 50 hitting seasons in team history. In 1963 he was an All Star and came in 7th in the MVP voting. In his career Battey was a 3 time Gold Glove winner and 4 time All Star. In the 1965 All Star game at Metropolitan Stadium he received the most votes of any American League All Star and finished the year with a .285/.369/.476 line.

• #50 Tony Oliva 1969/OPS+ 133: Tony Oliva was third in the AL with a batting average of .309, was named an All Star. His final numbers were: .309/.355/.496. Despite winning 97 games the Twins fell to the eventual World Series champions Baltimore Orioles in the League Championship Series 3-0 in games. Oliva's bat was not the problem in the ALCS. He batted .385/.429/.769 with one home run in the series.