TW Hit List - Rogers Hornsby

"People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do, I stare out the window and wait for spring."

It’s been said that Rogers Hornsby was a player whose well-attested all around brilliance was apparently only matched by his capacity to aggravate those around him. But we will honour the dead and only speak of his on-field brilliance, of which there is plenty to say. And for the record, Williams himself says that Hornsby was a coach of his in the Red Sox farm system and “Hornsby treated me as well anybody could have treated me.” In his book, The Science of Hitting, Williams highlights his golden rule: get a good pitch to hit. But he confesses that he learned this from Hornsby during his farm days. And judging from the numbers, Hornsby got a lot of good pitches to hit.

Hornsby was not an obvious talent growing up, or even in the minors. But when came up to the bigs, he broke out. After a .313 rookie season in 1916 playing all four infield spots (he eventually played Short and Third), he established himself as one of the best of the game. He won the NL batting title from 1920 to 1925 and the Triple Crown in 1922 and 1925. Only he and Williams have won the Crown twice. The stretch of seasons he put together from 1921 to 1925 have got to be one of the more remarkable stretches in baseball history. He hit over .400 three times, hitting .424 in 1924, the highest single season average in the twentieth century. He was MVP twice in this time and even more, he took over managing his St. Louis Cardinals in 1925 and led the team to World Series victory in 1926 in a huge upset over the Yankees. (Interestingly, the only World Series to end on a caught stealing when Hornsby laid the tag on Ruth at second base.) After this season, he was rewarded by being traded.

Hornsby finished his career batting .358, second only to Ty Cobb and the best ever by a right-hander. Unlike Cobb though, he had some pop. He hit 301 home runs and a career 1.010 OPS. They say “Rajah” had a fantastically keen eye and the glories of baseball lore give us all the evidence we need: Once, after three consecutive called balls to Hornsby, a brash rookie pitcher complained loudly to umpire Bill Klem only to watch as his fourth delivery landed in the distant bleachers. Klem patiently explained to the young rookie, “When the ball is over the plate young man, Mr. Hornsby will let you know.”