Some interesting stats

Did some random number crunching after a friend and I were chatting about some of the power hitters(mostly making fun of Adam Dunn's strikeouts and poor average), and I decided to crunch some numbers, and a few things became very clear to me.

Here's what I did: First stat is that I figured out what percentage of the time that a player got a hit was that hit a single (Hits - (2B + 3B + HR) / Hits).

Another stat I did was to add walks in, to basically figure out, how often when a player reached base did they only reach first base(Singles + Walks / Hits + Walks)

Then, similar to OBP and Batting Avg, I figured out how often among at-bats and plate appearances did a player reach first base but go no further, multiplying my above figures by OBP and BA.

Here's some of the interesting things I found:

1) Adam Dunn is the 2nd coming of Mark McGwire.

Yes. It's true. Besides the obvious, that they're both mountain sized men who hit a lot of home runs, the comparison goes much further. First off, with the basic stats, they both had sub-par batting averages, but were willing to take walks, as evidenced by their on-base percentages:

Dunn - .250 BA, .384 OBP
McGwire - .262 BA, .394 OBP

They also had surprisingly similar percentages of singles. On the first stat, percentage of hits that are singles, their career numbers are damn near identical:

Dunn - .4825
McGwire - .4827

They also both hit home runs very often per at bat. McGwire's career number is a home run every 10.6 at bats. Dunn's sits right now at 13.9 for his career, but that number over the last 2 1/2 seasons(since he really started crushing them at a McGwire-like rate), the rate is only 12.6 ABs for every home run.

2) Pete Rose was even greater than I thought

Now, everyone should know he's the all-time hits leader, with 4,256.

And I guess when you keep that in mind, this shouldn't shock you, but the man has 3,215 singles alone. If you took away EVERY extra base hit he ever had, he would still have more hits than everyone in Major League Baseball history other than 12 players. Pete Rose was also 3rd on the list of players I ran the numbers for on percentage of times he was up that he would hit a single(.228) behind Ty Cobb(see below) and current St. Louis Cardinals shortstop David Eckstein.

3) Ty Cobb is automatically my choice for a lead-off hitter, all time.

Here's some numbers for you: .342 OBP, .267 BA

That would make a pretty fair lead-off man. It compares fairly well with those of Scott Podsednik and David Eckstein for their careers and is far better than Jose Reyes's numbers so far(yeah, he's young, I'm not trying to rip him).

Those would be Ty Cobb's number if you took out HIS extra base hits, like I did with Pete Rose above. His actual career numbers were: .433 OBP and .366 BA, but the fact that about 27% of the time he came up to bat he got a single is pretty astounding. This number far surpasses the .228 Pete Rose had and the .229 that 2nd place David Eckstein had.

4) Richie Sexson is VASTLY overrated.

The guy can seriously mash the ball. That no one will debate. If we compare him to Adam Dunn, Mark McGwire and Troy Glaus(the closest comparisons of the players I figured these numbers for), then we get this:

Player - Batting Average - OBP - 1B%* - Single/Hits

R. Sexson - .267 - .348 - .237 - .544
A. Dunn - .250 - .384 - .274 - .483
M. McGwire - .263 - .394 - .281 - .483
T. Glaus - .254 - .358 - .252 - .522

* - 1B% is the percentage of time a player reaches first base either through a single or a walk.

As you can see, Sexson actually has the highest batting average of the four players. However, he has the lowest OBP and 1B%. Now 1B% isn't necessarily a huge stat, if he were hitting a lot more for power, which would mean he would also have a lower Singles/Hits percentage.

So Richie Sexson is considered a big-time power hitter, so you can forgive his tendency to strike out so much right? Wrong. He fails to draw walks and hits singles more often than any of these other players who he seems to compare favorably to. So what you've got in Richie Sexson is a power hitter who fails to make contact and fails to hit for power on the level of the other power hitters.

This isn't to say he's an awful, awful player. He has had two seasons of 45 home runs and last year belted 39. But, compared to the other two active players(Glaus, Dunn), he also makes more money at 13M a year to Glaus's 10M and Dunn's 7.5M

Before I move on from these stats, I will play with them a little more and post some more. I'm looking for more ideas on power hitters and lead-off hitters, who I think these stats will most clearly demonstrate the worth of. Please post in the comments any players you'd like me to add to the chart.

The following players are already IN the chart: Adam Dunn, Richie Sexson, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Albert Pujols, David Ortiz, A-Rod, Troy Glaus, Jim Thome, Vlad Guerrero, Andruw Jones, Derrek Lee, Rickey Henderson, Scott Podsednik, David Eckstein, Jose Reyes, Pete Rose, Ty Cobb, Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Ted Williams and Stan Musial.

I mostly need ideas on lead-off kinda guys, all throughout history. If you give me current ones, please try to come up with ones who have been in the league for at least 5+ full years, as players like Reyes skew the numbers because of their relative lack of experience.