Why this card is awesome: Because here's another guy who deserved a better card number. Even in 1987, the year of the homer, a 22-year-old guy smacking 30 HR and 109 RBI deserved a little more press. Seirra is clearly in the necklace club.
Cool stat: Sierra's got the 4th-lowest career OPS+ for a guy with 300 homers. And he has the 13th-fewest walks in that club. But here's the really odd one: he has BY FAR the fewest hit-by-pitches in that group. How the hell did he manage to get hit only 7 times in his career? In fact, of the 135 guys to amass at least 7935 ABs in MLB history, Sierra has the fewest HBP. (Incidentally, my whipping boy Garrett Anderson has 7934 ABs and 6 HBP.)
4 comments:
As you may or may not remember, Sierra stood extremely far away from the plate in the batter's box in order to fully extend his arms when swinging. This probably resulted in him being hit so few times.
That's exactly what I was thinking. He certainly stood way off the plate later in his career with the Yankees, and he had a really long swing as a result of the full extension.
Here's another necklace. Is it a nice figure or religious symbol? Nope. Ruben, who I really thought was a fantastic player while in Texas, wears a monument to his first initial.
Looking at the list for fewest HBP, 5 of the top 8 were switch-hitters (Sierra, Mantle, Chili Davis, Larry Bowa, and Eddie Murray). Have there been any studies done that show right-handed pitchers tend to hit more right-handed batters? and vice-versa.
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