Carlos Guillen Among Baseball's Most Complete Hitters

This is the third article in a series of articles on run production. The others are linked below:

Run Production 1

Run Production 2

In my previous post on run production, I mentioned that Carlos Guillen was the only Tiger hitter to finish in the top 40 in the league in BA, EOBP and ISO among 126 players with 300 or more PA. How many other hitters in baseball were as well rounded in 2006? Remember that I’m only talking about hitting skills here. Base running is being left out of this for now. Table 1 shows that there were only 5 other American hitters to achieve the trifecta. The biggest surprise on the list was Greg Norton. Remember him? This is the same Greg Norton who batted .174 with a .532 OPS in 99 PA for the Tigers in 2004. I would not count on him showing up on this list again in 2007.

There were also 6 National League hitters among 130 players with 300 or more PA to finish in the top 40 in all 3 categories. There are no huge surprises in the NL although Garrett Atkins got help from Coors Field and really was not in the same class as the top 5. Brad Hawpe also just barely made the list but I crossed him off as he would not have made if I had adjusted the three stats for ballpark.

Table 1: Well Rounded American League Hitters

Player	Team	PA	BA	EOBP	ISO	RC/G	RC/G Rank
Hafner	CLE	564	.308	.190	.350	10.43	1
Ramirez	BOS	558	.321	.181	.298	9.29	2
Dye	CHA	611	.315	.106	.306	8.03	6
Guillen	DET	622	.320	.121	.199	7.51	12
Norton	TB	335	.296	.113	.224	6.95	16
Konerko	CHA	643	.313	.106	.239	6.85	19

Table 2: Well Rounded National League Hitters

Player	Team	PA	BA	EOBP	ISO	RC/G	RC/G Rank
Pujols	STL	634	.331	.151	.340	9.84	1
Howard	PHI	704	.313	.166	.346	9.67	2
Berkman	HOU	646	.315	.158	.306	9.08	3
Cabrera	FLA	676	.339	.142	.229	8.90	5
Jones	ATL	477	.324	.142	.273	8.70	6
Atkins	COL	695	.329	.124	.228	7.06	16