Where Does Cabrera's Season Rank in Tigers History?

I have spent too much time recently trying to explain why I think Mike Trout should be the MVP over Miguel Cabrera.  So, today I'll just talk about Cabrera and where his season ranks in Tigers history.

Everyone knows that the Tigers slugger is closing in on a Triple Crown.  He is currently leading the American League in batting average and Runs Batted In and is just one behind Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton in homers.  Winning the Triple Crown would be a rare event.  It has been accomplished only 13 times since 1901, nine in the AL and four in the NL. The only Tiger to do it was the legendary Ty Cobb who batted .377/9/107 in 1909.

I think it would be really cool if Cabrera won the triple crown, but most of you know that those are not my preferred statistics.  I'll start by using the OPS+ statistic.  If we compare a batter's OPS to league average and adjust for home ballpark, we get his OPS+.  An OPS+ of 100 is league average.  An OPS+ of more than 100 is better than average and an OPS+ of less than 100 is worse than average.  Cabrera currently leads the league with a 170 OPS+. 

The Tigers single-season leaders are shown in Table 1 below.  As of today, Cabrera is 16th on the Tigers all-time list.  Interestingly, this is only his third best season as a Tiger as he posted marks of 181 in 2011 and 178 in 2010.  Three consecutive years with an OPS+ of 170 or better would be quite remarkable.  The only other Tiger to do that was Cobb from 1909-1912.

As is always the case, Cobb dominates the leaders appearing nine times in the top 20.  Other Tigers showing up multiple times are the great Hank Greenberg (four), Cabrera (three) and the under appreciated Harry Heilmann (three). For someone who grew to love the game in 1970s, it's pretty exciting to finally see a modern Tiger finally making a top twenty list more than once. 

Table 1: Tigers Single-Season OPS+ Leaders  

Player	Year	PA	OPS+
Ty Cobb	1917	669	210
Ty Cobb	1910	590	206
Norm Cash	1961	673	201
Ty Cobb	1912	609	200
Ty Cobb	1911	654	196
Harry Heilmann	1923	627	194
Ty Cobb	1909	651	193
Ty Cobb	1915	700	185
Miguel Cabrera	2011	688	181
Harry Heilmann	1927	596	180
Ty Cobb	1916	636	180
Miguel Cabrera	2010	648	178
Al Kaline	1967	550	176
Hank Greenberg	1937	701	172
Hank Greenberg	1940	670	171
Miguel Cabrera	2012	646	170
Hank Greenberg	1935	710	170
Hank Greenberg	1938	681	169
Ty Cobb	1922	613	169
Harry Heilmann	1922	526	169
Ty Cobb	1908	635	169

Data Source: Baseball-Reference


A limitation of OPS+ is that it weights OBP and slugging equally.  In actuality, OBP is more important than slugging and should carry more weight.  It also does not give a batter credit for playing time.  So, I'll also take a look at Batting Runs.  It has been determined from the results of thousands of games that the following linear weights are most appropriate:

single 0.47
double 0.77
triple 1.04
home run 1.40
walk 0.31
HBP 0.34

Based on that, we can arrive at a player's Batting Runs (BtRuns).  Cabrera currently has 57 BtRuns which means that he has contributed 57 runs beyond what you would expect from an average player.  As shown in Table 2, that ranks him 18th on the Tigers all-time single-season list.  Cabrera still has 13 games to go, so he has a chance to move up the list. As with OPS+, Cabrera had even better seasons in 2011 (71) and 2010 (64).

First baseman Norm Cash is the Tigers all-time leader with 85 BtRuns in 1961.  Beyond that, we see the same familiar names populating the table - Cobb, Cabrera, Geenberg and Heilmann.

 
Table 2: Tigers Single-Season Batting Runs Leaders

Player	Year	PA	BtRuns
Norm Cash	1961	673	85
Ty Cobb	1911	654	76
Ty Cobb	1917	669	75
Harry Heilmann	1923	627	74
Miguel Cabrera	2011	688	71
Ty Cobb	1915	700	70
Ty Cobb	1912	609	69
Hank Greenberg	1937	701	67
Ty Cobb	1910	590	66
Miguel Cabrera	2010	648	64
Hank Greenberg	1940	670	64
Harry Heilmann	1927	596	64
Ty Cobb	1909	651	62
Hank Greenberg	1935	710	62
Magglio Ordonez	2007	679	61
Hank Greenberg	1938	681	61
Harry Heilmann	1921	672	60
Miguel Cabrera	2012	646	57
Ty Cobb	1916	636	56
Ty Cobb	1922	613	56

Data Source: Baseball-Reference


What I find most interesting about these compilations is Cabrera's three-year run of 191 Batting Runs which is surpassed only by Cobb's 211 in 1910-1912.  Cabrera's 2012 season has certainly been outstanding, but his consistent greatness over three years has been even more impressive.