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Stan Musial Named 1948 MVP!

“Stan Musial is a better player than Joe DiMaggio was in his prime.” -Ty Cobb speaking of Stan Musial in 1952.

“Cobb is baseball’s greatest. I don’t want to contradict him, but I can’t say that I was ever as good as Joe DiMaggio.” – Stan Musial replying to Ty Cobb’s compliment with his usual modesty.

Seventy-five years ago yesterday, December 2, 1948, Stan Musial was named the 1948 National League MVP. “Stan the Man” led the league in hitting with a .376 batting average and 131 RBIs, but just missed the Triple Crown by one home run.  So let’s take a moment to pay tribute to the memory of one of the true greats in baseball history. Someone mentioned to me recently that Frank Robinson is the most underrated player in baseball history. That may be true…but if so, then Stan Musial must be a close second. His career stats are staggering.

A few years ago, as part of my “Greatest Individual Seasons of All-Tme” series, I featured Stan Musial’s 1946 season, which as I said at the time, was surely one for the record books. But “upon further review,” his 1948 season may have even been better. Both were “off the charts,” but I’ll let you decide for yourself which was the best!

Stan Musial’s Career Stats

Stan Musial played 22 seasons for the Cardinals, from 1941 to 1945 and from 1946–63. The Donora, Pennsylvania native is universally regarded as one of the greatest and most consistent hitters in baseball history. Those of us who saw his unique “corkscrew” batting stance will never forget it. Stan batted .331 over his career and set National League records for career hits (3,630); RBIs (1,951); games played (3,026); at-bats (10,972); runs scored (1,949); doubles (725), total bases (6,134), and extra-base hits (1,377) most of which were later broken by Pete Rose. He is still in the top-10 all-time in all of these categories.

At the time of his retirement, his 475 career home runs ranked second in National League history behind Mel Ott’s total of 511. Had his career not been interrupted by military service in 1945, he certainly would have been a member of the 500 Home Run club. 

A seven-time National League batting champion, and two-time National League RBI champion, his 6,134 total bases remained a major league record until surpassed by Hank Aaron. He also compiled 177 triples, .417 OBP,  .559 slugging average, and 159 OPS+. In 10,972 career at-bats, he struck out only 696 times. Musial had identical totals of 1,815 hits at home and on the road. He won three National League MVP awards, and led the Cardinals to three World Series championships (1942, ’44, and ’46). He shares the major league record for the most All-Star Games played (24) with Hank Aaron and Willie Mays. Also noteworthy is that Stan played 3,026 games without an ejection. 

Stan’s 1946 Season

In 1946, Musial led the National League in virtually every category, including games (156), plate appearances (702), at-bats (624), runs (124), hits (228), doubles (50), triples (20), batting average (.365), OBP (.434), slugging ( .587), and OPS (1.021), as he won his second National League MVP award. He led the Cardinals to their third pennant in five years and the 1946 World Series championship. It would be hard to top a season like this, however…

Could 1948 Have Been Even Better?

One of our readers pointed out that in 1948, Musial again led the National League in virtually every offensive category. But what made this season so historically significant was that his lead in most of these categories was by huge margins over his nearest competitor: Batting average (.376, 43 points higher than the second-place finisher), hits (230, 40 higher), runs (135, 18 higher), doubles (46, six higher), triples (18, six higher), RBIs (131, six higher), OBP (.450, 27 points higher), slugging average (.702, 138 points higher), extra-base hits (103, 28 higher), and total bases (429, 113 higher). His OPS+ of 200 can only be described as “Ruthian.” In 611 at-bats, Musial struck out only 34 times. His 39 home runs, a career-high, left him just one short of league-leaders Johnny Mize and Ralph Kiner, and thus one home run short of the Triple Crown.

Stan Musial was a first-ballot inductee into the Baseball Hall  Fame in 1969. He was also selected for the Major League All-Century team, and to the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame in the inaugural class of 2014. His #6 has been retired by the Cardinals.

Sadly, Stan Musial passed away on January 19, 2013, aged 92, in Ladue, Missouri. I think we can all fully appreciate what a great ballplayer Stan “The Man” Musial truly was. And, as we all know, he was an even greater man, beloved by all who knew him. We will rarely, if ever, see another like him again…

Gary Livacari

Photo Credits: Sports Illustrated The Baseball Book; and Public Domain

Information: Excerpts edited from the Stan Musial Wikipedia page

Statistics from www.Baseball-Reference.com, Stan Musial page.

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