What Ichiro did that year was something that no one else in the history of baseball has ever done, something I like to call The Platinum Season, when he was selected to start the All-Star Game (not just start, but lead off and play centerfield as well for the home AL), won a Gold Glove in one of three outfield spots (other winners were Mike Cameron and Torii Hunter), a Silver Slugger in one of three outfield spots (along with Manny Ramirez and Juan Gonzalez) and a batting title. Those awards are B-List awards if you ask me; consolation prizes for players who don't bring home serious bacon like the MVP and Rookie of the Year.
In 2001, Ichiro brought the whole pig home with the American League Most Valuable Player and Rookie of the Year.
Ichiro is already the greatest Japanese player ever play for a Major League team. With 9 total Gold Gloves, an MLB record 10-straight seasons with 200+ hits (5 straight seasons leading the MLB in hits), 2 batting titles, almost 3,000 hits (over 4,000 total in professional baseball including his time in Japan), and 484 steals entering tonight (most among active players), he is a lock for the Hall of Fame, making him the first Japanese born player to be inducted. Here's a fun piece from CBS Sports about Ichiro learning Spanish to talk trash to other Hispanic players - as if he wasn't good enough already.
But the Platinum Season. It isn't impossible, as our slender subject of tonight's conversation has proved, but it's close to it. Not only is it your first full season in the bigs, but you have to be the best at everything - fielding, hitting, and enough of an asset to a winning team to be considered the Most Valuable. The fans have to love you to vote you to start, and the press has to love you to vote you in. But the advancement of the game and its awards have handcuffed some of the greats. For example:
In 2001, Ichiro brought the whole pig home with the American League Most Valuable Player and Rookie of the Year.
Ichiro is already the greatest Japanese player ever play for a Major League team. With 9 total Gold Gloves, an MLB record 10-straight seasons with 200+ hits (5 straight seasons leading the MLB in hits), 2 batting titles, almost 3,000 hits (over 4,000 total in professional baseball including his time in Japan), and 484 steals entering tonight (most among active players), he is a lock for the Hall of Fame, making him the first Japanese born player to be inducted. Here's a fun piece from CBS Sports about Ichiro learning Spanish to talk trash to other Hispanic players - as if he wasn't good enough already.
But the Platinum Season. It isn't impossible, as our slender subject of tonight's conversation has proved, but it's close to it. Not only is it your first full season in the bigs, but you have to be the best at everything - fielding, hitting, and enough of an asset to a winning team to be considered the Most Valuable. The fans have to love you to vote you to start, and the press has to love you to vote you in. But the advancement of the game and its awards have handcuffed some of the greats. For example:
All-Star selections: The first ASG wasn't until 1933. Babe Ruth, the greatest hitter of all time, only was selected twice. But that wasn't a direct indication of skill: it was timing.
Rookie of the Year Award: not introduced until 1947 with Jackie Robinson its inaugural winner
Gold Gloves: Not introduced until 1957. Even then, it was consolidated between both the AL and NL.
Silver Slugger: Not introduced until 1980!
There is some consternation about when the MVP was first awarded. According to MLB.com, the first MVP award was granted in 1931, but on Baseball Reference, there are smatterings of MVP awards between 1914 and 1931, so they must not have been officially awarded and recognized until 1931. So when I said that Ichiro is the only person to have ever achieved the Platinum Season, that's statistically true, but maybe not historically true, simply because some of the awards weren't created yet!
Here is what I'm going to do: I'm going to try my best to speculate who would have won those awards in the past to compare them to Ichiro's Platinum Season. For the sake of argument, we'll stick with the MVPs officially recognized by MLB.com beginning in 1931. For the most part, this makes our job easy, because the MVP winners from 1931-1947 weren't rookies, so they are all, unfortunately, eliminated from the Platinum Season. Now, with the list of Rookies of the Year, 20 of them have gone on to win an MVP award (since the inception of the award, of course). Only two have won it in the same year: Ichiro (2001) and Fred Lynn (1975).
Fred Lynn is kind of an underwhelming case in baseball history. He's hit the only grand slam in All-Star Game history, one of two to ever win an MVP and ROY, and was a doubles machine until he left Boston. In his first three years with the Angels, Lynn was selected to All-Star teams but only hit .271 with 66 doubles when he hit 47 doubles his rookie year. Production fell right off the table and I think a Hall of Fame potential player disappeared. Anyway, Lynn is Ichiro's competition for the Platinum Season.
MVP? .331/.401/.566, 21 home runs, 105 RBIs, 103 runs, 47 doubles - Check.
ROY? Beat teammate Jim Rice by 22 points in average, 51 points in OBP - Check.
Gold Glove? Check.
All-Star? Check.
Silver Slugger? Funny you should ask. Lynn was a center fielder in 1975, his best year. The way Silver Sluggers are awarded make this a bit tricky. Since there are three outfield positions to award, the MLB doesn't pick a left fielder, right fielder, and center fielder, they just pick three outfielders who slug (hence the name). So let's see if Lynn would have held up in 1975 against other AL outfielders.
Reggie Jackson would have been a shoo-in. Mr. October (also the strikeout king) had 36 homers, 104 RBIs, and a .511 slugging percentage. Lynn has him beat in RBIs and SLG% but it's Reggie Jackson compared to a rookie. Jackson has one of the three.
Bobby Bonds had a statistically similar season, collecting 32 home runs, 85 RBIs and posting a .512 slugging percentage. Again, not as good as Lynn, but the increased number of home runs and slugging percentage give him the edge for the second outfield spot.
The last competitor/candidate would be Don Baylor, who hit 25 home runs, 76 RBIs, and slugged .489. All good, but not as good as Lynn, who led all outfielders in slugging and RBIs. If I were voting, I'd give Lynn the Silver Slugger, giving him another Platinum Season.
Ichiro did it in 2001, and it was amazing. He blew Americans out of the water with how smoothly he transitioned from Japan to the MLB. At age 27, he led the Mariners to 114 wins in the regular season and the ALCS against Jeter's mighty Yankees. Remember how much buzz there was about Tanaka coming to the MLB this offseason? I wish I was old enough to remember how much hype their was about Ichiro and how he blew it all away.
But Fred Lynn did it as a 23 year old straight out of USC. He played briefly at the professional level in 1974 but after a year at AA in 1973, and split time in 1974, I think his Platinum Season in 1975 was a little better. 4 years younger, almost no professional baseball. But the competition wasn't quite as good, either.
You be the judge. Thanks for reading.
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