NL Player of the Week - Mel Ott

NL Player of the Week

Mel Ott

Mel Ott (HA4) is the dominant player in the National League in our replay. This is no accident. Ott, who is less known today than he deserves, was a star in a period of stars.

Ott played his entire 22 year career as a Giant. He has 511 lifetime home runs. While this number may have been inflated do to playing in the home run friendly Polo Grounds with its short lines, the Polo Grounds were not, overall, a hitters' part given its huge foul territory and deep straigtaways. Ott's OPS+ usually hovered in the 150s (i.e. his on base percentage + slugging average expressed as a percent of the average) for many, many years. In short, if the Polo Grounds added significantly to Ott's home runs, it also signficantly reduced his other hits. As Bill James sums up, "Ott, had he played in another park, would have 100 fewer home runs, but his overall stats would have been as good or perhaps better than they are. He is not an overrated player..."

One of Ott's misfortunes is his undisputed title as the greatest player never to win an MVP. His lifetime win shares (a statistic used by Bill James to quanltify all a player's offensive statistics) of 525 is far higher than that of the next non-MVP, Eddie Mathews. He might have won in 1929, however, had the award existed at the time.

Ott was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1951.