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| I'm guessing this is the only time that Rob Deer and "amazing" was used in the same sentence. |
Kingman might not have been the original “two true outcomes”
player, but he probably has more home runs than any of the others. We’re first going to look back at his career,
then at the end, we’ll go over some truly comical stats about him.
Kingman was originally drafted in the second round of the
1967 Major League draft by the California Angels out of Prospect High School in
Mount Prospect, IL. Kingman declined
their offer, instead deciding to attend the University of Southern California. Before even playing a game there, the
Baltimore Orioles drafted him in the first round (ninth overall) in the January
Secondary draft in 1968. He again
declined, and was eventually drafted with the first pick in the June Secondary
draft in 1970 by the San Francisco Giants.
Upon signing with the Giants, they assigned him to AA
Amarillo. In his first taste of
professional ball, he hit .295. He would
never hit that high again. In 60 games,
he also added nine doubles, a triple, 15 home runs, 41 RBIs, with 37 walks vs.
64 strikeouts. In 38 games in the
outfield, he had five assists. That’s
good! He also had nine errors. That’s not good! In 21 other games at first base, he didn’t
make one error in 164 chances. The
Giants had learned their lesson for the most part, and when he was promoted to
AAA Phoenix, he only played three games in the outfield (but still managed an
error). At first base, he only made
seven errors all season, good for a .992 fielding percentage. In 1971 at Phoenix, he hit .278 with 29
doubles, five triples, 26 home runs and 99 RBIs, with 32 walks vs. 105
strikeouts. While the power was
certainly there, his OBP plummeted from .401 the year before to .334.
Kingman was one of eight Giants to play in all four games in
that NLCS, but the only one with fewer than 10 at bats, as he went 1-9 with a
walk and three strikeouts. Overall for the
1971 season, he would finish hitting .278 with 10 doubles, two triples, six
home runs and 24 RBIs, with nine walks and 35 strikeouts. He made his major league debut on July 30th,
going 0-1 as a pinch hitter and defensive replacement. The next day, he would hit his first career
home run/grand slam off of Dave Giusti in a 15-11 win over the Pirates. He also added a double and had five RBIs that
day. In the second game of a double
header the next day, Kingman would add two home runs and four RBIs in an 8-3
victory over the Pirates. |
| It says first base on the card, and you don't argue with baseball cards. |
Overall for the season, Kingman hit .225 with 17 doubles,
four triples, 29 home runs and 83 RBIs, with 51 walks and 140 strikeouts, and
he added 16 stolen bases. His on base
percentage was .303. At the age of 23,
you already had the definition of a Dave Kingman season for years to come. In the second game of the year, he hit for
the cycle, going 4-5 with three runs scored and six RBIs in a 10-6 victory over
the Houston Astros. He was largely quiet
until later in the month, when he had a five game streak where he went 7-18
with five home runs (with two on April 26th) and 11 RBIs. He added a two home run/five RBI game on May
22nd in a 9-8 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers. With two more two home run games on July 3rd
and September 19th, even with the low average and on base
percentage, I’m sure the Giants saw a potential game changer in Kingman. He actually finished a distant 24th
in the MVP voting that season.
1973 was an even more Dave Kingman season than the year
before. It looks like he may have been
battling some injuries in the middle of the season, as he only played in 19 games between June 29th and August 12th. Overall, he hit .203 with 10 doubles, a
triple, 24 home runs and 55 RBIs, with 41 walks and 122 strikeouts. His on base percentage was an even .300. They knew that he didn’t have any business in
the outfield, but they did keep sticking him at third base, where he had a .910
fielding percentage. He was at .986 at
first base. He was error-free at pitcher
though! That’s right, he pitched in two
games that season. His first outing was
in a Cincinnati Reds’ 11-0 blowout on April 15th, when Kingman threw
two innings, allowing two runs on a hit and four walks, with one
strikeout. The second was in a Dodgers’
15-3 blowout on May 13th, when he again threw two innings, allowing
two runs on two hits and two walks, with three strikeouts. He also threw two wild pitches.
Kingman was the Opening Day third baseman for the Giants in
1974. That lasted 13 days. At that point, his fielding percentage was
.816, and with a handful of appearances later in the season, it actually fell
to .797. He again had a decent season at
first base with a .983 fielding percentage.
He somehow managed not to make an error in three games in the outfield
across 14 1/3 innings. On the other side
of the ball, he hit .223 with 18 doubles, two triples, 18 home runs and 55
RBIs, with 37 walks and 125 strikeouts.
His on base percentage was .302.
He missed a handful of games in the middle of the ’74 season as well, which
held down his numbers again. He had a
two home run game on April 25th in an 8-2 victory over the Montreal
Expos, which was only one of two games that season where he had three hits.
Before the 1975 season, Kingman was purchased from the
Giants by the New York Mets. The Mets,
like the Giants, shuffled Kingman all around, as he played both corners of the
infield and outfield in ’75. He played
71 games in the outfield (mostly left field) to the tune of a .958 fielding
percentage with just six errors. He
continued to prove that he couldn’t play third base and should never be put
there, committing three errors in just 12 games with a fielding percentage of
.919. In 58 games at first, he had just
five errors and had a fielding percentage of .988. WHY WON’T THEY PUT ME AT FIRST BASE? Well, the Mets had franchise player Ed
Kranepool there. While Kranepool only
had four home runs and 43 RBIs in 106 games, he did hit .323, which would have
been good for seventh in baseball had he had enough plate appearances to
qualify. I’m sure the Mets didn’t see
that coming, as the previous season, Kranepool hit an even .300 in 94
games. That was the first season he ever
had hit the .300 mark; his career average entering the 1974 season sat at .251. |
| Please don't take first base from me. It's all I have. |
1976 would be the first full season of his career that
Kingman was freed of the scourge of third base.
Kingman played the majority of his time in left field, with an overall
outfield fielding percentage of .959 with only nine errors in 111 games. In 16 more games at first base, he didn’t
commit a single error. His batting
average skyrocketed yet again, this time all the way to .238, along with 14
doubles, one triple, 37 home runs and 86 RBIs, with 28 walks and 135
strikeouts. Again, more home runs than
walks. He had his first career three
home run game on June 4th in an 11-0 victory over the Dodgers,
tacking on eight RBIs. He would make his
first All Star appearance, and finish 18th in the MVP voting, which
was again won by Morgan.
New York was nice, but he was starting to miss
California. Wouldn’t it be great if he
could go back…
Well, Dave, I hope you
have your frequent flyer punch card handy, because you’re going to need it!
Kingman started 1977 again with the New York Mets. Through mid-June, the batting average (.209)
and strikeouts (66) were there, but the home runs (only nine), were not. He was hitting .272 with eight home runs on
May 13th, but then over the next month, he only hit .148 with one
home run. The Mets decided a change of
scenery may be better for them, so they traded Kingman to the San Diego Padres
for Paul Siebert and Bobby Valentine. As
bad as his defense had been in the past, Kingman only made three errors in
those last 62 games he had with the Mets across left field, right field, and
first base.
His time with the Angels would be brief – only 10
games. Highlights include his two-home
run game with four RBIs he had in a 12-7 victory over the Texas Rangers on
September 13th, and the one game he was with the Angels and didn’t
have a strikeout on September 9th.
After hitting .194 with two doubles, two home runs and four RBIs, with
one walk and 16 strikeouts, he was traded to the New York Yankees for Randy
Stein and cash. He made two errors in
his 10 games with the Angels, both at first base.
Kingman’s stay with the Yankees was even shorter than his
Angels career. He would only play in
eight games with the Yankees. He did hit
a home run in his first three games in his return to New York though. In those eight games, he hit .250 with two
doubles, four home runs and seven RBIs, with two walks and 13 strikeouts. He didn’t have a chance for an error with the
Yankees, as they employed him as strictly a designated hitter. Although arriving in New York so late in the
season meant he couldn’t play in the postseason, he still got a World Series
ring as the Yankees beat the Dodgers in six games.
 |
| Just passin' through friend. |
Technically, Kingman was on FIVE different teams in 1977, as
on November 30th, he was signed by his hometown Cubs. The Cubs finished right at .500 in ’77, and
with Bobby Murcer hitting 27 home runs that year, they probably figured they’d
have a pretty good slugging outfield for 1978.
Unfortunately, Murcer would only hit nine in 1978, and only 42 more
the rest of his career.
When you’re the type of hitter that Kingman was, I don’t
think you ever really have a good start to the season, but his was particularly slow in ’78. Through May 9th,
he was only hitting .192 with three home runs.
A couple of games with two hits in four at bats then led into May 14th. That’s when he went 4-7 with three home runs
and eight RBIs, including the game winning three run shot in the top of the 15th
inning in a 10-7 win over the Dodgers.
He would have a stint on the DL that forced him to miss most of July,
but he ended the season hitting a respectable .266 with 17 doubles, four
triples, 28 home runs and 79 RBIs, with 39 walks and 111 strikeouts. Playing exactly 100 games in the outfield, he
only made two errors, good for the highest outfielding percentage of his career
at .978. He added two more errors in six
games at first base. The Cubs were going
to need to get more out of Kingman though; they only hit a total of 72 home
runs that year. And more they would get.
In one of the classic all time Cubs games on May 17th,
he had three home runs and six RBIs in a 23-22
loss to the Phillies. That game
featured starters Randy Lerch and Dennis Lamp combining for 2/3 of an inning
pitched with 11 runs allowed. After the
first inning, the score was 7-6 Phillies.
They extended the lead to 17-6 by the middle of the fourth inning, and
21-9 by the middle of the fifth inning, before the Cubs scored ten runs and
made it 21-19 after the sixth. After the
Cubs tied it at 22 in the eighth, Mike Schmidt hit a solo home run in the top
of the 10th off of Bruce Sutter, and Bill Buckner, Kingman and Steve
Ontiveros couldn’t do anything in the bottom of the frame giving the Phillies
the win. For this game, under “Start
Time Weather”, it says “Wind 18mph in unknown direction”. You can probably take a good guess though.
On February 28th, 1981, Kingman was traded back
to the Mets for Steve Henderson and cash.
Back in New York, Kingman was back to his old self. At the end of April, he was only hitting .229 with four home runs, and his average dipped all the way to .179 on May 16th. On May 25th, he started a streak
of four games with a home run. Other
than that though, it was mostly free of anything spectacular. For the season, he hit .221 with 11 doubles,
three triples, 22 home runs and 59 RBIs, with 55 walks and 105 home runs. The 55 walks were the highest total he had to
that point in his career, and it was the first of two times his strikeout to
walk ratio dipped below 2:1. On defense,
he split his time between left field and first base. In 49 games in the outfield, he made seven
errors (most in the NL for a left fielder), good for a .927 fielding
percentage. Five of those errors came
prior to May 20th, when he primarily switched to first base. He only played 16 games in left field the
rest of the season. At first base, in 56
games, his 13 errors totaled a fielding percentage of .974.
 |
| Sorry Dave. |
Overall in 1983, Kingman hit a career low .198 with seven
doubles, 13 home runs and 29 RBIs, with 22 walks and 57 strikeouts. On defense, other than five error-free games
in right field, he was again used at first base. In 50 games, he made three errors for a
fielding percentage of .994. On November
8th, he became a free agent.
He slowed down a bit in May, only hitting four home runs,
and he had a quick stay on the DL at the end of that month and the beginning of
the next. When he came back in June, in
19 games he hit .318 with six home runs and 17 RBIs. He kept that going in July, when he hit .303
with eight home runs and 26 RBIs in 28 games.
In August, though he only had four home runs, he hit .286. Over the final month, he coasted to the
finish with a .221 average with three home runs.
Overall, the A’s had to be pleased with what they got out of
the 35 year old Kingman. For the season,
he hit .268, which was the third highest mark of his career, with a career high
23 doubles, a triple, 35 home runs and a career high 118 RBIs, with 44 walks
and 119 strikeouts. His 35 home runs
ranked second in the AL to Jesse Barfield’s 40, and his RBI count ranked third
in the junior circuit. He only played in
nine games at first base, but he didn’t make an error while he was there. He finished a distant 13th in the
AL MVP voting, and won the AL Comeback Player of the Year award.
In 1985, Kingman was back with the A’s. At the end of April, he was only hitting .227
with 4 home runs. At the end of May, his average had jumped to .259, thanks to him hitting .284 in May. This included seven home runs, and multiple hits in 11 of 25 games that month. His first real highlight of the season came on June 19th, when he hit
two three-run home runs off of Britt Burns in a 12 inning, 8-7 loss to the
Chicago White Sox. This game also
featured two stolen bases by Carlton Fisk, a feat he only accomplished seven
times in 2499 career games.
His average would get as high as .265 on June 4th,
but from there, it would steadily decline.
For the season, he hit .238 with 16 doubles, 30 home runs and 91 RBIs,
with a career high 62 walks and 114 strikeouts.
He also played in a career high 158 games, no doubt helped by the fact
that all but nine of those games were at DH.
In the other nine games at first base, he did not commit an error.
Despite Kingman still showing his power was still there (six
home runs in his first five games in August), there’s not much use for a
designated hitter that only hits .210.
The average DH hit .256 that season.
As a comparison, NL pitchers, as a whole, hit .137 (in his defense,
those same pitchers only hit 24 home runs combined). To go along with his average, he added 19
doubles, 35 home runs and 94 RBIs, with 33 walks and 126 strikeouts. Awful is too good of a word to describe his
.255 on base percentage. In only three
games at first base, he made two errors.
His 35 home runs were the most ever by a player in their final season.
In the middle of the 1987 season, Kingman signed a minor
league contract with the Giants.
However, through 20 games at AAA Phoenix, he was only hitting .203 with
three doubles, two home runs and 11 RBIs, with 12 walks and 11 strikeouts. Being that the Giants didn’t have access to
the DH position, and they had a kid at first base in the middle of a season
where he would finish fifth in the NL MVP voting, those 20 games in Phoenix
would be the last professional games he would ever play.
Fun fact! In 1987,
Will Clark stole five bases. He was
caught stealing 17 times. You have to admire his persistence. Only Vince Coleman, who stole 109 bases, was
caught more times in the NL (22).
Now that we’ve thoroughly rehashed Kingman’s entire career
season by season, we can start to have some fun. Before we begin, let’s go over his career
stats. He hit .236 with 240 doubles, 25
triples, 442 home runs, 1210 RBIs and 85 stolen bases, with 608 walks and 1816
strikeouts. His career on base
percentage was .302. In 11 seasons
across 648 games in the outfield, he had a fielding percentage of .957. He probably should have been utilized more at
first base, where it was .985, but he never should have been used at third
base, where it was .906.
The 240 doubles vs. 442 home runs stat stood out to me. I wondered how often that happens – more home
runs than doubles. The answer is quite a
lot, actually. You have to go all the
way down to 12th place in all time home runs before you find a
player who hit more doubles than home runs.
Rafael Palmeiro* hit 585 doubles to go along with his 569 home
runs. Other players in the 500 home run
club with more doubles than home runs include Ted Williams, Albert Pujols and
Eddie Murray.
 |
| I will never pass up the chance to post a picture of Killebrew. |
Let’s delve in a little more on that average. Although in any given year, you could say that
the league owned Kingman, there were a few pitchers that he owned. Of pitchers he had more than 10 plate
appearances against, he hit the best off of Matt Young, going 8-12 with a walk,
four home runs, and 14 RBIs. He also hit
.500 or better off of Tom Underwood, Fred Scherman and Ray Fontenot. He had the most plate appearances against
Hall of Famers Steve Carlton and Phil Niekro.
He actually didn’t do too bad against them, hitting .258 off of Carlton
(with 36 strikeouts) and .276 off of Niekro (with 31 strikeouts).
In looking at his splits, there really isn’t much that
stands out. For the most part, as far as
average goes, he was awful. But he was
CONSISTENTLY awful. He hit .231 against
righties, and .247 against lefties. He
hit .237 at home, vs. .234 on the road.
He hit a high of .241 in April and a low of .229 in April. All other months were in the .230s. He hit .239 with no outs, .243 with one out,
and .226 with two outs.
Here’s where things get weird. Let’s look at ratios, children. Everyone is pretty familiar with HR/AB. We’ll get to that in a minute, but let’s take
a look at some other interesting ratios from Mr. Kingman. First of all, let’s look at home run %. He hit a home run in 6% of his plate
appearances. The league average was
2%. So he hit a home run three times as
often as an average player. Hank Aaron’s
ratio was 5.4%. Even all time walks
leader Barry Bonds’ ratio was 6%. DAVE
KINGMAN WAS AS GOOD AS BARRY BONDS.
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| The snowman poses with Kingman after striking him out. |
Kingman hit an extra base hit in 9.5% of his plate
appearances, and a staggering 45% of his hits were of the extra base variety.
Now, let’s look at the famous AB/HR mark. He led the league in that category four
times, including a career high 11.1 AB/HR in 1979 with the Cubs. He also finished in the top 10 six other
times. Overall for his career, his ratio
is 15.11 AB/HR. That’s good for 14th
all time, slightly behind Alex Rodriguez, tied with Juan Gonzalez, and a tick
above Russell Branyan and Mickey Mantle.
DAVE KINGMAN WAS BETTER THAN RUSSELL BRANYAN AND MICKEY MANTLE.
Perhaps the most tragic thing about Kingman is the fact that
he only spent three years with his hometown Cubs. Wrigley Field, sitting only 20 miles from the
high school where he was a three sport star, definitely brought out the best in
him. As a Cub, he hit a combined .278
with 44 doubles, nine triples, 94 home runs and 251 RBIs, with 105 walks and
286 strikeouts. Take out those three
years as a Cub and it’s enough to drop his career batting average to .227. I ran some numbers to figure out what life
would be like if Kingman finished his career in Chicago:
Finally, let’s take a look at the player that he best lines
up with in today’s game. That would be
Adam Dunn. The similarities are
striking:
If you project out Kingman’s stats to the same number of plate appearance Dunn has, you get:
In either scenario, it’s clear that the lack of walks
severely hurt Kingman. It’s not really
surprising, but the numbers make it so much clearer.
What if Kingman could have walked twice as much as he did,
putting him pretty close to Dunn’s numbers?
His average would have went up to .260.
His on base % would have went up to an absurd .460 (Bonds
territory). And his AB/HR ratio would be
first all time at 7.3. Would that make
him a Hall of Famer? Hard to say. Actually, he probably would have played three
or four more years, hit over 500 home runs, and would have almost certainly
been a lock. Instead, Real Dave Kingman
only garnered 0.7% of the vote when he was first eligible in 1992, and fell off
the ballot, which isn’t surprising, as he had the second lowest career WAR of
the 37 players on the ballot that year (only Pete Vuckovich had less).
The funnier question is – what if Dunn only walked as much
as Kingman? His average would fall to .217, his on base % would fall to .276, and his HR/AB ratio would fall from 14.8 to 16.2, and instead of 10th place all time, between Ted
Williams and Manny Ramirez, he’d be in 33rd place all time, tied
with Lou Gehrig, and between Mike Piazza and Jim Gentile.
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