Are you curious what the best batting average or best OPS or lowest ERA is over any 60-game stretch in modern major league history?
Well, Tom Tango (MLB.com senior data architect) and Jason Bernard (MLB.com baseball research and development manager) did the digging and MLB.com's Matt Kelly presents the information, but there are significant errors in his article.
Babe Ruth is listed as having the best OPS of all-time over a 60-game period (1.598, May 11 to July 22, 1920), but Ruth actually played in 68 games between those dates and posted a 1.572 OPS. For what it's worth, Ruth's 60-game span from May 23 to July 19 produced a 1.558 OPS. That is still an otherworldly performance, but it's not what is in the article.
I also looked at Rogers Hornsby's .466 batting average from June 21 to August 29, 1924. Again, this is supposedly to be over 60 games, but it's 71 games, and Hornsby batted .467.
Don't worry, some of the information is correct. I picked Barry Bonds's 1.016 slugging percentage from April 13 to June 23, 2001 and discovered it was accomplished in 60 games.
Good job noticing this!
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