Angels Hit .300

Here is a shot of the scoreboard showing the Angels line-up and their batting averages yesterday. Everyone was hitting .300+.

I recall the Boston Red-Sox line-up having 6 or 7 .300 hitters in recent years and, during those periods when they seemed especially loaded with offensive talent, I would scour the box scores to see how many .300 hitters were going to bat at other teams. The most productive teams in baseball usually had three or four and I rarely saw any team with five. Around the league yesterday, the Cubs, Brewers, and Nationals each had three .300+ hitters in their line-ups; everyone else (except the Angels) had fewer.

The Yankees, in particular, always seemed to have lots of talented hitters and were the team I most expected (with their propensity to buy productive hitters) to approach a 9-man order of .300 hitters. However, I really never thought any team could have nine concurrent .300 hitters in a line-up capable of playing reasonable defense. I now see that my expectations were wrong.

I knew the Angels had been hitting well of late and that many had raised their averages considerably. But I was surprised when I heard this story. This has been one of those rare baseball events that none of us may see again.

I wonder if all those asterisk typing writers who want to fill the record books with footnotes about steroids have taken notice. I will be curious to hear their explanation of such an explosion of offense in the presumed absence of performance enhancing substances.