The term "Triple Crown" is typically used when a player leads one league, such as theAmerican League (AL) or theNational League (NL), in the specified categories. A tie for a lead in any category, such as home runs, is sufficient to be considered the leader in that category. A "Major League Triple Crown" may be said to occur when a player leads all ofMajor League Baseball in all three categories.
Rogers Hornsby(left) andTed Williams(right) are the only MLB batters to have won the Triple Crown twice. Hornsby achieved this in 1922 and 1925, while Williams accomplished this in 1942 and 1947.
The term "Triple Crown", unless modified, generally connotes the batting achievement; it is not necessary to refer to it as the "hitting" Triple Crown. A hitter who completes a season leading a league inbatting average,home runs, andruns batted in (RBI) may be said to have won the "Triple Crown."[1]
The Triple Crown reflects the ability of a hitter to excel in three important ways: to hit safely a high percentage of the time (batting average); to hit the ball long distances (home runs); and to produce when runners are on base, driving them home to score (RBI). It is an uncommon feat to lead all hitters in each of these categories. It has been accomplished 17 times in major league seasons, most recently in 2012 byMiguel Cabrera. Cabrera's was the first since 1967, whenCarl Yastrzemski accomplished the feat. Yastrzemski won the Triple Crown the year afterFrank Robinson did, the only time back-to-back Triple Crowns occurred in baseball history.
Hiromitsu Ochiai andOscar Charleston are the only players to have won three batting Triple Crowns in any league. Ochiai won in 1982, 1985, and 1986 while competing in thePacific League ofNippon Professional Baseball. Charleston won in 1921 while playing in theNegro National League, and again in 1924 and 1925 while playing in theEastern Colored League. In the American League and National League, the most batting Triple Crowns won by a player is two.Rogers Hornsby was the first to accomplish it, winning his first in 1922 and then leading both leagues in 1925 en route to his second Triple Crown, both with theSt. Louis Cardinals.[3][4]Ted Williams later matched this mark, leading both leagues in 1942 and the American League in 1947, both with theBoston Red Sox.[5][6] Ochai andRandy Bass each recorded Triple Crowns in consecutive seasons in the Nippon League, in 1985 and 1986.
The Cardinals have won the most hitting Triple Crowns as a franchise with four. Along with Hornsby's two,Tip O'Neill won in the now-defunctAmerican Association in 1887 while the team was known as the St. Louis Browns,[7] andJoe Medwick added the Cardinals' fourth in 1937.[8] Eleven of the thirteen eligible[9] players who have batting Triple Crownshave been elected to theHall of Fame.[10][11] Baseball journalistTim Kurkjian believes the Triple Crown has become more difficult to win with the advent of more hitters who choose to specialize in either hitting for batting average or power.[12]
Sandy Koufax won three Major League pitching Triple Crowns, two consecutively and all three within four seasons.
Apitcher who leads the league inwins,strikeouts, andearned run average (ERA) is said to have won the "Pitching Triple Crown."[13] The term was previously defined as leading the league in wins, ERA, and winning percentage. It was used in that older sense to describe the unsuccessful pursuits of that goal byBobby Shantz in 1952[14] andJohnny Antonelli in 1954[15] as well asSandy Koufax in 1963.[16] Koufax was first described as having won the Pitching Triple Crown in the current sense after his 1965 season,[17] though the older sense continued to be used.[18]
In contrast to the respective batting statistics, the Pitching Triple Crown statistics are more or less complementary (for example, a pitcher who is especially proficient at striking out batters is likely to give up fewer earned runs, and consequently more likely to win games); therefore, the accomplishment is not as rare as the batting crown.
The Pitching Triple Crown has been accomplished 39 times in the American and National Leagues. The most by one player is three, accomplished by three players.Grover Cleveland Alexander captured his first two in consecutive seasons with thePhiladelphia Phillies (1915–1916), and won a third in 1920 with theChicago Cubs. Alexander is the only pitcher to win a Pitching Triple Crown with more than one major league team.[19][20][21]Walter Johnson won his three Triple Crowns with theoriginal Washington Senators, leading the league in all three categories in 1913, 1918, and 1924.[22][23][24]Sandy Koufax was the most recent to capture three Triple Crowns, winning his three within four seasons for theLos Angeles Dodgers (1963, 1965–1966); all of Koufax's crowns led both major leagues, the most for any player.[25][26][27]
Outside MLB,Yoshinobu Yamamoto andSun Dong-yol each won three pitching triple crowns and are the only players to earn this achievement in three consecutive seasons. Yamamoto achieved this record in theNPB from 2021 to 2023, and Sun Dong-yol achieved it in theKBO League from 1989 to 1991.
Eighteen of 24 major league pitchers who have won a Triple Crown and are eligible for the Hall of Fame have been inducted.[30] The Triple Crown winners who most recently became eligible for the Hall arePedro Martínez andRandy Johnson. Both were elected to the Hall of Fame in 2015, each in their first year of eligibility.[31]
The most recent major league pitchers to achieve the feat areChris Sale andTarik Skubal in 2024.[32] As of 2024, every MLB pitcher who has achieved the Triple Crown has concurrently won theCy Young Award for that season.[33]
The first major league pitcher to achieve the pitching Triple Crown wasTommy Bond, in the NL in 1877. The following year,Paul Hines became the first major leaguer to lead the NL in the three batting categories; he,Heinie Zimmerman, andMiguel Cabrera are the only three players to be AL or NL Triple Crown winners and not reach the Hall of Fame, although Cabrera will not be eligible for induction until 2029.[10][28][34] The highest home run total reached by a Crown winner wasMickey Mantle, with 52 in 1956. The highest RBI total belongs toLou Gehrig, with 165 in 1934. Rogers Hornsby has the highest home run total by an NL winner, 42, from his 1922 season. The NL high for RBI is 154, set by Joe Medwick in 1937.Hugh Duffy's .440 average in his 1894 Triple Crown season is the highest batting average by any player in major league history.Nap Lajoie, in 1901, set the all-time AL single-season high in batting average with .426.
Among the major leaguers who earned the pitching Triple Crown, the lowest ERAs belong to Walter Johnson (1.14 in 1913 AL) and Grover Alexander (1.22 in 1915 NL). The highest win total belongs toCharles Radbourn, amassed in 1884, who in that year set a major league single-season record with at least 59 wins.[35][36] Radbourn struck out 441 batters that season, the highest total for a Triple Crown winner. Walter Johnson holds the highest win total by an AL pitching Triple Crown winner, with 36 in 1913. Among AL pitching Triple Crown winners,Pedro Martínez registered the highest season strikeout total, with 313 in 1999. Since 1901, the major league pitcher with the highest season strikeout total in the course of a Triple Crown season is Sandy Koufax, striking out 382 in 1965.
Research in 2015 restored the Chicago Cubs'Heinie Zimmerman of 1912 to the list.[37] There is doubt over whetherHugh Duffy's 1894 RBI totals were the highest.[38]
Mickey Mantle is the most recent MLB batting Triple Crown winner to lead both leagues in all three categories, achieving the feat in 1956.Miguel Cabrera is the most recent AL batting Triple Crown winner, achieving it in 2012; the first since 1967.
On December 16, 2020,Major League Baseball announced that the records ofNegro league baseball from 1920 to 1948 would be designated as major league status. As such, seven different leagues that existed in that time period are now recognized as being on the same level as MLB.[101] Seven batters and four pitchers achieved the Triple Crown in that era.[102]
Hideo Fujimoto had the lowest single season ERA of any triple crown winning season, regardless of league, with a 0.73 ERAYoshinobu Yamamoto is the only pitcher in the history of Nippon Professional Baseball to win three pitching Triple Crowns consecutively
Sun Dong-yol is the only player in KBO league history to achieve the triple crown as a pitcher three times.
Since the KBO League's strikeout titles began to be officially awarded in the 1993 season, the criteria for KBO League pitchers Triple Crown until 1992 are wins, ERA, and a pitcher's winning percentage.[120]
Sun Dong-yol won the MVP of the season in 1986 with getting annual wins, strikeout, and ERA title. But as mentioned above, the KBO League's pitcher triple crown standard at that time was a winning-rate title, not a strikeout, so it is officially considered that Sun Dong-yeol in 1986 did not achieve the triple crown. Sun Dong-yol's winning percentage in the 1986 season was .800, ranking 2nd in the league.
^The major league season in 2020 was less than half the length of a typical season, starting in late July and condensed into 60 games due to theCOVID-19 pandemic.
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