He didn't look for accolades and the Fenway Park crowds rarely offered them-but Ted Williams was one of the game's most consistently brilliant performers.

 

STATS
YEAR
 G AB H 2B 3B HR TB R RBI BB AVG
1939
 149 565 185 44 11 31 344 131 145 107 .327
1940
 144 561 193 43 14 23 333 134 113 96 .344
1941
 143 456 185 33 3 37 335 135 120 145 .406
1942
 150 522 186 34 5 36 338 141 137 145 .356
1946
 150 514 176 37 8 38 343 142 123 156 .342
1947
 156 528 181 40 9 32 335 125 114 162 .343
1948
 137 509 188 44 3 25 313 124 127 126 .369
1949
 155 566 194 39 3 43 368 150 159 162 .343
1950
 89 334 106 24 1 26 216 82 97 82 .317
1951
 148 531 169 28 4 30 295 109 126 144 .318
1952
 6 10 4 0 1 1 9 2 3 2 .400
1953
 37 91 37 6 0 13 82 17 34 19 .407
1954
 117 386 133 23 1 29 245 93 89 136 .345
1955
 98 320 114 21 3 28 225 77 83 91 .356
1956
 136 400 138 28 2 24 242 71 82 102 .345
1957
 132 420 163 28 1 38 307 96 87 119 .388
1958
 129 411 135 23 2 26 240 81 85 98 .328
1959
 103 272 69 15 0 10 114 32 43 52 .254
1960
 113 310 98 15 0 29 200 56 72 75 .316
TOTAL 2292 7706 2654 525 71 521 4884 1798 1839 2019 .344

STORY
He was the consummate craftsman, a man who mastered the science and intimate subtleties of the strike zone, perhaps better than anyone before or since. So keen was the batting eye of Theodore Samuel Williams that if he took a pitch, umpires invariably called it a ball. In 1941, Joe DiMaggio made the headlines with a 56-game hitting streak, but during the same period, "The Splendid Splinter" outhit DiMaggio .412 to .408. Williams produced 185 hits that season in 456 official at-bats, and that translated to a .406 average. No one has reached the .400 plateau since. Like DiMaggio's streak, it is a standard against which the best players are measured. The last game and the last at bat, Williams hit a home run. And even the Boston stubborn fans, who had never thought Williams to be a favorite to them, had to rise to their feet in tribute.