ZiPS Time Warp: Ted Williams

July 30, 2020

Ted Williams isn’t the typical beneficiary of a trip in the ZiPS time machine. After all, anyone who has the slightest interest in baseball — and many who don’t — know his name, even if they aren’t familiar with every last one of his accomplishments. Williams typified the cerebral, scientific hitter in the same way that Babe Ruth created the archetype of the larger-than-life slugger. The mercurial Ruth likely would have had considerably more trouble adapting to today’s game, but I’m of the opinion that the Splendid Splinter would actually thrive in a world where offense is looked at more as science than myth made true. Perhaps the best modern comparison for Williams is Joey Votto if the latter somehow got a hold of a genie’s lamp.

The list of Williams’ accomplishments is far too lengthy to run down in complete fashion, so we’ll settle for a sampling. He’s first all-time in on-base percentage and second in slugging percentage. He’s the most recent player to hit .400, and for the better part of a century was the last player to win a Triple Crown, which he did twice. Ted finished with a .344 batting average, 521 homers, 2,654 hits, and enough black ink in his stats that he could have started his own newspaper.

But Williams’ career was also marked by long absences from the game. He was drafted after Pearl Harbor, initially receiving a deferment because he was his mother’s sole support. He played through the 1942 season, but enlisted in the Navy reserve after its conclusion and served for the next three years.

In terms of baseball, those were prime seasons of his career lost. The 1943-1945 stretch represented his age-24 through age-26 seasons, years when a lot of Hall of Famers turn in some of their most eye-popping campaigns. Taking a look at the list of Hall of Fame hitters through those ages sorted by WAR, there are some truly gigantic numbers involved:

Hall of Fame Hitters by WAR, Ages-24 to 26

Name	WAR
Babe Ruth	36.5
Mickey Mantle	31.7
Rogers Hornsby	31.5
Jimmie Foxx	30.0
Lou Gehrig	29.5
Tris Speaker	28.5
Ty Cobb	27.3
Joe DiMaggio	25.7
Mike Schmidt	25.7
Ron Santo	24.8
Willie Mays	24.4
Eddie Collins	24.1
Rickey Henderson	22.3
Johnny Bench	22.1
Hank Aaron	22.0
Ralph Kiner	21.8
Frank Robinson	21.6
Arky Vaughan	21.0
Johnny Mize	20.8
Frank Thomas	20.4
Mel Ott	20.4
Frank Baker	20.4
Lou Boudreau	20.4
Joe Cronin	20.3
Robin Yount	20.3

Every hitter in the Hall of Fame who was allowed to play in major league baseball put up something in those seasons. They averaged just under five wins per season, and 123 of the 153 hitters put up at least 10 WAR. (For those who are curious, Sam Rice, an extremely late-bloomer, only collected 1.3 WAR during these ages.)

In 1952, Williams did it all again. Activated for the Korean War, he played in just six games that season, reporting for training in May. That stint in the armed forces was a shorter one and Williams returned for the end of the 1953 season, wreaking a terrible vengeance on pitchers while hitting .407/.509/.901 with 13 homers in 37 games. He was his usual self in 1954, but injuries took a toll. Slowed down by a broken collarbone in the spring, the 35-year-old announced that 1954 would be his final season. The Red Sox offered him the manager job, which he declined.

But his retirement was entwined with a messy divorce and he returned to the Red Sox in May 1955. Almost every player in history would envy his decline phase. From 1955 until his retirement in 1960, Williams hit .336/.470/.623. His final 1.096 OPS suggests he could have stayed around even longer, but he finished his career in style, hitting one last Fenway dinger off Orioles pitcher Jack Fisher.

As baseball fans, we can’t help but wonder what Teddy Ballgame could have done with more ballgames. There are a few ways to look at this, so I’ll start with this easiest.

Here’s how hitters throughout baseball history rank if we take out the stats generated during their ages-24-26 and 33-34 seasons. Suffice it to say, Williams shoots up the charts. Overall, Williams and Stan Musial are the only two players in the top 25 for WAR who went to war, though Joe DiMaggio likely makes the top 25 without World War II:

Career WAR, Ages 24-26, 33-34 Removed

Name	WAR
Ted Williams	127.8
Barry Bonds	127.7
Babe Ruth	113.6
Ty Cobb	112.2
Willie Mays	104.3
Honus Wagner	100.6
Stan Musial	100.4
Hank Aaron	99.9
Tris Speaker	89.1
Rogers Hornsby	87.4
Joe Morgan	84.3
Eddie Collins	84.1
Mel Ott	80.8
Alex Rodriguez	78.3
Mickey Mantle	74.8
Rickey Henderson	73.7
Cap Anson	72.4
Nap Lajoie	72.2
Carl Yastrzemski	71.5
Frank Robinson	70.5
Eddie Mathews	69.4
Lou Gehrig	68.6
Cal Ripken	68.0
Jimmie Foxx	66.9
Mike Schmidt	66.8

But that’s not entirely fair to the others, is it? After all, they actually put up those seasons! Plus, I have a projection system, for an occasion just such as this. For this part of the Time Warp, I asked ZiPS to project Williams, with 1942 being the jumping-off point from reality:

ZiPS Time Warp: Ted Williams, 1942

Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	OPS+	WAR
1943	.347	.492	.580	505	131	175	30	5	26	92	141	47	221	11.3
1944	.360	.495	.596	495	171	178	31	7	24	118	130	45	223	10.6
1945	.349	.498	.577	487	136	170	30	6	23	94	142	45	218	10.3
1946	.354	.510	.681	480	177	170	30	8	37	120	150	54	233	12.5
1947	.350	.518	.675	468	157	164	28	8	36	107	160	47	231	11.5
1948	.346	.525	.643	459	183	159	27	8	31	121	169	42	215	10.8
1949	.343	.530	.668	452	176	155	26	8	35	117	177	40	219	11.1
1950	.353	.529	.735	445	191	157	26	9	42	126	163	40	217	11.2
1951	.345	.507	.673	441	144	152	24	8	35	97	142	39	210	10.0
1952	.321	.474	.601	439	119	141	20	8	29	81	125	41	196	8.6
1953	.326	.465	.612	436	110	142	19	8	30	75	111	38	189	7.3
1954	.320	.458	.578	403	96	129	16	8	24	65	100	33	177	7.5
1955	.308	.440	.509	373	90	115	13	1	20	58	86	31	153	5.1
1956	.308	.433	.506	344	79	106	12	1	18	49	74	27	140	4.3
1957	.290	.394	.438	317	64	92	9	1	12	41	52	24	129	2.2
1958	.285	.375	.423	291	53	83	8	1	10	33	40	21	119	1.3
1959	.277	.365	.386	267	48	74	6	1	7	30	35	18	107	0.3
1960	.271	.350	.367	229	34	62	5	1	5	22	27	15	96	-0.3
Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	OPS+	WAR
ZiPS RoC	.331	.478	.588	7331	2159	2424	360	97	444	1446	2024	647	194	135.5
Actual	.340	.482	.631	5602	1257	1905	371	38	394	1324	1526	513	191	94.0
Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	OPS+	WAR
ZiPS Career	.336	.479	.600	9435	2700	3173	514	130	571	1961	2519	843	194	171.9
Actual	.344	.482	.634	7706	1798	2654	525	71	521	1839	2021	709	188	130.4

ZiPS actually didn’t do too terribly projecting Ted! The computer in 1942 didn’t know just how good he’d still be in 1960; 18 years is a really long time to project a player out. Williams now passes the 3,000-hit mark and adds 50 home runs. The extra playing time is enough to get him to 171.9 wins, pushing him past Ruth at the top of the leaderboard.

And it still rips Williams off a bit. In truth, we’re not looking for a career projection for Ted Williams, just one for 1943-1945 and 1952-1953. We actually know he was awesome in 1960, so why give him ZiPS’ prediction for 1960? Using projections instead of reality gives him a few better performances in the mid-40s, but he loses more from not getting credit for his amazingly gentle decline.

But never fear. One of the projects I had time to work on during our sad baseball interregnum this year was an addition to ZiPS to make it able to do things backwards. So to fill in Ted’s war years, I ask ZiPS to project what performances from 1943 to 1945 are most likely to lead to his actual results from 1946 to 1951. I then repeat the process for 1952 and 1953.

ZiPS Time Warp: Ted Williams, Filled-In Career

Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	OPS+	WAR
1939	.327	.436	.609	565	131	185	44	11	31	145	107	64	160	7.1
1940	.344	.442	.594	561	134	193	43	14	23	113	96	54	162	6.7
1941	.406	.553	.735	456	135	185	33	3	37	120	147	27	235	11.0
1942	.356	.499	.648	522	141	186	34	5	36	137	145	51	216	11.6
1943	.353	.495	.565	519	144	183	35	6	21	109	142	42	206	10.2
1944	.349	.494	.581	516	142	180	37	7	23	120	144	40	207	10.5
1945	.341	.489	.604	513	140	175	39	9	26	125	144	40	212	10.8
1946	.342	.497	.667	514	142	176	37	8	38	123	156	44	215	11.8
1947	.343	.499	.634	528	125	181	40	9	32	114	162	47	205	10.5
1948	.369	.497	.615	509	124	188	44	3	25	127	126	41	189	8.5
1949	.343	.490	.650	566	150	194	39	3	43	159	162	48	191	9.9
1950	.317	.452	.647	334	82	106	24	1	28	97	82	21	168	4.3
1951	.318	.464	.556	531	109	169	28	4	30	126	144	45	164	7.1
1952	.351	.495	.661	433	96	152	26	3	34	112	123	33	210	9.4
1953	.364	.506	.723	390	86	142	23	3	37	101	112	30	224	8.8
1954	.345	.513	.635	386	93	133	23	1	29	89	136	32	201	8.4
1955	.356	.496	.703	320	77	114	21	3	28	83	91	24	209	7.1
1956	.345	.479	.605	400	71	138	28	2	24	82	102	39	172	6.3
1957	.388	.526	.731	420	96	163	28	1	38	87	119	43	233	9.4
1958	.328	.458	.584	411	81	135	23	2	26	85	98	49	179	4.5
1959	.254	.372	.419	272	32	69	15	0	10	43	52	27	114	0.0
1960	.316	.451	.645	310	56	98	15	0	29	72	75	41	190	3.4
Year	BA	OBP	SLG	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	OPS+	WAR
Total	.345	.485	.628	9976	2387	3445	679	98	648	2369	2665	882	195	177.3

This time, we get Ted an extra 800 or so hits and more than a hundred extra homers. He even gets an additional point of batting average, finishing at .345. First in career WAR, the walk record, and a top 10 ranking for homers and hits feels a bit more representative of the feats of arguably the best pure hitter baseball has ever seen, doesn’t it?

We hoped you liked reading ZiPS Time Warp: Ted Williams by Dan Szymborski!

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Dan Szymborski is a senior writer for FanGraphs and the developer of the ZiPS projection system. He was a writer for ESPN.com from 2010-2018, a regular guest on a number of radio shows and podcasts, and a voting BBWAA member. He also maintains a terrible Twitter account at @DSzymborski.