Over his last 81 games of the 2016 regular season — and his team’s last 88 games — Joey Votto did something that was not like any of those other remarkable things he has been doing over these last 13 seasons.
He hit .400.
It was “the best stretch of hitting in my career,” Votto said this week. It was special. He’s proud of it. And he did it over a really long period of time — more than three months (June 30 through Oct. 2) and more than 350 plate appearances.
But you know what it wasn’t? A full season.
Not that year, it wasn’t anyway, because that was a normal season. A 162-game season. A six-month season. But that isn’t what we’re going to have this season. So let’s think about something.
Suppose Votto were to hit .400 over 82 games in this season. That’s something no player has done over a full season since Ted Williams in 1941. According to the rules of baseball, Votto technically would be the first .400 hitter since Williams. But would he have done the same thing Ted Williams did?
“Nooooo,” Votto answered resoundingly. “No, no, no, no, no.”
That’s six no’s if you’re keeping score in your wordsmith booth at home. He meant every one of them.
But according to the standards applied to this season, this would in fact be a .400 season. So how, he was asked, would he explain that to Ted Williams, his personal hitting hero?
“I probably wouldn’t explain anything to him,” Votto said, chuckling knowingly, as a man whose head is filled with massive Ted Williams lore. “He’d probably be doing plenty of explaining to me. And I would sit there with my mouth open and listen.”
Now that would be a good idea, because Ted no doubt would have several thoughts. And we know exactly what he’d think Joey Votto could do with his supposed .400 “season.” But does that mean we should feel compelled to attach an asterisk to it — or any sort of explanation?
Sorry, Ted was unavailable for comment. But Joey Votto has a comment.
“No, no, no, no, no,” he said, adding five more no’s to his career totals. “I think that fans, baseball fans, the general public, are really intelligent. And they’re capable of discerning between one achievement and the next.”
You would probably be astounded by how much Votto knows about the historic significance of hitting .400 and of the men who have chased it in modern times. He knows all about Tony Gwynn batting .394 in the strike-shortened 1994 season. He knows all about George Brett taking a .400 average into September 1980 and finishing at .390.
He remembers Todd Helton reaching .400 in late August 2000 and John Olerud hovering above .400 in August 1993.
Votto brought all of those seasons up to me without being asked. All of those men hit .400 for longer than he did in 2016. So if he — or anyone else — were to hit .400 in a season like this, he thinks he has a feel for what it would mean and wouldn’t mean.
“If I were to do it, I would be very happy with it,” he admitted. “But that’s my favorite part of the sport. That’s my favorite part of my job, is performing — and then leaving the story and weaving the context (to others). I love how people get to tell it themselves. It’s honestly my favorite part.”
So you can add Joey Votto to the membership rolls of the No Asterisks Club. Not necessary, he says. Really, really not necessary.
“I think that baseball fans can certainly tell the difference,” he said. “I don’t think asterisks are ever necessary. Context is the story. I don’t think we need historical records as much as we need stories being told.”