Looking at those numbers, it looked like he would certainly hit for around .300... but a career .338 hitter I don't know if too many people could have envisioned as well.

Congrats Tony!

was his lack of strikeouts. DO you realize he struck out less than 25 times in a year FIVE times. Try finding someone who does that in any era of play. You put the ball in play and see what happens. But if you whiff 1 out of every 4 ABs like alot of guys today, you cant hit .330.
Some Websites (ESPN) ridicule Gwynn for not having to much power for a corner OFer (so what) and say he didnt walk enough. But when you hit .338 every year, why do you need to walk 100 times. His career OBP% is around .390. Yes he got fat at the last half of his career. But he was a great clubhouse guy, and a professional hitter. Leaving him or Ripken off a ballet is a discgrace.

Am I reading this right, or does that say he hit .328 in the PCL in '82, not .289 as the last sentence says?  Grrr, I have to be the jerk that says something, don't I.  :(

Not a lot of power, but super consistent.  IMO he never had an "off year" in his entire career.  Even on his last legs in his final 2 seasons, where he was having trouble staying on the field due to his aging body, he still was hitting in the .320's with an OBP of .360+ proving that he was indeed a hitting machine.  I think Maxima231 above is pretty much in agreement with me.

I sometimes have my doubts about the hall of fame vote when Gwynn and Ripken miss 100% by more than a few votes while Dante Bichette and Bobby Bonilla actually get some votes.

Can't wait for the Ripken retro!

How you win 8 batting titles and arent a unanimous choice to be in the hall of fame is beyond me. It really hurts the credibility of the hall and their voters.

Yeah, 8 batting titles and a career .338 BA is about as qualified as you can get for the HOF.  Should have been a unanimous selection.

In the early years, when he was still healthy, he was a surprisingly effective basestealer with 56 and only 12 CS in 1987, a year he scored 119 runs.

He averaged only 122 games played for his career.  If anything would give you pause in terms of his HOF qualifications, his durability would have to be at the top of the list.  It certainly kept his counting stats such as RBI's and Runs Scored down and he wasn't helping his team when he wasn't on the field.

i requested a gwynn prospect retro and now i got one. i didn't realize his minor league career was so short! 42 games in the northwest league (walla walla--i wish there were still a team there now, there isn't a more fun-to-say town name in the USA), 23 in the texas league, and 93 in the PCL. that's the fast track, all right.

Of course Gwynn deserved to be in the Hall but, that said:

1. Those in the press referring to him as the "best hitter since Ted Williams" are simply wrong. There's probably 25 players who debuted after 1950 who were better hitters.
2. Speed. When you look at Gwynn's career, you see someone with incredible contact skills and excellent control of the strike zone. The big weakness, of course, was power. That's fine. Not everyone can hit for power. But, if Gwynn had worked harder to stay in shape he could have kept stealing bases at the clip he was during the '80s. I mean, you team a .330 or .340 BA with 40 steals a year and 80 BBs and now you've got something really, really special.

The point is not that he wasn't a HOFer or not that he wasn't a great player but that he could have been in the upper, upper tier had he stayed in better shape.

No chance you can name 25 guys better...
If anything there are guys about his equal..
Brett, Boggs, Carew....not to many more...In todays game Ichiro is similar. he just has to do it for at least 5 more years...25 is a major reach on your part....
And dont reach for guys who arent similar hitters...I dont want to hear some guy who mostly hit .315 is a better hitter...remember. OVER .350 FIVE TIMES..
lets see that list....

I asked you to find similar hitters and you couldnt. I named them all.
Your comparing apples to oranges. Youve got a whole list of power hitters there. You dont hear anyone mention any of those guys you listed as one of the best hitters since Ted Williams very often. But Ted Williams thought Gwynn was one of the best hitters. None of the people you listed except Bonds ever hit anywhere near as high as Gwynn. If you say your list is better because they hit HR, I say Gwynn is better because he never cost his team in lousy ABs by striking out 130+ times a year. Pure hitting isnt about taking HGH and hitting 550 foot HRs. Its about contact, controlling the strike zone and not giving away ABs. I realize todays hitters dont get embarrassed by whiffing 130+ times a year. But they should. Arod looks terrible swinging and missing at strike 3 about 20% of his Abs. However, I concede when he breaks Bonds/Aarons HR record, people might say he was the greatest hitter ever. I just dont happen to think a guy who has a career line of .304/.389/575 who whiffs more than he walks is one of the best ever.

"Look, when you go to the plate, you go there to create runs not to hit for a high batting average. Was Tony Gwynn the best player since Ted Williams to hit for a high BA? Sure - that's apparent in his, yes, high BA. But was Tony Gwynn one of the best players since Ted Williams in terms of creating runs? No way. Not close."

Simple logic: The point of hitting is to create runs. Tony did not create runs at nearly the rate as those players I listed. Therefore, Tony is not as great a hitter as those players I listed.

Under your view, you would rather have a hitter who hits for average, doesn't strike out and creates fewer runs than a player who doesn't hit for average, does strike out and yet creates more runs. That simply doesn't make sense and every single piece of research conducted over the last 20 years has conclusively proven that it doesn't make sense, dude.