SPB-3 1951 Season              Status: Season starts March 1

1949 Final stats posted

The stats and power rankings for the final month of 1949 are now posted.

Don Rahn has captured his 4th pennant in a row, including the 1946 pennant when he was in the N.L., with his Brooklyn Royal Giants. Once again he has outdistanced my Hoosier Thunderbolts for the title, as the T'Bolts have also been the runner up over these four years of Brooklyn championships. This time was by far the biggest distance between the two teams as he won by 13 full games. In 1946 it was 2 games, in 1947, 6 games, and in 1948, again by two games. Hats off to Don! He has had my number every year!

In the N.L., the Chicago Stampers of Steve Lehman have taken the pennant this year. But that was not decided until the final weekly series when Chicago took on the second place (at the time) Schaumburg Hawks of John Ungashick. Chicago took it to Schaumburg by besting them 6 of the 7 games, which allowed the DeVilbiss Tigers of Mike Murphy to slip into second place when the final bell rang. Talk about a tough pill to swallow! Poor John.

So the 1949 World Series will soon begin with the Royal Giants being the favored team by the Vegas bookies.

This is based on the Royal Giants 106-48 record, as opposed to the Stampers record of 88-66 season mark. But in a short series, any team can get hot and score an upset, as we have often seen in SPB W.S. history.

As for the seasons offensive leaders in the A.L. slugger Ralph Kiner scored first in so many categories, that there is little reason to doubt he will be the exclusive 1949 A.L. MVP with his .373 B.A., his .495 OBP, and that amazing .831 Slugging Avg. The reason for that is the mind boggling 70 HR's, and 197 RBI to back up this claim! Kiner also led with 201 hits, and 152 runs scored. Wow, what a year!! The East Kenosha Lions Bobby Thomson led with 39 doubles, and the River City Rugrats featured the triples leader in speedster Bob Dillinger who hit 18 three-baggers. Dillinger also captured the SB lead with a mere 13, as it shows the A.L. was just sitting back waiting for the hitters to lead the way.

In the N.L., another huge reason for their pennant was the great season put forth from 2B Jackie Robinson, sure to be N.L. MVP as he also led the N.L. with a .352 batting average, (barely beating out fellow teammate Carl Furillo by a single point!). Jackie, like Kiner, also captured the league OBP with a .439 mark, and even took the slugging crown at .531. He also led his league in doubles with 38, runs (114), hits (206), and SB (33). Another whew! The combo of Robinson and Furillo were just too much for the other teams to overtake when it comes to Stamper Stars. The Stampers Furillo led the league with 10 triples and drove in 131 runners to win that title as well. Rock Islands second year star Larry Doby edged out Schaumburgs Hank Sauer for the HR crown 34 to 32. There were many good pitchers in the A.L. Larry Jansen of the Royal Giants fashioned a 21-8 mark to tie Hoosier's Hal Newhouser, also a 21 game winner (21-12). The South River Muckdogs also had a pair of 20 game winners in Harry Brecheen (20-12), and Virgil Trucks (20-13). Nineteen game winners featured 3 players, Brooklyn's Dick Fowler (19-6), Hoosier's Ken Heintzleman (19-8), and the Maumee River Carps Bob Lemon at 19-12. East Kenosha Lions hurler Ned Garver at 2.32, edged South River V. Trucks (2.35) for the ERA crown. South Rivers Don Newcombe took a slight lead in whiffs over Maumee's B. Lemon, taking the strikeout crown 146-140. The River City Rugrats featured the leagues top reliever as Bobby Hogue led with 17 saves in only 31 appearances. Quite a feat there, as well.

In the N.L., there were no 20 game winners, as the Stampers Howie Fox (19-8), edged out the Tigers Mel Parnell, who fashioned an 18-9 record, for the top winners. The ERA battle featured 3 outstanding marks, with the top one belonging to the Indianapolis Clowns Gerry Staley who fashioned a nice 2.06 mark. Others with great ERA's this season were the Stampers ace H. Fox at 2.29, and the Tigers M. Parnell at 2.32. The Rock Island Arsenal's Tommy Byrne led with 136 strikeouts. The Clowns G. Staley tied up with the Tigers Joe Page, both recording 19 saves to lead the N.L. firemen.

So be sure to check out the leader boards to see where your favorites finished. There are just a ton of good performers out there this season. Many of whom did not lead their leagues in any catagory. Check out all the stats. It is one of the rewarding things about playing the games in SPB. Enjoy! And once again congratulations to Don Rahn and Steve Lehman for their championship seasons of 1949.

Oh, last but not least, thanks to Chris Williams for another great year serving as our SPB III League Statistician, and for already preparing the W.S. file.