Tony Gwynn

Baseball Player Won-Loss Records
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Tony Gwynn

Hall-of-Famers as Seen Through Player Won-Lost Records: Tony Gwynn

Tony Gwynn was elected to the Hall of Fame in his 1st year of eligibility, 2001, with 97.6% of the vote.

Five highlights of Tony Gwynn's career:

Tony Gwynn was named to 15 All-Star teams in his career. He started ten All-Star games at four different positions (LF, CF, RF, and DH). Gwynn won five Gold Gloves and seven Silver Sluggers and received MVP votes 12 times (with seven top-10 finishes).

Gwynn led the National League in batting average eight times and in hits seven times. His 3,141 career hits are the 21st most in major-league history and his .338 career batting average is the second-highest since MLB integration.

Tony Gwynn led the National League in at bats per strikeouts (AB/K) ten times. Gwynn's career high in strikeouts was 40 (in 1988). From 1991 - 1996, Gwynn never struck out more than 19 times in a season.

Tony Gwynn faced 18 Hall-of-Fame pitchers a total of 541 times in his career. Gwynn batted .331/.371/.410 against Hall-of-Fame pitchers, striking out only 26 times in 541 plate appearances.

Gwynn won the 1995 Branch Rickey Award, which was "given annually to a member of an MLB organization in recognition of his exceptional community service"; the 1998 Lou Gehrig Memorial Award, which is awarded by the Phi Delta Theta fraternity to a major-league player "who best exhibits the character and integrity of Lou Gehrig"; and the 1999 Roberto Clemente Award, which is awarded by Major League Baseball to the player who "best exemplifies the game of baseball, sportsmanship, community involvement, and the individual’s contribution to his team."

The first two tables below present Tony Gwynn's career as measured by Player won-lost records, in and out of context.

Season	Team	Age	Games	pWins	pLosses	pWORL	pWOPA

Basic Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1982	SDN	22	54	5.7	6.4	-0.4	-1.0
1983	SDN	23	86	11.0	9.7	1.6	0.7
1984	SDN	24	158	25.4	18.1	7.9	5.8
1985	SDN	25	154	22.0	19.8	2.9	0.9
1986	SDN	26	160	22.2	20.0	2.7	0.7
1987	SDN	27	157	21.1	19.1	2.5	0.6
1988	SDN	28	133	18.9	15.4	4.0	2.4
1989	SDN	29	158	21.0	18.9	3.1	1.2
1990	SDN	30	141	18.1	19.7	-1.3	-3.0
1991	SDN	31	134	18.6	15.4	3.5	1.9
1992	SDN	32	128	16.6	14.1	3.0	1.5
1993	SDN	33	122	16.6	15.5	1.6	0.1
1994	SDN	34	110	14.9	14.6	0.8	-0.7
1995	SDN	35	135	19.3	16.7	3.1	1.3
1996	SDN	36	116	14.1	13.4	0.9	-0.4
1997	SDN	37	149	19.8	17.1	3.2	1.4
1998	SDN	38	127	14.1	12.1	2.2	0.9
1999	SDN	39	111	13.1	13.0	0.2	-1.1
2000	SDN	40	36	3.7	4.2	-0.3	-0.7
2001	SDN	41	71	3.2	3.2	0.3	-0.0
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,440	319.4	286.1	41.5	12.4
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			27	3.4	3.1	0.4	0.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,467	322.9	289.2	42.0	12.5

Season	Team	Age	Games	eWins	eLosses	eWORL	eWOPA

Expected Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1982	SDN	22	54	6.0	6.1	0.2	-0.4
1983	SDN	23	86	10.6	10.0	0.9	-0.1
1984	SDN	24	158	23.6	19.8	4.2	2.1
1985	SDN	25	154	22.2	19.6	3.2	1.2
1986	SDN	26	160	22.9	19.3	4.1	2.1
1987	SDN	27	157	22.2	18.0	4.7	2.9
1988	SDN	28	133	18.1	16.2	2.4	0.8
1989	SDN	29	158	21.2	18.7	3.5	1.6
1990	SDN	30	141	19.4	18.4	1.4	-0.4
1991	SDN	31	134	18.1	15.8	2.7	1.1
1992	SDN	32	128	15.9	14.7	1.7	0.2
1993	SDN	33	122	17.2	14.9	2.9	1.3
1994	SDN	34	110	16.3	13.3	3.4	1.9
1995	SDN	35	135	18.5	17.5	1.3	-0.5
1996	SDN	36	116	14.1	13.4	0.9	-0.4
1997	SDN	37	149	19.6	17.3	2.9	1.1
1998	SDN	38	127	14.0	12.2	2.1	0.7
1999	SDN	39	111	13.2	13.0	0.4	-0.9
2000	SDN	40	36	4.0	3.9	0.2	-0.2
2001	SDN	41	71	3.4	3.0	0.7	0.4
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,440	320.6	285.0	43.8	14.6
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			27	3.4	3.1	0.3	-0.0
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,467	324.0	288.1	44.1	14.6

Baseball-Reference's bullpen entry on Tony Gwynn opens with a perfect description of Tony Gwynn, the baseball player: "Tony Gwynn was easily one of baseball's best pure hitters of all time." Looking at Tony Gwynn's batting splits at Baseball-Reference, it's hard to find splits in which Tony Gwynn batted below .300. He batted .345 against right-handed pitchers, .325 vs. lefties. His lowest career batting average for any month was .325 in July. His lowest batting average by number of outs in the inning was .317 with two outs. His lowest batting average based on the position of baserunners was .308 with runners on 1st and 2nd. And my favorite batting split for Tony Gwynn: for his career, he batted .302 with two strikes on him.

Basically, there were two aspects of batting at which Tony Gwynn did not excel. He did not walk very often - because, when you bat .338 for your career, you don't really need to walk very often - and he did not hit a lot of home runs (although he had 135 career home runs). But Tony Gwynn could spray hard-hit line drives all over the field as well as anybody.

Batting won-lost records are compiled across seven components. The three most significant components of batting are what I identify as Components 3, 4, and 5.

Component 3 measures the value of plate appearances that do not result in the batter making contact: strikeouts, walks, hit-by-pitches.

Component 4 measures the expected value of balls on which the batter makes contact - including home runs - based on the how the ball was hit (line drive, fly ball, ground ball). Defensively, Component 4 decisions are assigned entirely to pitchers.

So, Components 3 and 4 are the essence of the batter-pitcher matchup.

Component 5 assigns value based on whether a ball-in-play became a hit or an out. Defensively, Component 5 decisions are shared between pitchers and fielders.

Let's look at how Tony Gwynn ranked in the key components of hitting.

Component 3

As I noted above, Tony Gwynn did not walk very often - only 790 times (including 203 IBB) in 10,232 career plate appearances (54 walks per 700 PA). But he struck out even less often - only 434 times. Because Tony Gwynn walked and struck out so infrequently, he amassed a very low share of his batting decisions in Component 3. In fact, Gwynn amassed an historically low share of his batting decisions in Component 3.

The next table shows the players with the lowest percentage of their total batting decisions amassed in Component 3 since 1969, among players with at least 50 batting wins.

		Top 25 Batters (Component 3, lowest share of total Batting decisions)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct	% of Total
1	Manny Sanguillen	5.4	6.9	0.438	6.2%
2	Bill Buckner	13.7	9.7	0.584	6.3%
3	Brian Harper	4.6	4.0	0.534	6.6%
4	Tommy Helms	4.9	4.1	0.544	7.1%
5	Ozzie Guillen	6.8	11.2	0.377	7.3%
6	Felix Millan	10.5	4.1	0.718	7.4%
7	Doug Flynn	3.3	6.7	0.330	7.4%
8	Mickey Hatcher	5.1	5.2	0.496	7.8%
9	Tony Gwynn Sr.	21.6	9.2	0.700	7.9%
10	Matty Alou	5.9	3.5	0.629	7.9%
11	Rennie Stennett	6.0	7.2	0.453	7.9%
12	Tim Foli	8.9	8.5	0.512	8.0%
13	Damaso Garcia	4.7	6.9	0.408	8.0%
14	Willie Davis	6.6	9.0	0.424	8.2%
15	Don Mattingly	15.2	9.5	0.615	8.4%
16	Dan T. Meyer	6.6	6.0	0.526	8.4%
17	Ralph Garr	7.2	9.4	0.435	8.6%
18	Bengie Molina	7.2	10.2	0.412	8.6%
19	Larry Bowa	14.6	11.8	0.553	8.6%
20	Johnny C. Ray	10.9	7.1	0.607	8.7%
21	Mickey Rivers	8.9	10.2	0.464	8.7%
22	Deivi Cruz	4.3	9.3	0.316	8.7%
23	Lance Johnson	9.7	8.3	0.537	8.8%
24	Gary DiSarcina	5.4	6.7	0.448	8.8%
25	Al Oliver	17.3	15.8	0.523	8.9%

Because of Gwynn's low number of Component 3 decisions, he doesn't show up particularly high in something like net Component 3 wins. But his Component 3 winning percentage was exceptional. The next table shows the top batters in Component 3 winning percentage (minimum of 20 Component 3 decisions).

	Top 25 Batters (Component 3, winning percentage - min. 20 component 3 decisions)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct
1	Greg Gross	16.2	5.3	0.753
2	Joe L. Morgan	51.3	17.2	0.749
3	Willie Randolph	39.5	14.4	0.732
4	Ozzie Smith	33.1	12.5	0.727
5	Pete Rose Sr.	41.4	15.6	0.726
6	Mike Scioscia	16.6	6.5	0.717
7	Mike Hargrove	30.9	12.2	0.717
8	Wade Boggs	38.8	16.1	0.707
9	Rusty Staub	29.4	12.4	0.703
10	Tony Gwynn Sr.	21.6	9.2	0.700
11	Ken Oberkfell	16.7	7.4	0.692
12	Mark Grace	30.2	13.8	0.686
13	Butch Wynegar	19.6	9.2	0.680
14	Eric Young Sr.	20.4	9.8	0.676
15	Barry Bonds	68.3	32.8	0.676
16	Carl Yastrzemski	34.1	16.6	0.673
17	Toby Harrah	37.7	18.8	0.667
18	Roy White	24.8	12.7	0.662
19	Steve Braun	18.1	9.3	0.661
20	Ted Sizemore	14.3	7.3	0.660
21	Hank Aaron	15.8	8.3	0.655
22	Brian S. Giles	34.1	18.0	0.654
23	Tim Raines Sr.	38.9	20.6	0.654
24	Jason Kendall	27.5	14.7	0.652
25	Ron Fairly	16.2	8.7	0.652

Component 4

As I explained above, Component 4 measures the expected value of balls on which the batter makes contact, including home runs. As I also noted above, home runs were one of the very few relatively weak parts of Tony Gwynn's offensive game.

It is fairly common, however, in sabermetric measures, to separate home runs from "balls in play". The next table does this. The table below shows the top batters in Component 4 batting wins, excluding home runs, relative to average, since 1969.

		Top 25 Batters (Component 4, excluding home runs)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct	eWOPA
1	Joey Votto	36.4	36.8	0.497	9.4
2	Freddie Freeman	30.6	29.4	0.510	8.4
3	Miguel Cabrera	45.7	56.4	0.447	8.0
4	Tony Gwynn Sr.	54.8	72.0	0.432	8.0
5	Wade Boggs	53.3	69.9	0.433	7.9
6	Adrian Gonzalez	40.0	47.5	0.457	7.7
7	Will Clark	40.1	48.5	0.453	7.4
8	Rod Carew	46.4	59.5	0.438	7.3
9	Dave Magadan	28.6	29.3	0.493	7.2
10	Mark Grace	48.6	63.8	0.432	7.1
11	Pete Rose Sr.	54.1	73.9	0.423	6.9
12	Matt Kemp	31.8	36.4	0.466	6.6
13	Yadier Molina	41.1	52.4	0.440	6.6
14	David Wright	32.2	37.5	0.462	6.5
15	Joe Mauer	38.9	49.8	0.438	6.2
16	Keith Hernandez	38.6	49.3	0.439	6.1
17	Michael Young	42.3	55.8	0.431	6.1
18	Daniel Murphy	31.5	38.0	0.453	5.8
19	Andrew McCutchen	30.2	36.6	0.452	5.5
20	Buster Posey	26.8	30.9	0.464	5.5
21	Bobby Abreu	41.3	55.9	0.425	5.4
22	Pedro Guerrero	28.6	34.4	0.454	5.3
23	Al Oliver	48.1	68.3	0.413	5.1
24	George Brett	54.9	80.3	0.406	5.0
25	Paul Goldschmidt	22.7	25.3	0.473	5.0

Not surprisingly, Tony Gwynn ranks very high on this list.

Component 5

Component 5 allocates value based on whether a ball in play becomes a hit or an out, given where and how a ball was hit. Some of the factors that help lead to high Component 5 winning percentages include baserunning speed - e.g., the ability to beat out infield hits - and how hard one hits the ball - e.g., hard-hit line drives become hits more often than weaker-hit line drives. Tony Gwynn excelled at both of these skills and, consequently, he excelled at Component 5.

The next table shows the top players in Component 5 wins over (non-pitcher) average since 1969.

		Top 25 Batters (Component 5)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct	eWOPA
1	Rod Carew	82.4	63.2	0.566	18.7
2	Derek Jeter	97.4	81.6	0.544	15.5
3	Kirby Puckett	64.0	49.5	0.564	14.5
4	Mickey Rivers	53.5	39.7	0.574	13.6
5	Willie McGee	70.9	55.5	0.561	13.4
6	Tony Gwynn Sr.	91.5	75.5	0.548	13.2
7	Ichiro Suzuki	92.7	79.3	0.539	12.7
8	Paul Molitor	93.0	80.5	0.536	12.5
9	Willie Wilson	66.3	54.6	0.549	11.7
10	Jose Cruz Sr.	66.6	54.4	0.551	10.2
11	Larry Walker	53.4	41.8	0.561	10.2
12	Ken Griffey Sr.	61.0	50.0	0.550	9.7
13	Ralph Garr	46.5	36.3	0.562	9.3
14	Wade Boggs	82.1	72.9	0.530	9.2
15	Lou Brock	52.4	41.7	0.557	9.1
16	Andres Galarraga	59.0	48.2	0.551	9.1
17	Carl Crawford	57.0	47.5	0.545	8.9
18	Hunter Pence	52.0	41.8	0.554	8.9
19	Johnny Damon	77.6	68.5	0.531	8.8
20	Claudell Washington	53.1	43.9	0.548	8.6
21	Dave Parker	71.4	61.3	0.538	8.3
22	Ron LeFlore	37.8	29.4	0.563	8.3
23	Reggie Jackson	59.9	51.3	0.539	8.1
24	Brett Butler	72.8	63.0	0.536	8.1
25	Kenny Lofton	70.4	62.0	0.532	7.8

Overall Value on Balls in Play

Combining Component 4, excluding home runs, and Component 5 can be thought of as essentially measuring batter value on balls in play. The next table shows the top players in combined Component 4 and 5 batting wins, excluding home runs, above average. Rather than only going back to 1969, this table includes all players for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records.

		Top 25 Batters on Balls in Play (Components 4 & 5, excluding home runs)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct	eWOPA
1	Rod Carew	143.2	136.1	0.513	19.9
2	Roberto Clemente	135.2	131.9	0.506	17.3
3	Tony Gwynn Sr.	146.2	147.5	0.498	16.6
4	Lou Brock	139.1	138.5	0.501	16.5
5	Pete Rose Sr.	196.4	213.6	0.479	15.4
6	Rogers Hornsby	95.3	88.2	0.519	14.3
7	Derek Jeter	149.7	158.2	0.486	13.8
8	Paul Waner	144.8	152.4	0.487	13.6
9	Willie McGee	106.9	106.6	0.501	12.7
10	Wade Boggs	135.5	142.8	0.487	12.6
11	Joe Medwick	109.3	112.3	0.493	11.5
12	Miguel Cabrera	112.6	116.6	0.491	11.4
13	Bill Terry	92.4	91.9	0.502	11.1
14	Kiki Cuyler	102.2	105.2	0.493	10.7
15	Ichiro Suzuki	142.7	156.5	0.477	10.6
16	Paul Molitor	145.5	160.1	0.476	10.6
17	Joey Votto	80.0	77.4	0.508	10.5
18	Stan Musial	149.4	166.2	0.473	10.1
19	Joe Torre	105.4	110.6	0.488	10.1
20	Will Clark	93.2	95.5	0.494	9.9
21	Freddie Freeman	66.3	61.6	0.519	9.9
22	Tony Perez	118.1	128.3	0.479	9.4
23	Dick Allen	76.0	75.3	0.502	9.2
24	David Wright	78.0	78.0	0.500	9.1
25	Kirby Puckett	97.6	102.9	0.487	9.1

There you go: Tony Gwynn was one of the top five batters for whom I have calculated Player won-lost records in major-league history on balls in play.

Article last updated: February 12, 2019

All articles are written so that they pull data directly from the most recent version of the Player won-lost database. Hence, any numbers cited within these articles should automatically incorporate the most recent update to Player won-lost records. In some cases, however, the accompanying text may have been written based on previous versions of Player won-lost records. I apologize if this results in non-sensical text in any cases.

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