Wade Boggs

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Wade Boggs

Hall-of-Famers as Seen Through Player Won-Lost Records: Wade Boggs

Wade Boggs was elected to the Hall of Fame in his 1st year of eligibility, 2005, with 91.9% of the vote.

Five highlights of Wade Boggs's career:

Wade Boggs participated in the longest game in professional baseball history, a 33-inning minor-league game between the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox, the AAA affiliates of the Baltimore Orioles and Boston Red Sox. Boggs played the entire game at third base and batted 4-for-12, including an RBI double in the bottom of the twenty-first inning. Boggs was on deck when the winning run scored.

Wade Boggs batted at least .325 with at least 200 hits and 100 runs scored in each of his first seven full major-league seasons (1983 – 89). He also had 40 or more doubles in 6 of these 7 seasons.

From June 9, 1985 through June 7, 1986, Wade Boggs played 163 games and batted exactly .400 (258-for-645).

Wade Boggs is the only player in major-league history to have at least 150 singles, 50 extra-base hits, and 100 walks in a season. Boggs did it twice, in 1986 and 1988.

Wade Boggs was the first third baseman in Tampa Bay Devil Rays (now Rays) history. He had the first RBI and first home run in Tampa history when he hit a two-run home run off the Tigers’ Justin Thompson with one out in the bottom of the sixth inning on March 31, 1998.

The first two tables below present Wade Boggs'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	BOS	24	104	10.4	9.1	2.0	1.0
1983	BOS	25	153	22.2	18.3	5.5	3.6
1984	BOS	26	157	18.0	17.6	2.0	0.3
1985	BOS	27	161	22.9	18.7	6.1	4.1
1986	BOS	28	149	22.0	15.1	8.4	6.7
1987	BOS	29	147	19.6	14.8	6.2	4.6
1988	BOS	30	155	20.0	15.7	6.0	4.3
1989	BOS	31	156	17.9	15.9	3.6	2.0
1990	BOS	32	155	18.0	17.7	2.0	0.3
1991	BOS	33	144	19.5	15.6	5.5	3.8
1992	BOS	34	143	16.3	16.9	0.9	-0.8
1993	NYA	35	143	16.4	15.6	2.4	0.8
1994	NYA	36	97	14.1	10.1	5.2	4.0
1995	NYA	37	126	13.7	12.0	2.9	1.6
1996	NYA	38	132	13.4	13.3	1.3	0.0
1997	NYA	39	104	9.2	8.7	1.4	0.5
1998	TBA	40	123	10.5	11.3	0.2	-1.0
1999	TBA	41	90	7.8	9.4	-0.8	-1.7
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,439	291.6	255.8	60.8	34.3
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			39	4.4	4.0	0.8	0.3
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,478	296.0	259.8	61.6	34.6

Season	Team	Age	Games	eWins	eLosses	eWORL	eWOPA

Expected Player Won-Lost Records
						Value Decomposition
1982	BOS	24	104	10.3	9.2	1.8	0.8
1983	BOS	25	153	22.5	18.0	6.1	4.2
1984	BOS	26	157	18.8	16.8	3.7	2.0
1985	BOS	27	161	23.4	18.1	7.3	5.3
1986	BOS	28	149	20.7	16.3	5.9	4.2
1987	BOS	29	147	20.1	14.3	7.2	5.6
1988	BOS	30	155	20.2	15.4	6.5	4.7
1989	BOS	31	156	18.8	15.1	5.2	3.6
1990	BOS	32	155	17.9	17.7	2.0	0.3
1991	BOS	33	144	19.2	15.9	4.8	3.1
1992	BOS	34	143	16.6	16.6	1.5	-0.1
1993	NYA	35	143	15.6	16.4	0.9	-0.7
1994	NYA	36	97	13.6	10.6	4.2	3.0
1995	NYA	37	126	13.6	12.2	2.6	1.3
1996	NYA	38	132	13.1	13.7	0.6	-0.8
1997	NYA	39	104	9.2	8.7	1.4	0.4
1998	TBA	40	123	10.8	11.0	0.9	-0.3
1999	TBA	41	90	8.1	9.0	-0.0	-0.9
			------	------	------	------	------
CAREER (reg. season)			2,439	292.5	254.9	62.5	36.0
			------	------	------	------	------
PostSeason (career)			39	4.2	4.3	0.3	-0.1
			------	------	------	------	------
COMBINED			2,478	296.6	259.2	62.8	35.8

Wade Boggs collected over 3,000 hits in his major-league career, won 5 batting titles, made 12 All-Star games, and was elected to the Hall of Fame with over 90% of the vote in his first year of eligibility. Obviously, there was a tremendous appreciation of Wade Boggs's major-league career. But for all of that, I think Wade Boggs might have actually had an even better career than he's sometimes given credit for. He led the league in batting average five times, but he led the league in on-base percentage six times (and in total times on base eight times) and ranks higher on the career list in OBP (25th) than batting average (33rd). His 12 All-Star games tie for the 26th-most all-time, but Baseball-Reference ranks his MVP shares as 216th all-time.

Wade Boggs's Peak

Wade Boggs finished in the top 10 in MVP voting four times in his career. These came consecutively, from 1985 through 1988, with a top finish of 4th (in 1985). As impressive as that is, it almost certainly understates how impressive Wade Boggs's peak was. According to Baseball-Reference, for example, Wade Boggs ranked 2nd-3rd-2nd-1st in WAR in the AL over those four seasons (and 3rd in 1989) and led AL position players in WAR for three consecutive years (1986 - 1988, with 2nd-place finishes on either side of that).

Player won-lost records generally agree with WAR regarding the excellence of Wade Boggs's prime.

As measured by (context-neutral, teammate-adjusted) eWins over either positional average or replacement level, Wade Boggs was one of the top three players in major-league baseball over the latter half of the 1980's (1985 - 1989).

		eWins over Positional Average Top 10 Players						eWins over Replacement Level Top 10 Players
	Player	eWins	eLosses	eWOPA	eWORL		Player	eWins	eLosses	eWOPA	eWORL
1	Wade Boggs	122.0	96.0	25.5	35.9	1	Cal Ripken	134.6	118.4	24.5	36.5
2	Roger Clemens	80.9	56.5	25.4	34.5	2	Rickey Henderson	125.0	96.3	25.4	36.1
3	Rickey Henderson	125.0	96.3	25.4	36.1	3	Wade Boggs	122.0	96.0	25.5	35.9
4	Cal Ripken	134.6	118.4	24.5	36.5	4	Roger Clemens	80.9	56.5	25.4	34.5
5	Darryl Strawberry	125.6	95.3	23.7	34.2	5	Darryl Strawberry	125.6	95.3	23.7	34.2
6	Alan Trammell	114.3	100.0	21.2	31.5	6	Alan Trammell	114.3	100.0	21.2	31.5
7	Bret Saberhagen	79.8	59.7	21.1	30.3	7	Orel Hershiser	91.1	76.9	20.9	31.0
8	Orel Hershiser	91.1	76.9	20.9	31.0	8	Bret Saberhagen	79.8	59.7	21.1	30.3
9	Dwight Gooden	84.3	70.7	20.2	29.4	9	Dwight Gooden	84.3	70.7	20.2	29.4
10	Mike Schmidt	105.2	81.8	19.9	28.8	10	Ozzie Smith	121.6	108.5	18.2	29.1

Wade Boggs's Career

Wade Boggs did not merely have an excellent peak, he had an excellent career. For example, Wade Boggs is currently 30th alltime in career hits, 26th in career walks, and 24th in career times on base. The next table shows the top 10 players in (context-neutral, teammate-adjusted) eWins over positional average earned as a third baseman.

		Top 10 Third Basemen (Measured by eWOPA at Third Base)
		eWins	eLosses	eWinPct	eWOPA
1	Mike Schmidt	315.2	240.9	0.567	65.7
2	Eddie Mathews	293.4	229.5	0.561	56.0
3	Chipper Jones	266.7	214.9	0.554	45.5
4	Ron Santo	286.6	244.0	0.540	33.8
5	George Brett	220.6	187.4	0.541	31.5
6	Wade Boggs	272.9	240.9	0.531	31.0
7	Scott Rolen	261.3	224.6	0.538	30.9
8	Adrian Beltre	339.5	306.0	0.526	29.0
9	Alex Rodriguez	160.9	132.0	0.549	27.9
10	Ron Cey	249.4	215.7	0.536	25.7

Wade Boggs rates as one of the top ten third basemen of at least the past 100 years.

Great peak, great career; great player.

Article last updated: February 17, 2020

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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