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Will there ever be another player to join the ranks of the ‘last four hitters’?

Luis Arajuez (26-Miami Marlins) is attempting to break an 82-year waiting list.

The 26-year-old went 4-for-4 with a home run and two RBIs in the Marlins’ 9-6 win over the Kansas City Royals on 6 June.

The win pushed his batting average to a whopping 30-for-93 (208-for-83). He is now the batting leader in both leagues.

He’s the only player on pace to hit .400 this season. The next best hitter, Bo Bissett (Toronto Blue Jays), is 3-for-3, almost seven points behind Araujo. Araújo’s “freak” high batting average is a reflection of his individual skill, not a league trend.

In 2019 with the Minnesota Twins, Arajuez was promoted to the big leagues after playing just 16 games in Triple-A. He went on to play a whopping 92 games, cementing himself as the Twins’ starting second baseman, then serving as the team’s go-to utility player while battling injuries.메이저놀이터

Last year, he won the American League (AL) batting title (31-for-66), beating out Shohei Ohtani (Los Angeles Angels) for the Silver Slugger.
Since joining Miami of the National League (NL) via trade at the end of the year, his potential has exploded. In April, he became the first hit-for-the-cycle in franchise history, and has been a league-leading hitter ever since. He’s still a young, developing hitter.

If Arajuez continues his hitting pace and wins the batting title for the second straight year, he will become the first player in modern baseball (since the 1900s) to lead the league in batting in consecutive seasons.

The last player in Major League Baseball history to hit .400 was Ted Williams in 1941. At the time, Williams batted .456 (185 for 456) with 37 home runs, 120 RBIs, and an OPS of 1.287. If sacrifice flies were counted separately, as they are now, his adjusted batting average would be 4.141.

Williams, who batted over .300 in his final season, had a reputation as an “arrogant genius.” The defence designed to stop him was the shift.

Miami had played 61 games before this one. Only seven players in the history of the major leagues have ever challenged Williams with an on-base percentage over 4 per cent through 61 games, not including Araez and Williams himself (1948). Chipper Jones (4 for 1, 8) in 2008 is the highest, followed by Larry Walker (1997, 4 for 1, 6), Paul O’Neill (1994), Rod Curry (1983, over 4 for 1), Stan Musial (1948, 4 for 8), Tony Gwynn (1997, 4 for 5), and Roberto Aloma (1996, 3 for 9).