Baseball Triple Crown Part I

So, lately, I've been thinking about the Triple Crown in baseball. It's a pretty remarkable thing. It requires a very balanced offensive game. Not to be overly-obvious here, but you need average (to win the batting title), power (for the home run crown), and of course, lots of luck (to lead in RBI). So, in the AL-era (since 1901), there have been 218 seasons (109 in each league) and only 13 Triple Crown winners, which is less than 6% of seasons. Now, this is all probably extremely, extremely obvious to all of you. But I got to thinking-- which Triple Crown is most impressive? I decided to weight the statistical categories evenly, and check the margin by which each player won his Crown. Obviously, there is some margin for error here. Batting titles are usually won by a thin margin, so it naturally favors power hitters moreso than contact hitters. Additionally, as mentioned above, there is a lot of luck involved in the RBI title-- it's hugely a function of luck as compared to skill. So again, home runs are potentially overrated. But, I'm more lazy than I am concerned with accuracy, so I decided to just run with it. Here's what I've found:

Player:	Hornsby	1922	NL		Player:	Hornsby	1925	NL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.401	42	152			0.403	39	143
0.354	26	132			0.367	24	130
1.133	1.615	1.152	3.900		1.098	1.625	1.100	3.823
Player:	Mantle	1956	AL		Player:	Foxx	1933	AL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.353	52	130			0.356	48	163
0.345	32	128			0.336	34	139
1.023	1.625	1.016	3.664		1.060	1.412	1.173	3.644
Player:	Williams	1942	AL		Player:	Lajoie	1901	AL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.356	36	137			0.426	14	125
0.331	27	114			0.340	12	114
1.076	1.333	1.202	3.611		1.253	1.167	1.096	3.516
Player:	Cobb	1909	AL		Player:	Robinson	1966	AL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.377	9	107			0.316	49	122
0.347	7	97			0.307	39	110
1.086	1.286	1.103	3.475		1.029	1.256	1.109	3.395
Player:	Medwick	1937	NL		Player:	Williams	1947	AL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.371	31	154			0.343	32	114
0.364	31	115			0.328	29	98
1.019	1.000	1.339	3.358		1.046	1.103	1.163	3.312
Player:	Gehrig	1934	AL		Player:	Klein	1933	NL
BA	HR	RBI			BA	HR	RBI
0.363	49	165			0.368	28	120
0.356	44	142			0.349	27	106
1.020	1.114	1.162	3.295		1.054	1.037	1.132	3.224
Player:	Yaz	1967	AL
BA	HR	RBI
0.326	44	121
0.311	44	113
1.048	1.000	1.071	3.119

In case you didn't notice, the columns indicate which statistic. The second row is the player at hand's statistic by the given measure. The third row is second place in each statistical category. The third is the percentage over second place the Triple Crown winner finished. Next to the three percentages is the sum of the them. In other words, the higher that last number, the greater the margin by which the player won the Triple Crown. They are already in order from highest to lowest (reads left to right). What this tells us, is that Rogers Hornsby was a beast. An absolute beast. Sure he won the Triple Crown in 1922. But were you aware that he established a post-1901 NL record in all three categories? I didn't know that until I researched this stuff, but that's just plain ridiculous. I know some sabrmetricians really fault Hornsby, especially because he was a bad defensive player, but he lapped the field in each category in 1922 and 1925. As I'm just passing along short thoughts, the biggest surprise to me was how generally unimpressive Ted Williams' Triple Crowns are. Anyway, hope this is at least a little enlightening.