Todd Helton of the Rockies currently leads the National League in batting average, runs batted in, and is 3 home runs behind McGwire.
Winning a Triple Crown is hard to do. It hasn’t been done since Yaztremski in the American League in '67.
I think Helton has a real shot. The homerun category will be tough, but if Bonds or McGwire do another stint or two on the DL, and if Sammy is uninspired due to the crappy team he’s on it could happen that Helton sneaks in there.
Yeah, yeah, I know. What about Junior? True, Griffey has the ability, but I think that although he will put up good numbers this season, it will still be next year and beyond before he is totally adjusted to the NL. Then look out.
I see Helton as very capable of winning a batting crown, but a triple crown winner needs help from his teammates in terms of runners on base to get the RBIs. Colorado, despite it’s home park, really doesn’t have that good an offense.
I’m also not sure Helton could win the home run crown.
I don’t think anyone’s all that likely to win it,
but if I had to name other candidates:
Griffey (don’t believe he’ll contend for the Avg part of it)
Chipper Jones
Bonds (will need help from teammates for RBIs)
Brian Giles (see Bonds. One of the best players not too many people know about)
Mike Piazza (needs RBI help. Bad home park)
Vladimir Guererro (see Bonds and Giles)
Jeff Bagwell
Here’s an unsolicited bit of advice. Never post at 4 in the morning local time and expect to make a coherent argument.
My point was, that, except for home runs, Helton needs baserunners to have opportunities for RBIs. While I believe the Rockies WILL give him plenty of opportunities, I see it quite possible that a few others (Chipper Jones) might have more “ducks on the pond” to potentially drive in.
I concede that Colorado’s offense is better than I thought, but I should point out that, in comparing the potential RBI opportunities of Todd Helton vis a vis the other candidates, a better measure would be to measure the respective teams’ on base percentage (as opposed to batting average) MINUS Todd Helton’s vs. whoever you are comparing him to (say, Ken Griffey). In comparing team runs scored, you’d want to subtract out the Rockies runs minus Helton’s runs plus Helton’s homers (Helton only gets an RBI when he scores a run when he drives himself in via homer) and compare that to the Reds runs minus Griffey’s Runs plus Griffey’s homers. I’m not explaining this well, but you get the idea.
I don’t want to sound overly critical in my original response. Helton probably has as good a shot as anyone, this year, but I don’t see it likely that anyone will win it, because it’s SO hard to win all three catagories. I also see homers as the most likely to trip Helton up.
If Vladimir Guerrero played for a better team, I’d probably deem him as likely, or possibly more likely to do it. But the Expos won’t give Vlad a lot of baserunners.