Jake Daubert
Daubert won the 1913 National League MVP award by perfecting the art of consistent contact at a time when strikeouts were considered embarrassing. His .303 career average over 15 seasons came from pure bat control — he struck out just 194 times in over 7,600 at-bats, a rate that would be remarkable even by today's standards.
The left-handed first baseman represented baseball's dead-ball era philosophy: put the ball in play and let things happen. His 56 career home runs across 2,014 games tell the story of a different game entirely, one where singles and doubles drove offense. Daubert's MVP season came during his peak Brooklyn years, when his ability to consistently reach base made him invaluable.
What made Daubert special wasn't power but precision. In an era when most hitters swung wildly, he treated each at-bat like a chess match, working counts and finding gaps. His strike-to-contact ratio remains one of the most impressive in baseball history.
Career · Batting
15 seasons| Year | Team | G | AB | HR | RBI | AVG | OPS | OPS+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1910 | BRO | 144 | 552 | 8 | 50 | .264 | — | — |
| 1911 | BRO | 149 | 573 | 5 | 45 | .307 | — | — |
| 1912 | BRO | 145 | 559 | 3 | 66 | .308 | — | — |
| 1913 | BRO | 139 | 508 | 2 | 52 | .350 | — | — |
| 1914 | BRO | 126 | 474 | 6 | 45 | .329 | — | — |
| 1915 | BRO | 150 | 544 | 2 | 47 | .301 | — | — |
| 1916 | BRO | 127 | 478 | 3 | 33 | .316 | — | — |
| 1917 | BRO | 125 | 468 | 2 | 30 | .261 | — | — |
| 1918 | BRO | 108 | 396 | 2 | 47 | .308 | — | — |
| 1919 | CIN | 140 | 537 | 2 | 44 | .276 | — | — |
| 1920 | CIN | 142 | 553 | 4 | 48 | .304 | — | — |
| 1921 | CIN | 136 | 516 | 2 | 64 | .306 | — | — |
| 1922 | CIN | 156 | 610 | 12 | 66 | .336 | — | — |
| 1923 | CIN | 125 | 500 | 2 | 54 | .292 | — | — |
| 1924 | CIN | 102 | 405 | 1 | 31 | .281 | — | — |
| Career | 2014 | 7673 | 56 | 722 | .303 | — | — | |
Matchups, projections, comps — grounded in Lahman, Retrosheet, and Statcast.