Happy Birthday to the late and great Hall of Famer Jimmie Foxx. Throughout the game’s history, we’ve witnessed many incredible offensive players who played First Base. Jimmie Foxx is in the conversation as arguably the second greatest offensive First Basemen to ever play behind Lou Gehrig. In a career that lasted twenty seasons, notably with the Philadelphia Athletics, Boston Red Sox, as well as the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies, Foxx was nothing short of incredible at the plate and in the field, winning a couple of championships as well as having a ton of individual accolades. 

Career Statistics/Accolades (1925-42; 44-45):

.325 BA 2,646 HITS 534 HR 1,922 RBI 1,751 RUNS .428 OBP

  • 9x All-Star
  • 3x AL MVP (1932-33 & 38)
  • 2x Batting Title (1933 & 1938)
  • 2x World Series Champion (1929-30)
  • 1933 Triple Crown Winner

Foxx is also up there among the greatest right-handed hitters of all time. Foxx batted .300 or higher and drove in 100 or more RBIs 13 times. Foxx also scored 100 or more Runs eleven times. You can tell when a player is an IMMORTAL when you look at a player’s stats, and you see that it bleeds with “Black-Bold Face Type.” For Jimmie Foxx, it does; he led in HRs four times, RBIs & OBP three times, Walks and AVG twice, and RUNS once in 1932. While he did lead the league in Strikeouts seven times, he drew more Walks (1,452) than Strikeouts (1,311) throughout his career.

Defensively, the only position he didn’t play during his career was Second Base. He played Third Base a number of times during his career. However, he wasn’t a great fielding third baseman, having a lifetime .930 Fielding Percentage at Third Base. At First Base, that was his best position in defense and making a living. Foxx spent 16,775 Innings at the position and was a lifetime .992 Fielder. He was consistently maintaining a Fielding Percentage above the league average year-to-year.

Jimmie Foxx appeared in the World Series three times during his career, all with the Philadelphia Athletics in back-to-back-to-back years. In 18 World Series games, Foxx went (22 for 64) .344 BA along with 4 HR, 11 RBI, and an OBP of .425. Foxx and the Athletics won the World Series in 1929, beating the Cubs in 5 games, and in 1930, beating the Cardinals in 6 games, while losing to the Cardinals in 7 in 1931. 

At the time of his retirement in 1945, Foxx was 2nd to Babe Ruth in all-time home runs with 534. He also was 5th all-time in RBIs with 1,922. Jimmie Foxx is one of the three greatest in terms of all-time First Baseman and greatest Right Handed Hitters. Jimmie Foxx is in both the Athletics and Red Sox Hall of Fame and the Baseball Hall of Fame. Believe it or not, it took until his seventh year of eligibility for Foxx to receive enough votes to be enshrined into Cooperstown; I mean, what the fuck! Besides being a Major League Baseball All-Century Team nominee, he was ranked #15 on The Sporting News list of 100 Greatest Ballplayers in 1999.

References:

  1. Jimmie Foxx via Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmie_Foxx#
  2. Jimmie Foxx Career Statistics via Baseball-Reference: https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/f/foxxji01.shtml