1898 MLB Season Leaders

2 leagues · 152 team games · 31 ranking tables

Awards

None of these awards existed yet. The earliest award in this database is from 1911, so a 1898 season has no award to show. That is a fact about the calendar, not about the players on this page.

National League

Led the National League — the first row of every table below.

Batting13 categories

RunsR

1	John McGraw	143
2	Hughie Jennings	135
3	George Van Haltren	129
4	Willie Keeler	126
5	Duff Cooley	123
6	Jimmy Ryan	122
7	Fred Clarke	116
8	Ed Delahanty	115
9	Jesse Burkett	114
10	Nap Lajoie	113

HitsH

1	Willie Keeler	216
2	Jesse Burkett	213
3	George Van Haltren	204
4	Nap Lajoie	197
5	Jimmy Collins	196
5	Duff Cooley	196
7	Lave Cross	191
8	Bill Everitt	190
9	Gene DeMontreville	186
10	Jimmy Ryan	185

Doubles2B

1	Nap Lajoie	43
2	Ed Delahanty	36
3	Jimmy Collins	35
3	Bill Dahlen	35
5	John Anderson	33
6	Jimmy Ryan	32
7	Honus Wagner	29
8	Tommy Corcoran	28
8	Lave Cross	28
8	Kip Selbach	28
8	George Van Haltren	28

Triples3B

1	John Anderson	22
2	Billy Hoy	16
2	George Van Haltren	16
4	Tommy Corcoran	15
4	Harry Davis	15
4	Joe Kelley	15
7	Elmer Flick	13
7	Jimmy Ryan	13
7	Jake Stenzel	13
7	Bobby Wallace	13

Home RunsHR

1	Jimmy Collins	15
2	Bill Joyce	10
2	Honus Wagner	10
4	John Anderson	9
4	Ed McKean	9
6	Hugh Duffy	8
6	Elmer Flick	8
8	Billy Hoy	6
8	Nap Lajoie	6
8	Herman Long	6

Runs Batted InRBI

1	Nap Lajoie	127
2	Jimmy Collins	111
3	Joe Kelley	110
4	Hugh Duffy	108
5	Dan McGann	106
6	Honus Wagner	105
7	Herman Long	99
7	Bobby Wallace	99
9	Bobby Lowe	94
9	Ed McKean	94

WalksBB

1	John McGraw	112
2	Bill Joyce	88
3	Billy Hamilton	87
4	Elmer Flick	86
5	Hughie Jennings	78
6	Ed Delahanty	77
7	Jimmy Ryan	73
8	Harry Blake	69
8	Jesse Burkett	69
8	Cupid Childs	69
8	Elmer Smith	69

Stolen BasesSB

1	Ed Delahanty	58
2	Billy Hamilton	54
3	Gene DeMontreville	49
4	Charlie Dexter	44
5	John McGraw	43
6	Patsy Donovan	41
7	Fred Clarke	40
8	Billy Hoy	37
9	Fielder Jones	36
9	George Van Haltren	36

Wins Above ReplacementWAR

1	Hughie Jennings	7.9
2	Ed Delahanty	7.5
3	John McGraw	6.8
4	Bill Dahlen	6.6
5	Jimmy Collins	6.5
6	Billy Hamilton	6.0
7	Nap Lajoie	5.9
8	Billy Hoy	5.5
9	Kip Selbach	5.4
10	Elmer Smith	5.4

Batting Averagemin 471 PA

1	Willie Keeler	.385
2	Billy Hamilton	.369
3	John McGraw	.342
3	Elmer Smith	.342
5	Jesse Burkett	.341
6	Ed Delahanty	.334
7	Jimmy Collins	.328
7	Gene DeMontreville	.328
7	Hughie Jennings	.328
7	Fred Tenney	.328

On-Base Percentagemin 471 PA

1	Billy Hamilton	.480
2	John McGraw	.475
3	Hughie Jennings	.454
4	Elmer Flick	.430
5	Ed Delahanty	.426
6	Elmer Smith	.425
7	Willie Keeler	.420
8	Jesse Burkett	.415
9	Jimmy Ryan	.405
10	Dan McGann	.404

Slugging Percentagemin 471 PA

1	John Anderson	.494
2	Jimmy Collins	.479
3	Nap Lajoie	.461
4	Ed Delahanty	.454
5	Billy Hamilton	.453
6	Elmer Flick	.448
7	Jimmy Ryan	.446
8	Bill Lange	.439
9	Joe Kelley	.438
10	Elmer Smith	.432

On-Base Plus Sluggingmin 471 PA

1	Billy Hamilton	.933
2	Ed Delahanty	.880
3	Elmer Flick	.878
4	Hughie Jennings	.876
5	John McGraw	.871
6	Elmer Smith	.858
7	Jimmy Collins	.856
8	Jimmy Ryan	.850
9	John Anderson	.842
10	Joe Kelley	.835

Pitching10 categories

WinsW

1	Kid Nichols	31
2	Bert Cunningham	28
3	Pink Hawley	27
3	James McJames	27
5	Ted Lewis	26
6	Cy Seymour	25
6	Jesse Tannehill	25
6	Vic Willis	25
6	Cy Young	25
10	Clark Griffith	24
10	Wiley Piatt	24

SavesSV

1	Kid Nichols	4
2	Bill Dammann	2
2	Charlie Hickman	2
2	Ted Lewis	2
2	Jesse Tannehill	2
6	Bill Hart	1
6	Amos Rusie	1
6	Willie Sudhoff	1
6	Cy Swaim	1
6	Jack Taylor	1

StrikeoutsSO

1	Cy Seymour	239
2	James McJames	178
3	Vic Willis	160
4	Kid Nichols	138
5	Wiley Piatt	121
6	Amos Rusie	114
7	Cy Young	101
8	Clark Griffith	97
9	Ed Doheny	96
10	Jack Powell	93
10	Jesse Tannehill	93

Innings PitchedIP

1	Jack Taylor	397.3
2	Kid Nichols	388.0
3	Cy Young	377.7
4	James McJames	374.0
5	Bert Cunningham	362.0
6	Gus Weyhing	361.0
7	Cy Seymour	356.7
8	Jack Powell	342.0
9	Brickyard Kennedy	339.3
10	Pink Hawley	331.0

Complete GamesCG

1	Jack Taylor	42
2	Bert Cunningham	41
3	James McJames	40
3	Kid Nichols	40
3	Cy Young	40
6	Cy Seymour	39
6	Gus Weyhing	39
8	Brickyard Kennedy	38
9	Clark Griffith	36
9	Jack Powell	36

ShutoutsSHO

1	Wiley Piatt	6
1	Jack Powell	6
3	Jay Hughes	5
3	Kid Nichols	5
3	Jesse Tannehill	5
6	Clark Griffith	4
6	Amos Rusie	4
6	Cy Seymour	4
9	Theodore Breitenstein	3
9	Pink Hawley	3
9	Bill Magee	3
9	Walt Woods	3

Wins Above ReplacementWAR

1	Cy Young	9.4
2	Kid Nichols	9.1
3	James McJames	9.0
4	Clark Griffith	7.9
5	Jesse Tannehill	7.9
6	Jack Taylor	7.5
7	Gus Weyhing	7.1
8	Bert Cunningham	6.5
9	Frank Killen	6.5
10	Wiley Piatt	6.5

Earned Run Averagemin 152 IP

1	Clark Griffith	1.88
2	Al Maul	2.10
3	Kid Nichols	2.13
4	James McJames	2.36
5	Jimmy Callahan	2.46
6	Cy Young	2.53
7	Vic Willis	2.84
8	Ted Lewis	2.90
9	Jesse Tannehill	2.95
10	Jack Powell	3.00

Walks and Hits per Inningmin 152 IP

1	Kid Nichols	1.03
2	Al Maul	1.07
3	Clark Griffith	1.13
3	Cy Young	1.13
5	James McJames	1.18
6	Ted Lewis	1.20
7	Jay Hughes	1.22
8	Jim Gardner	1.23
9	Jesse Tannehill	1.23
10	Jimmy Callahan	1.23

Fielding Independent Pitchingmin 152 IP

1	Cy Young	2.83
2	Jesse Tannehill	2.96
3	Clark Griffith	2.98
4	James McJames	2.98
5	Kid Nichols	3.05
6	Al Orth	3.18
7	Wiley Piatt	3.19
8	Jim Hughey	3.20
9	Jimmy Callahan	3.21
10	Billy Rhines	3.25

Independent Black clubs in 1898

8 more ranking tables from 1898. These clubs played a much shorter league schedule than the American and National Leagues did, so the counting statistics are not on the same scale as the ones above.

The Negro Leagues had none of these awards. There was no Most Valuable Player vote, no Cy Young Award, no Gold Glove and no Silver Slugger in Black baseball, so no player in those sections below could appear in the award list above however he played. A blank there says something about how the leagues were organised and nothing at all about the players.

Independent Black clubs

Led the Independent Black clubs — the first row of every table below.

There is no batting average table in this section, and that is not a gap in the record. Rate statistics need a qualifying line, and the one this site uses for 1898 is 471 plate appearances — three point one per team game across a 152-game schedule. The Independent Black clubs played a far shorter league season than that, so no player in it reaches the line and no rate table can be built without comparing a handful of games to a full year. The counting tables above are unaffected: those are simply what the players did.

Batting8 categories

RunsR

1	Sol White	4
1	Clarence Williams	4
3	Harry Buckner	3
3	Ross Garrison	3
3	Frank Grant	3
3	Andy Jackson	3
3	Bob Jordan	3
3	John Nelson	3
3	James Robinson	3
3	Dave Wyatt	3

HitsH

1	Sol White	8
2	Frank Grant	7
2	Andy Jackson	7
2	James Robinson	7
2	Dave Wyatt	7
6	Harry Hyde	6
6	Robert Jackson	6
8	Billy Holland	5
8	Bob Jordan	5
8	Harry Moore	5

Doubles2B

1	Bob Jordan	2
2	Harry Buckner	1
2	Ross Garrison	1
2	Frank Grant	1
2	Billy Holland	1
2	George Hopkins	1
2	Doc Howard	1
2	Andy Jackson	1
2	Harry Moore	1
2	James Robinson	1
2	Dave Wyatt	1

Triples3B

1	Andy Jackson	1

Home RunsHR

1	Harry Hyde	1
1	Andy Jackson	1
1	Johnson	1
1	Harry Moore	1
1	Dave Wyatt	1

Runs Batted InRBI

1	Andy Jackson	5
1	Sol White	5
3	Dave Wyatt	4
4	Frank Grant	3
4	Bob Jordan	3
4	Harry Moore	3
4	John Nelson	3
4	James Robinson	3
9	Ross Garrison	2
9	Harry Hyde	2
9	Johnson	2

WalksBB

1	Ross Garrison	4
2	Bert Jones	3
2	Bob Jordan	3
4	Harry Buckner	2
4	John Nelson	2
6	Robert Footes	1
6	Frank Grant	1
6	Robert Jackson	1
6	Willis Jones	1
6	Harry Moore	1
6	Clarence Williams	1

Wins Above ReplacementWAR

1	Frank Grant	0.3
2	Robert Jackson	0.3
3	Dave Wyatt	0.2
4	Johnson	0.2
5	Andy Jackson	0.1
6	Harry Hyde	0.1
7	James Robinson	0.1
8	Bob Jordan	0.0
9	Harry Moore	0.0

How this page is built

The qualifying line for 1898 is 471 plate appearances and 152 innings pitched. It comes from the length of the schedule — 152 games per team, measured from the season files themselves — at the official rate of 3.1 plate appearances and one inning per team game. Batting average, on-base, slugging, OPS, earned run average and WHIP all use it; a player who came to the plate twice and got two hits does not appear at the top of the batting average table, which is exactly what that line is for. Counting statistics such as home runs and strikeouts have no minimum, because none is needed.

How the rankings were made

Wins above replacement in these tables is ours rather than the source database's, so it will not match a published figure exactly. Also: why every ranking stops at one league, and why some categories are missing on purpose.

Every ranking on this page is worked out inside one league. 1898 is counted as 2 separate leagues — National League and Independent Black clubs, and a player is ranked only against the men in his own. Leading the American League and leading baseball are different claims, and the one we can make from these files is the first. There is no combined table anywhere on this page, because adding two leagues together would produce a number that no record book recognises.

There are 31 ranking tables here, 12 places deep. Players tied on a value share a place, so a table can run past ten rows when the tenth spot is shared, and a league with fewer than ten qualified players in a category is left out rather than shown as a top ten that is not one. A player who did none of the thing is not ranked in it either — a shutout table lists the pitchers who threw one, not the hundreds who threw none tied on zero. Some categories are missing on purpose: nobody leads a league in strikeouts at the plate, in losses, or in home runs allowed. A ranking is meant to mark an achievement, so only achievements are ranked.

Wins above replacement on this page is ours, not the source database's. The hitting and pitching files carry a WAR column that we compute here from the same season lines you see, using park factors and a run environment worked out per season. Published versions elsewhere use different methods and will not match ours exactly. Every other column is the record as the database supplies it.

Names on this page lead to that player's own record. Most of them open a full career page with every season he appeared in. Some open a summary screen instead — we pre-build pages for the players people look for, and everyone else is assembled on demand from the same files, so the numbers are identical either way even though the address looks different.

Data for 1871 to 2025: Lahman Baseball Database 2025, compiled by SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) and licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported. Negro Leagues data licensed from Seamheads.com and included under SABR major-league recommendations (2021-02-11, 2024-06-03). This page ranks the 1898 season lines published on this site, league by league, with WAR worked out here. — the WAR columns are computed here — and they are published under the same CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported licence, as ShareAlike requires. That database is published once a season is complete, so the 2026 figures on this site come from a different place: the MLB Stats API, whose notice reads “Copyright 2026 MLB Advanced Media, L.P. Use of any content on this page acknowledges agreement to the terms posted here http://gdx.mlb.com/components/copyright.txt”. Those numbers are MLB Advanced Media, L.P.’s, not SABR (Society for American Baseball Research)’s, and they carry that notice rather than the CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported licence above. Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Major League Baseball or any of its clubs.