19 days ’til Opening Day: Tony Gwynn

There are 19 days left until that best day of the year, MLB’s Opening Day.

Tony Gwynn’s 19 has been retired by the San Diego Padres. And with good reason — he has to be one of the best contact hitters in the history of baseball.

Random Tony Gwynn factoids (I found by looking at his B-Ref page):

• From his first full season on, Gwynn’s lowest batting average in a season was .309. Lowest.
• He hit over .350 seven times and over .320 13 times.
• Despite not having much power (never hit more than 17 homers in a season) — he finished in the top 10 in OPS six times.
• In his final season at age 41, he put up a line of .324/.384/.461 (OPS+ of 127). Not much diminishing skills there.

So yeah, Tony Gwynn was pretty good. He also played his entire career in San Diego. No wonder Padre fans love him.