Cardinals pitcher John Lackey is Thursday’s Box-Toppers Player of the Day.
Lackey pitched seven scoreless innings, striking out eight and allowing five hits, in the 6-3 win over the Brewers.
Top 10 players
Here are the top 10 players in Box-Toppers points (BTP) for the 2015 season as of Sept. 17.| Player | Pos | Team | BTP | |
| 1 | Arrieta, Jake 2738 | pi sp | chi nl | 23.1 |
| 2 | Kershaw, Clayton 2494 | pi sp | lad nl | 22.7 |
| 3 | deGrom, Jacob 3343 | pi sp | nym nl | 20.4 |
| 4 | Price, David 2593 | pi sp | tor al | 20.1 |
| 5 | Greinke, Zack 1871 | pi sp | lad nl | 19.7 |
| 6 | Hernandez, Felix 2064 | pi sp | sea al | 19.4 |
| 7 | Keuchel, Dallas 3050 | pi sp | hou al | 19.4 |
| 8 | Sale, Chris 2806 | pi sp | chi al | 17.1 |
| 9 | Bumgarner, Madison 2753 | pi sp | sf nl | 17.0 |
| 10 | Scherzer, Max 2588 | pi sp | dc nl | 17.0 |
Lackey rises to 55th place in Box-Toppers points among all players since 1995, when record keeping began. He earns 2.0 Box-Toppers points for being Player of the Day, giving him 106.8 for his career. With his points Thursday, he passes two players on the “all-time” list—Aramis Ramirez (105.8) and Frank Thomas (106.2). (Thomas began his career in 1990, five years before Box-Toppers record keeping began. If his entire career were tracked, based on rough projections, Thomas would likely have about 145 career Box-Toppers points.) Lackey now trails 54th-place player Lance Berkman (108.1).
Lackey has 8.7 Box-Toppers points for the season, 52nd among all players, 20th among NL pitchers.
American League Player of the Day—Omar Infante of the Royals homered, doubled and went 3-for-4, driving in seven runs, in the 8-4 win over the Indians.
National League Batter of the Day—Addison Russell of the Cubs doubled and went 2-for-4, scoring twice and driving in two runs, in the 9-6 win over the Pirates.
American League Batter of the Day—There is no separate AL Batter of the Day Thursday because the overall AL Player of the Day was batter Omar Infante.
Notable—Mike Trout of the Angels rose to second place among AL batters in Box-Toppers points after earning Player of the Game honors.
Trout (2HR 2-3 3R 5BI in the 11-8 win over the Twins) earns 1.0 Box-Toppers point, giving him 11.0 for the season, rising to 29th place among all players.
Trout had a Box-Toppers game score of +7.0 Thursday, the same as Omar Infante. But Infante won AL Player of the Day honors on a tiebreaker because he had more at bats than Trout—four vs. three. Had Trout earned AL Player of the Day honors instead of Infante and earned 1.7 Box-Toppers points, Trout would have had 11.7 points for the season, enough to pass AL batting leader Prince Fielder of the Rangers (11.5). But he didn’t.
Trout led AL batters in Box-Toppers points much of July and all of August, but was passed by other players in September. This was Trout’s first Box-Toppers point since July 26.
Debut—Orioles pitcher Chaz Roe made his Box-Toppers debut, the first time in his career he earned Player of the Game honors. Roe (1.1IP 0H 0R 2K W in the 4-3 win over the Rays) made his Major League debut July 1, 2013, and was playing in his 58th career game. He is the 3,597th player to debut in Box-Toppers since record keeping began in 1995.
Scoring—Lackey earns 2.0 Box-Toppers points for being Player of the Day and Infante earns 1.7 Box-Toppers points for being AL Player of the Day. Russell earns 1.5 Box-Toppers points for being NL Batter of the Day. All of Thursday’s other Players of the Game (listed in the chart below) earn 1.0 Box-Toppers point.
About Box-Toppers—Box-Toppers tracks who most helps their team win the most games. Using standard box score statistics, Box-Toppers uses a simple formula to determine a Player of the Game for each Major League Baseball game played. That player is the person who contributed most to his team’s win. In regular season games, players earn 1.0 Box-Toppers point for being named Player of the Game and can earn bonus points for being Player of the Day or top player or batter in their league for the day.
Top player from each game
Listed from highest to lowest Box-Toppers game score
| 9/17 | Score | Team | Player | AB | R | H | BI | BB | K | IP | H | R | ER | BB | K | |
| MLB | 8.0 | Cardinals | John Lackey (W,12-9) | - | - | - | - | - | - | 7.0 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 8 | |
| AL | 7.0 | Royals | Omar Infante, 2B | 4 | 1 | 3 | 7 | 0 | 0 | - | - | - | - | - | - | |
| 7.0 | Angels | Mike Trout, CF | 3 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 1 | - | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| 7.0 | Blue Jays | Marco Estrada (W,13-8) | - | - | - | - | - | - | 8.0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 4 | ||
| 3.1 | Orioles | Chaz Roe (MR) (W,4-2) | - | - | - | - | - | - | 1.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| 3.1 | Marlins | A.J. Ramos (S,28) | - | - | - | - | - | - | 1.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| 3.0 | Rangers | Shin-Soo Choo, RF | 5 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 1 | - | - | - | - | - | - | ||
| 3.0 | Athletics | Sean Doolittle (W,1-0) | - | - | - | - | - | - | 2.0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| BAT | 2.0 | Cubs | Addison Russell, SS | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | - | - | - | - | - | - |