**Box-Toppers points leaders among 2024 free agents include Blake Snell, Juan Soto, Corbin Burnes and Clayton Kershaw.**

Blake Snell, Juan Soto among free agents with most 2024 Box-Toppers points

Shawn Plank November 11, 2024

Blake Snell and Juan Soto are among this season’s free-agent players with the most 2024 Box-Toppers points.

Snell leads the entire class, earning 15.7 Box-Toppers points in 2024 with the Giants, most among all free-agent players, seventh among all players and fifth among National League pitchers.

Soto has the most 2024 Box-Toppers points among all free-agent batters, earning 11.0 with the Yankees, seventh among all free agents, 43rd among all players in 2024 and second among American League batters (behind only teammate Aaron Judge’s 13.0).

Will 2023 rules changes finally place a check on pitchers’ decade of dominance?

Shawn Plank March 9, 2023

Will baseball’s 2023 rules changes finally place a check on pitchers’ decade-plus dominance over batters?

Or will the changes prove as ineffectual as the 2021 crackdown on pitchers using sticky, foreign substances on baseballs?

Pitchers won fewer Box-Toppers Player of the Game honors after foreign substance crackdown, but still dominated in 2021

Shawn Plank January 19, 2022

Pitchers won fewer Box-Toppers Player of the Game honors after a Major League Baseball sticky-substance rule crackdown in June, but pitchers still dominated in 2021.

Even after the June 21 rules crackdown, pitchers still won the vast majority of Box-Toppers Player of the Game honors. But the rate of their dominance decreased from 65.5 percent prior to the crackdown and 56.5 percent after.

A Box-Toppers comparison of Braves title teams from 1995 and 2021

Shawn Plank November 5, 2021

The Braves who won the 2021 World Series seem very different from the last Braves team that won the World Series in 1995. Comparing how each team fared in Box-Toppers points and rankings in their respective seasons.

A look at Clayton Kershaw’s rise to 2nd place on Box-Toppers ‘all-time’ career points list

Shawn Plank June 28, 2021

Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw now has the second-most career Box-Toppers points since player tracking began in 1995.

Kershaw rose into second place on the “all-time” career points list Sunday with 246.6 points, passing Pedro Martinez (244.8), who held the second-place spot for more than 22 years.

Scherzer passes Verlander in career Box-Toppers points, in race with 5th lead change since 2017

Shawn Plank May 31, 2021

Nationals pitcher Max Scherzer recently passed Astros pitcher Justin Verlander on the career Box-Toppers points list.

It is the fifth time in less than four years that the career Box-Toppers points lead between the two has changed.

Lindor, Tatis have lowest career Box-Toppers point totals among top 10 big money contracts

Shawn Plank May 3, 2021

Francisco Lindor and Fernando Tatis Jr. had the lowest career Box-Toppers point totals among the 10 players with baseball’s biggest money contracts at the time of their signing.

The two players signed the biggest offseason contracts prior to the 2021 season. Lindor signed a 10-year, $341 million contract with the Mets, the third-largest contract in baseball history and Tatis signed a 14-year, $340 million contract with the Padres, baseball’s fourth-largest.

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Update: 2020 saw biggest decline in managers who have won World Series with their current team

Shawn Plank December 19, 2020

On Jan. 14, 2020, for the sixth time ever and the first time in more than 40 years, there was only one manager who had won a World Series on the team he currently managed (Dave Martinez of the Nationals).

Dave Roberts of the Dodgers became the second active incumbent World Series-winning manager on Oct. 27. Still, going from six such managers at the end of 2019 to just two in 2020 is the biggest-ever decline from the end of one season to the next.

What would 2019 have looked like if only the final 60 games of season were played?

Shawn Plank August 24, 2020

What would the 2019 baseball season have looked like if only the final 60 games were played?

In many ways, it would have looked exactly like the entire, overall 2019 season: From about July 25 on in 2019, the Houston Astros were Box-Toppers’ top-ranked team and Astros pitcher Gerrit Cole was Box-Toppers’ top-ranked player. Both also led for the overall 2019 season.

What would a 60-game schedule look like? Here's a Box-Toppers look at 2019 after 60 games on June 4

Shawn Plank July 3, 2020

Imagine a Major League Baseball season beginning normally in the spring and ending on June 4.

That’s what the proposed pandemic-shortened 60-game schedule for 2020 will seem like.

In 2019, most clubs had played at least 60 games by June 4. That was barely more than a third of the regular season’s 162 games (37 percent). But for 2020, if all goes according to plan and the coronavirus doesn’t intervene to cut it even shorter, 60 games will be the complete, entire season.

A look at how top draft picks fared in career Box-Toppers points and rankings

Shawn Plank June 16, 2020

Alex Rodriguez has the most career Box-Toppers points of all Major League Baseball number-one draft picks since 1990.

Rodriguez, who was the first pick in the 1993 draft, earned 187.0 Box-Toppers points during his career from 1994 to 2016, which is 10th overall since 1995 and second among all batters (behind Albert Pujols of the Angels with 201.8).

2020 sees biggest decline in managers who have won World Series with their current team

Shawn Plank February 3, 2020

As of Jan. 14, 2020, for the sixth time ever and the first time in more than 40 years, there is only one manager who has won a World Series on the team he is currently managing (Dave Martinez of the Nationals).

To close 2019, there were six managers who won a World Series with his current team. Going from six such managers to one is the biggest drop in one offseason since the World Series was first played in 1903.

A correction: Rays' Blake Snell leads by wider margin after fixing errors in 2018 Box-Toppers stats

Shawn Plank February 21, 2019

Striving to create a more perfect Box-Toppers, I discovered some errors in player tracking in 2018 and have been correcting them in recent weeks.

There were 10 total errors I discovered that changed the Box-Toppers point totals for 17 different players. Those errors were discovered after re-examining about one-third of the 2,430 games played in the 2018 season. So in other words, after looking at about 830 games, I found 10 errors.

One reason that league-leading batters have had low Box-Toppers point totals in recent seasons is that batters’ overall share of Box-Toppers points earned is declining. Prior to 2010, batters earned about half or more of all Box-Toppers points awarded. Since 2010, batters’ share of points has been below 50 percent each season—and as low as 39.14 percent. (More detailed data used for this graph can be found in the chart at the bottom of his page.)

Batters leading leagues in Box-Toppers points poised to have record-low point totals

Shawn Plank September 11, 2018

It seems increasingly likely that Box-Toppers’ league-leading batters will set dubious records in 2018.

Both the American League and National League leaders among batters in Box-Toppers points currently have point totals that would be the lowest to lead their league’s batters for a season since Box-Toppers tracking began in 1995.

Braves’ Freddie Freeman leads Home Run Derby participants in 2018 Box-Toppers points

Shawn Plank July 16, 2018

Freddie Freeman of the Braves may be seeded seventh among the eight players in Monday’s Home Run Derby, but he has the most 2018 Box-Toppers points in the group.

Freeman has 6.5 Box-Toppers points this season and ranks third among National League batters in Box-Toppers season player rankings. However, his 16 home runs this season is seventh-most among the eight derby participants and has him seeded seventh in the tournament-style derby.

Clayton Kershaw’s lackluster start could doom his record streak of 20 Box-Toppers points per season

Shawn Plank July 10, 2018

Clayton Kershaw is having a career-low season in Box-Toppers points and his record streak of seven straight seasons with 20.0 or more Box-Toppers points could come to an end.

Through the games of July 9, Dodgers pitcher Kershaw has just 4.0 Box-Toppers points in 2018, the fewest he’s had at this point in any full season he’s played. (His first full season was 2009).

Box-Toppers career points top 10 has most active players on list in 10 years, with Scherzer’s rise

Shawn Plank June 21, 2018

With Max Scherzer’s rise into Box-Toppers career points top 10 list this month, there are now six active players in the top 10, the most since 2008, when there were eight.

Scherzer, the Nationals pitcher, became the 10th-ranked player on Box-Toppers “all-time” list on June 5 with 172.1 career points, passing Roy Halladay (170.7). Box-Toppers tracking began in 1995.

Box-Toppers’ new Detail Leaders page shows detailed season-by-season point totals from 1995-2017

Shawn Plank April 24, 2018

An overview of Box-Toppers' new season-by-season Detail Leaders page.

This page includes a sprawling, scrolling chart that shows a listing of the top five or 10 players in different categories and subcategories for each season going back to 1995, the first year of Box-Toppers player tracking. It’s a useful tool for research or to relive who were the top players of past seasons.

In 2017, while batters made gains, pitchers still had more Box-Toppers Player of the Game honors

Shawn Plank March 5, 2018

While batters made modest gains in 2017, earning more Box-Toppers points and Player of the Game honors than in 2016, pitchers were still dominant, earning the most Box-Toppers points and far and away the most Player of the Day honors for the season.

Here's a look at some key statistics in a comprehensive look at all 2,430 Major League Baseball games played and tracked in 2017 by Box-Toppers.

Kershaw breaks record for most consecutive seasons with 20 or more Box-Toppers points

Shawn Plank December 4, 2017

In 2017, Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw broke the record for most consecutive seasons with 20 or more Box-Toppers points.

Kershaw earned 23.1 points in 2017, his seventh straight season with at least 20 points. Previously, pitcher Randy Johnson held the record, earning 20 points or more for six straight seasons, from 1997 to 2002. (Box-Toppers tracking began in 1995.)