Bringing Baseball History to Center Field
 

1927 New York Yankees

Record: 110-44 in American League
Manager: Miller Huggins

It's only fitting that a team that produced a quarter of baseball's World Champions in a century would hold the honor for what is considered to be one of the greatest single teams of all time.

The Babe

Babe Ruth set a mark for home runs with 60 that wouldn't be broken until Roger Maris hit 61 in 1961.  Ruth added a .356 average and 164 runs batted in.

That would have been enough to bring him a triple crown, if it hadn't have been for teammate Lou Gehrig. Gehrig hit .373 with 175 RBI.

The 1927 Yankees would win 110 games and lose 44. It would be an American League record that would stand for 27 seasons and it earned the team the nickname "Murderer's Row." The question to ask, however, is how good was this team?

The Yankees opened the 1927 season with an 8-5 win over the Philadelphia Athletics. That win put the Yankees into first place and they never fell out of first for the rest of the season. Philadelphia finished second to the Yankees that season, 19 games out of first place.

Some facts about the 1927 New York Yankees: 
 

  • BATTING NUMBERS: The team had a batting average of .307. Its slugging percentage of .498 is an all-time record. The team hit 158 home runs that season. That total was 102 home runs more than the second place American League team.
     

  • ALL BUT TWO: The team lead the American League in every offensive category in 1927 with the exception of stolen bases and doubles. 
     

  • FOUR BY 100: Four players on the 1927 Yankees, including Ruth and Gehrig, drove in at least 100 runs. Tony Lazzeri added 102 RBI and Bob Meusal added 103. 
     

  • SIX 10-GAME WINNERS: In pitching, the team had six players with at least 10 wins. Waite Hoyt led the staff with a 22-7 record. The surprise, however, was Wiley Moore. Moore was a 30-year-old minor leaguer who finally got a shot in the major leagues. He finished the season with a 19-7 record and a league leading 2.28 earned run average. He added 13 saves to his season totals. 
     

  • SERIES SWEEP: The team swept the World Series in 4 games. The rumored reason was that the Pittsburgh Pirates were intimidated after watching the Yankees taking batting practice prior to the Series' Game 1.