Today I figured I needed to actually understand total bases ’cause I kept hearing analysts throw that stat around like it’s obvious. Honestly? I was kinda just nodding along pretending I knew what it meant. Started simple: looked at the box score from last night’s Yankees game after my coffee. Thought, “Okay, hits must be all that counts, right?” Nah. Quickly realized it’s messier than my garage. Total bases ain’t just hits. Total bases? More like total confusion.
Grabbed a pen and scribbled down Aaron Judge’s hits from the game:
- Single
- Double
- Home Run
- Walk (doesn’t count!)
Then I stared at the numbers like they’d magically explain themselves. They didn’t. Tried adding everything up manually: singles, doubles, triples, homers. Forgot triples even existed ’cause nobody hits those anymore. Did 1 base for a single, 2 for double, etc. Simple math, but my brain fried after two batters. Even messed up counting Judge’s homer as 4 bases instead of… wait, it IS 4. Okay, maybe I just suck at arithmetic.
Scratched my head, spilled coffee on the score sheet – classic. Realized I needed actual data. Pulled up MLB stats page on my phone (no link, obviously). Looked at Shohei Ohtani’s line ’cause dude’s a machine:
- 3 Singles (that’s 3 × 1 = 3)
- 2 Doubles (2 × 2 = 4)
- 1 Triple (1 × 3 = 3)
- 1 HR (1 × 4 = 4)
Added it all: 3+4+3+4=14 total bases. Felt proud for five seconds until I wondered why walks or steals don’t show up here. “But he stole a base too!” I yelled at my cat. Nope. Doesn’t count. At. All. Total bases only care about how many bases you reached from HITS. Walks? HBP? Errors? Nah. Doesn’t move the needle. Mind blown.
Then it clicked. This stat’s just raw power & hitting efficiency. It tells you who’s smashing the ball hard and far. Judge hits a moon shot homer – 4 bases in one swing. A guy slapping singles all day? Not so much. Makes total sense why sluggers dominate this category.
So yeah, spent 2 hours learning what could fit in a tweet: total bases = all bases gained from hits. Count singles as 1, doubles as 2, triples as 3, homers as 4. Ignore everything else. Still feel silly for overcomplicating it. Gonna explain this to my nephew later. If he laughs, I’m sending him my coffee-stained notes.