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The Dodgers of the last three years have their top three home run seasons in franchise history, a combination of incredible talent in the current era of baseball. But it’s not just home runs where this team has excelled. Since 2017 the Dodgers have had three of their six best years hitting doubles, too.
Corey Seager is the usual go-to for Dodgers doubles talk. He’s only 26 and is already is one of only six Dodgers with multiple seasons of 40 or more doubles. Seager co-led the National League with 44 doubles last season, and he seemingly had a double in every Dodgers intrasquad game.
Most Dodgers doubles per game
| Year | Doubles | Games | 2B/G |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Doubles | Games | 2B/G |
| 1930 | 303 | 154 | 1.97 |
| 2017 | 312 | 162 | 1.93 |
| 1932 | 296 | 154 | 1.92 |
| 2006 | 307 | 162 | 1.90 |
| 2019 | 302 | 162 | 1.86 |
| 2014 | 302 | 162 | 1.86 |
| 1934 | 284 | 153 | 1.86 |
| 1929 | 282 | 153 | 1.84 |
| 1941 | 286 | 157 | 1.82 |
| 2018 | 296 | 163 | 1.82 |
| 1953 | 274 | 155 | 1.77 |
| 2002 | 286 | 162 | 1.77 |
Seager kept that up with doubles on both Thursday and Friday.
Justin Turner did him one better, hitting a double on Thursday, one more on Friday, then hit two doubles on Saturday. Turner is one of only eight Dodgers with a double in each of the team’s first three games. No Dodger has doubled in the first four games of the season.
Mookie Betts hasn’t double yet this season, but he’s topped 40 doubles in each of the last five years — nobody else in the majors has more than three such seasons — averaging 43 per year. Fenway Park helped him, no doubt, but Betts also averaged 21 doubles on the road the last three seasons.
We’re only through three games so far this season, but the Dodgers already have nine doubles. Keeping up that pace over a season of any length seems impossible, given that the club record for doubles per game is 1.97, by Brooklyn in 1930. In 2017, when the Dodgers hit a franchise-record 312 doubles, they averaged 1.93 doubles per game.
The major league record for doubles in a season is 376 by the 2008 Rangers, who averaged 2.32 per game. The record for most doubles per game is 2.42 by the 1930 Cardinals.
To top that record in 60 games would require hitting at least 146 doubles. The Dodgers record for most doubles in a 60-game stretch is 135 (2.25 per game), by the 1930 Brooklyn club from their third through 62nd game that year.
I’m not sure if that’s doable for these Dodgers, but maybe hitting two doubles per game is. We have 57 more games to find out.
Game info
- Teams: Dodgers vs. Giants
- Time: 7:08 p.m. PT
- TV: ESPN
- Streaming; Watch ESPN