clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Ryan Raburn's career numbers against the White Sox look like a series of typos

I don't know what the White Sox did to Ryan Raburn, but his vengeance has been a sight to behold.

Jerry Lai-USA TODAY Sports

Ryan Raburn hit two home runs off Cy Young contender Chris Sale on Monday. On one level, it was hugely surprising, because no player had ever hit two home runs off Sale in the same game. On another level, this it was not surprising at all, because Ryan Raburn has killed the White Sox during his career.

  • Raburn's overall career batting line is .256/.316/.439. Against the White Sox his line is .292/.344/.504. He's really turned it on at U.S. Cellular Field, where his line is .323/.380/.562.
  • Raburn has hit 13 home runs at the ball yard formerly known as Comiskey, out of only 81 career home runs. That means 16% of his career home runs have come in a ballpark where he's never played as anything but a visitor.
  • In every MLB stadium aside from U.S. Cellular, Raburn has homered once every 31.9 at bats. At U.S. Cellular, he's homered once every 16.7 at bats, meaning almost twice as frequently.

Even more staggering than the rate stat and home runs splits for Raburn, are his RBI numbers when facing the White Sox:

  • Raburn has 82 career RBI against the White Sox. His next-highest total against any opponent is 25 (vs. the Royals), which means he's driven in 328% as many runs vs. the White Sox as he has against any other team.
  • Raburn has 320 career RBI, which means 26% of his career RBI have come against one team. Since 1961 (when expansion began), there are 54 players who've driven in at least 80 runs against the White Sox. The other 53 of them all had at least twice as many career RBI as Raburn. No one else's vs. the White Sox RBI total represented even 15% of their career RBI total, meaning Raburn's 26% dwarfs anyone's else's.

It would be too time-consuming to run the same study for every single team, but I highly doubt any other player with as many games played since expansion began has had more than a quarter of their RBI come against one team. It's a mind-boggling distribution of run production, and you'll forgive Chicago fans if they hope Raburn finds his way into the National League.