Written by: Raphie Cantor

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This is the debut piece of a new FFC series — Good Times, Dad Times.

The Padres are a championship-less franchise, but there has been no shortage of incredible statistical seasons played in San Diego. Tony Gwynn’s 1994 season in which he chased .400, Ken Caminiti’s 1996 NL MVP campaign, and Trevor Hoffman’s 53-save season in 1998 all come to mind. This series is not about those seasons.

The series does not examine the seasons that are etched in the halls of Cooperstown, but rather the ones that are scribbled on the beams of the OB Pier; the strange, weird, and forgotten single seasons in Padres history from a statistical standpoint. The Good Times, and the Dad Times.

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If you’re under the age of 50, you’d be forgiven if you’re not familiar with the work of former Padres catcher/first baseman Gene Tenace. He played four seasons in San Diego which saw the team go a cumulative 294-353. In fact, if you search “Gene Tenace” on YouTube, you’ll almost exclusively get videos from Tenace’s time as an Oakland Athletic, where he won World Series MVP in 1972. Tenace’s most lasting impact as a Padre may be his invocation by Anchorman character Champ Kind with his catchphrase “Gene Tenace at the plate…Uhhhh Whammy!”

But as a Padres fan, Tenace should demand your respect. To this day, Tenace is the Padres all-time leader in on-base percentage (OBP). This is the same team that Tony Gwynn played for his entire career. Tenace carried a .403 OBP during his time in San Diego, a full 15 points better than both Gwynn and Fred McGriff.

Why-oh-why, then, has Tenace existed in relative Padres obscurity (Pad-scurity)? The man could not hit for average. His .237 average in San Diego looks like it belongs more next to Austin Hedges’s name than the statistical leader of a major offensive category. We now live in the post-Moneyball world, where stats like on-base plus slugging (OPS) that paint a more holistic picture of a player’s offensive production are valued by the baseball community. But, Tenace played at a time when batting average was universally seen as the most important offensive statistic. At least for me, it only makes the Gene Tenace story more fascinating.

No season was more exemplary of Tenace’s style of play than his first in brown and gold in 1977. Tenace hit .233 that year. In 581 plate appearances, he only smacked 15 home runs. But somehow, Tenace managed a whopping .415 OBP. His OBP that season was higher than his slugging percentage of .410. How did he accomplish this? Plate discipline.

Tenace led the major leagues in walks in 1977 with 125. But as noted above, Tenace didn’t even eclipse 600 plate appearances that year, which is typically seen as the benchmark for a full season’s workload at the plate. Tenace was historically disciplined and efficient at the plate that year. His 1977 season was the 11th-best single season all-time in major-league history for walk percentage at 21.5 percent. Mind you, five of the 10 better seasons ahead of Tenace belong to Barry freakin’ Bonds, a man who could have stood in the batter’s box without a bat and carried historic offensive numbers.

Tenace was also plunked by 13 pitches that season, tied for most in the majors in 1977. Now, this could certainly be attributed to Tenace’s closed stance that crowded the plate. But his 13 HBPs were also one of the lowest single-season totals to lead the bigs in the 43 seasons since Tenace set that mark. Only Phil Bradley’s 1990 11-HBP season was a lower league-leading total.

Gene Tenace somehow managed to lead the majors in the two categories that require no athletic skill whatsoever. To be sure, walking 21.5 percent of the time is an incredible baseball accomplishment. But there’s an argument to be made that Gene Tenace’s eyes were more valuable than Gene Tenace’s arms and legs in 1977, and that makes me happy.

It’s my firm belief that this season should never leave the collective memory of Padres fans. As Champ Kind would say…Uhhhhh Whammy!

Credit to Topps for the Featured Image