Who is Jim Thome?

Jim Thome is a major league veteran. He is a 36 year old first baseman for the Chicago White Sox. He is an outstanding slugger with six seasons of forty homeruns or more, including one with 52, and he is about to joint he 500 homerun club. He is a perennial MVP candidate, a five time all-star in an era loaded with slugging first basemen, and a future Hall of Famer.

But that is not all. Jim Thome is so much more.

As just one example, Jim Thome almost never hits into a double play. Thome has never come close to hitting into 20 double plays in a season, and has only reached double figures three times (oddly, one of those times was in 98 games in 1994).

To put this in perspective – Albert Pujols has 114 double plays hit into in six seasons; Thome has 110 in 16 seasons.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Jim Thome is his rare combination of bases on balls and strikeouts. Thome currently ranks sixth all time in strikeouts, and should finish the 2007 season in third place behind strikeout legends Reggie Jackson and Sammy Sosa. If he plays until he is forty, Thome should easily be the all time strikeout champ.

But Thome is also currently 28th on the career bases on balls list, and with a typical season should wind up in the top 20. Again, if Thome plays until he is forty, he would probably end up either sixth or seventh on the all time list for bases on balls. If Thome has 500 more bases on balls in him – roughly five good seasons worth – he will finish in the top five of all time.

To put that in perspective, while no player is in the top ten in both career bases on balls and career strikeouts, and only Mike Schmidt, Mickey Mantle, Rickey Henderson, and Harmon Killebrew are in the top 20 of both, Jim Thome quite possibly could finish his career in the top five of both categories.

With this in mind, the Baseball Evolution staff has decided to designate a new club – the Jim Thome club – comprised of players who have averaged both 100 bases on balls and 100 strikeouts per 162 games over the course of their careers. The members are generally guys you would expect, with a few surprises.

One of the members appears to be lobbying to have the club renamed after himself.

First	Last	Pos	G	BB	SO	BB/162	SO/162	Total	Total/162
Jim	Thome	1B	1881	1364	1909	117	164	3273	282
Mickey	Tettleton	C	1485	949	1307	104	143	2256	246
Mark	McGwire	1B	1874	1317	1596	114	138	2913	252
Bobby	Abreu	RF	1485	1003	1181	109	129	2184	238
Mike	Schmidt	3B	2404	1507	1883	102	127	3390	228
Jimmy	Wynn	CF	1920	1224	1427	103	120	2651	224
Jeff	Bagwell	1B	2150	1401	1558	106	117	2959	223
Jack	Clark	RF	1994	1262	1441	103	117	2703	220
Mickey	Mantle	CF	2401	1733	1710	117	115	3443	232
Harmon	Killebrew	1B	2435	1559	1699	104	113	3258	217
Jason	Giambi	1B	1622	1089	1131	109	113	2220	222
Lance	Berkman	LF	1059	690	720	106	110	1410	216
Dolph	Camilli	1B	1490	947	961	103	104	1908	207
Gene	Tenace	C	1555	984	998	103	104	1982	206
Adam	Dunn	LF	830	579	935	113	182	1514	296

          *numbers through 2006 season.