Apropos of the discussion of Rollins' approaching the single-season at-bat and plate appearance record, there's another record worth talking about: the single-season team plate appearance record.
The powerhouse 1999 Cleveland Indians hold the single-season record at 6555 plate appearances. The top 5:
- 1999 Indians - 6555
- 1996 Red Sox - 6545
- 1976 Reds - 6538
- 2003 Red Sox - 6530
- 1993 Phillies - 6527
Plate appearances are pretty boring to most people. But, as you can see from the offenses listed above, more plate appearances go along with more offense. It's quite simple actually - every team is going to have roughly 4400 outs in a given year (162 games, 27 outs per game, give or take a few for home wins, extra innings, and rain shortened games), so the more plate appearances a team has above those 4400 outs, the more opportunities it has to score.
We know the Phillies offense is explosive this year. Now we know that it's got the possibility of being one of the best ever, if not the best, in this most important of stats.