One statistic that indicates Dick Allen was the greatest pure hitter in Phillies history

Virtually the entire baseball world agrees on something.

Dick Allen should be in the Hall of Fame.

That he wasn’t inducted when he was first eligible is a travesty, but not surprising. Allen was a misunderstood and controversial figure and, given the fact many of the sportswriters he sparred with were also the ones doing the voting and the lack of understanding of metrics outside of total hits and homers by most of those writers, Allen’s time on the ballot quickly came and went.

Since then, the case for his enshrinement has grown and, if the Golden Era Committee had seen fit to vote via Zoom rather than postpone their vote because they couldn’t meet face to face, Allen might have been alive to see himself get that final vote he didn’t receive six years ago, when the committee first reconsidered him.

Regardless, Allen’s No. 15 was retired by the Phillies earlier this year and fans have finally started to recognize him for what he was... one of the greatest players in franchise history.

On Episode 439 of Hittin’ Season, I spoke with Mitch Nathanson, author of “God Almighty Hisself: The Life and Legacy of Dick Allen,” about the life and times of Allen. The full interview can be heard below:

And as part of our Dick Allen tribute, The Dirty Inning also featured Allen on their podcast, talking about one of the greatest home runs the massive slugger ever slugged.

So where does Allen rank among the all-time among Phillies hitters? Speaking from a pure offensive standpoint, taking into consideration the era he played (the 1960s) and the ballparks he played in, Allen was the most effective hitter in team history.

OPS+ takes a player’s on-base plus slugging percentage, normalizes the number across the entire league, and accounts for external factors like ballparks. It then adjusts on a scale of 100, which is considered league average. So, an OPS+ of 150 is 50 percent better than the league average.

In this case, based on Phillies players with at least 2,000 career plate appearances, Allen’s career OPS of .902 was 53% better than the players of that era. Only Gavvy Cravath was as good as Allen, also with an OPS+ of 153. Mike Schmidt, generally considered the greatest player in Phils history, was third at 147, but one must also consider that Schmidt accumulated 10,062 plate appearances over the course of his Phils career, while Allen tallied less than half that, 4,511. So yes, Schmidt was only a few points behind and did it for a much longer stretch. If one were to ask who the best hitter in team history was, Schmidt is still probably the correct answer.

But Allen’s OPS+ puts into context just how great he was during the time he played, specifically his first six years, 1964-69. That he played that well while dealing with being the team’s first true black superstar in a city that lashed out against him during a tumultuous time in the city’s history, is even more incredible.

Make sure to check out both podcasts for more on Allen’s legacy with the Phillies. While he may not indeed be the best hitter in Phillies history, he was, during his time, the most dominant.