I find it hard to argue for his inclusion in the HoF, although Ted Williams called him the "best hitter not in the Hall" and he had his almost certain HoF career truncated by the call to duty. But, this thread gives me another chance to bring him up.
Everybody on this forum knows 1941 saw Joe DiMaggio hit safely in 56 consecutive games (get stopped and then hit in 16 more!) and Ted Williams go 6 for 8 on the last day to hit .406 for the season (only .002 below DiMaggio’s average during his 56-game streak!). But how many know who led the AL in hits that year?
It was Washington SS Cecil Travis, who was halfway to the HoF at the end of the 1941 season -- he had 1,370 career hits and a .327 average before what would have been his age-28 season. But duty beckoned and like many ball players he joined the armed forces that winter. Although he spent most of the war playing BB for military teams, he shipped out to the ETO in time for the Battle of the Bulge, during which he earned a Bronze Star and suffered frost bite so bad an operation was required to save his feet.
He eventually returned to the Senators while still only 31 years old (military service consumed his age-28, -29, -30, and -31 seasons), but the physical trauma suffered in Europe had robbed him of his ability to excel and his career quickly petered out. Despite hitting less than .250 in parts of three seasons before his retirement (following ‘Cecil Travis Night” in 1947 at Griffith Stadium with General Dwight Eisenhower in attendance), his career .314 batting average is still the best by a SS in AL history and third in MLB history (behind Honus Wagner (who else?) and Arky Vaughan).
So, while considering the possible candidates surfaced in this thread, most of whom have stronger career counting stats, remember to at least raise a glass to what might have been for Cecil Travis, who protected democracy instead of the 4-5 hole and discarded the second half of a HoF career in the process.
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