408 from 1911 to 1913), but Hornsby holds the record for four and five consecutive seasons (.404 from 1922 to 1925 and. Cobb holds the record for highest average in two and three consecutive seasons (.414 from 1911 to 1912 and.
Without the 1910 title, Cobb still led the league in five consecutive seasons from 1911 to 1915. Otherwise, Rogers Hornsby won the most consecutive titles, with six from 1920 to 1925. If Cobb is credited with the 1910 title, he won 9 consecutive titles from 1907 to 1915 and 12 total titles for his career. It is unclear whether Lajoie or Cobb won the 1910 AL title, with some sources attributing the title to each man. Honus Wagner and Gwynn are tied for the second-most titles, with eight apiece in the NL. 366, led the AL in average in 11 (or 12) seasons. Ty Cobb of the Detroit Tigers, who also holds the highest career batting average of. 426 average for the Philadelphia Athletics. The AL was established in 1901, and Hall of Fame second baseman Nap Lajoie led that league with a. The first batting average champion in the NL was Ross Barnes in the league's inaugural 1876 season, Barnes batted. 349 (159 hits in 455 ABs) with four hitless ABs added to reach the 502 PA requirement, but this would still have been higher than the next-highest eligible player (.344 average), so he was awarded the 1996 NL batting title.
Gwynn's batting average would have dropped to. Tony Gwynn, for example, had 159 hits in 451 ABs in 1996 (.353 average) but only 498 PAs.
However, if a player's lead in AVG is sufficiently large that enough hitless at bats can be added to reach this requirement and the player still would have the highest batting average, he wins the title. Since 1957, a player must have 3.1 plate appearances (PA) per team game (for a total of 502 over the current 162-game season) to qualify for the batting title. The American League (AL) winner is known as the " Rod Carew American League Batting Champion", while the National League (NL) leader is designated the " Tony Gwynn National League Batting Champion". In MLB, a player in each league wins the "batting title" each season for having the highest batting average that year. In Major League Baseball (MLB), it is calculated by dividing a player's hits by his at bats (AB). In baseball, batting average (AVG) is a measure of a batter's success rate in achieving a hit during an at bat. Ty Cobb won more batting titles than any other player, though the precise number is unclear because of the race in the 1910 American League.