Run totals throughout baseball history

It started out as a simple question, one I’ve had since reading in The Book that teams scored just under five runs per game from 1999 through 2002 and that generalized run expectancy totals could be gleaned based on that. Many have treated The Book as the definitive tome for sabermetrics since its publication in 2007. Candidly, I was a little irked by its use of run totals from such a peak era of baseball history to suggest normative conditions. It couldn’t be right to suggest teams all through history have averaged five runs a game. Could it?

With the help of Baseball-Reference.com and a willingness to kill a few hours making a spreadsheet, such questions can easily be answered. Going through 139 seasons of data, I found the answer to my question: through baseball history, teams have averaged 4.53 runs per game. There’s more worth saying here, granted. A more detailed, though still admittedly cursory look at what I discovered in my research follows below.

I. Wild West: Before the formation of the American League in 1901

Year Games Runs Average
1876 520 3066 5.9
1877 360 2040 5.67
1878 368 1904 5.17
1879 642 3409 5.31
1880 680 3191 4.69
1881 672 3425 5.1
1882 1144 6092 5.33
1883 1570 9030 5.75
1884 3088 16742 5.42
1885 1780 9292 5.22
1886 2104 11512 5.47
1887 2116 13417 6.34
1888 2184 10628 4.87
1889 2180 12986 5.96
1890 3216 19330 6.01
1891 2218 12635 5.7
1892 1842 9388 5.1
1893 1570 10315 6.57
1894 1598 11796 7.38
1895 1598 10514 6.58
1896 1584 9560 6.04
1897 1622 9536 5.88
1898 1842 9129 4.96
1899 1846 9672 5.24
1900 1138 5932 5.21
1876-1900 totals: 39482 224541 5.69


There isn’t much sense in comparing run totals before the formation of the American League in 1901 to today. Baseball in the 19th century was nothing like it is today. Leagues came and went, like the Union Association of 1884 or the Player’s League of 1890 or so many other circuits that no casual fan has ever heard of. Rules that modern fans may take for granted, such as the distance from the pitcher’s mound to home plate or the right of pitchers to not have their pitches called by opposing batters (seriously, this happened), were established through trial and error in these early seasons.

Don’t get me wrong, though, the run totals in baseball over the first 25 years after the National League was established in 1876 are a lot of fun. Baseball will never see anything like it again. There will never be another season like 1894, where the average team topped seven runs a game, all of baseball hit .309, and the Phillies boasted an all-.400 outfield and still finished fourth. There will never be another pitcher like Jack Wadsworth having a lifetime 6.85 ERA that’s just 5 percent worse than the MLB average for the years he played. The offensive boon of the 1920s/’30s and the steroid years have nothing on this wacky era.

II. Formation of the American League and the first Deadball Era

Year Games Runs Average
1901 2220 11073 4.99
1902 2234 9897 4.43
1903 2228 9888 4.44
1904 2498 9302 3.72
1905 2474 9635 3.89
1906 2456 8873 3.61
1907 2466 8690 3.52
1908 2488 8417 3.38
1909 2482 8797 3.54
1910 2498 9577 3.83
1911 2474 11160 4.51
1912 2464 11165 4.53
1913 2468 9961 4.04
1914 3760 14531 3.86
1915 3728 14213 3.81
1916 2494 8889 3.56
1917 2494 8949 3.59
1918 2032 7382 3.63
1919 2236 8668 3.88
1901-19 totals: 48194 189067 3.92


I wasn’t sure how to group these seasons together. While this time period more or less constitutes the Deadball Era, depending on who is consulted, these 19 seasons are more representative as a patchwork of a few sub-eras.

There’s 1901-03 where run totals are noticeably higher, primarily the result of two things, I’m guessing: 1) Foul tips not being called strikes in both leagues until 1903; and 2) A bit of chaos the first few seasons after the formation of the American League in 1901. These were years players jumped leagues irrespective of contracts, rosters sometimes being raided. The two leagues made peace in 1903, and run totals plummeted the following year.

With the exception of 1911 and 1912, Deadball Era scoring levels remained fairly constant from 1904 through 1919. Not counting 1911-12, teams scored an average of 3.72 runs per game 1904-19. We can exclude 1911 and 1912 as the ball wasn’t dead during those years. As noted in The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, both leagues used a cork-centered ball during these years, causing offense to spike. Emerging use of the emery ball in 1913 restored the advantage to pitchers.

III. A Golden Age for offense

Year Games Runs Average
1920 2468 10761 4.36
1921 2458 11928 4.85
1922 2476 12057 4.87
1923 2466 11871 4.81
1924 2462 11716 4.76
1925 2456 12593 5.13
1926 2468 11443 4.64
1927 2472 11746 4.75
1928 2462 11650 4.73
1929 2458 12749 5.19
1930 2468 13695 5.55
1931 2472 11891 4.81
1932 2466 12114 4.91
1933 2452 10989 4.48
1934 2446 11999 4.91
1935 2456 12026 4.9
1936 2476 12846 5.19
1937 2478 12070 4.87
1938 2446 11969 4.89
1939 2462 11876 4.82
1940 2472 11568 4.68
1941 2488 11168 4.49
1920-41 totals: 54228 262725 4.84


A number of changes happened in baseball around 1920. Eight members of the Chicago White Sox threw the 1919 World Series, leaving baseball scrambling with its first public relations crisis. Then Babe Ruth started hitting more homers than any player before him, attracting more fans than ever at the same time. In the midst, Ray Chapman became the first  major leaguer killed by a pitched ball. For these and perhaps other reasons, Major League Baseball banned the spitball and emery ball in 1921, as noted by Bill James; MLB also elected to keep cleaner balls in play that could be more easily seen by hitters and would be less likely to lose shape late in games.

This led to the first great offensive age of the modern era for baseball, 22 glorious seasons that offered some of the highest RBI totals and batting averages that will ever be seen. There’s a reason Rogers Hornsby’s .424 clip and Hack Wilson’s 191 RBIs have stood as record since these years. While run totals occasionally dipped, such as when less-lively balls were introduced in 1933, scoring stayed high until the majority of big leaguers went to war. I like this kind of baseball, if I’m being candid. It’s a wonder to me there hasn’t been more of it in the modern era.

IV. Second Deadball Era: World War II

Year Games Runs Average
1942 2448 9995 4.08
1943 2476 9687 3.91
1944 2484 10351 4.17
1945 2460 10286 4.18
1942-45 totals: 9868 40319 4.09


Although I haven’t seen it formally recognized as such, I consider World War II the third Deadball Era in baseball’s history, together with the early 20th century and mid-1960s. The run totals are certainly more or less in-line. Like the earliest Deadball Era, this one primarily owed itself to the balls in use. As noted in The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract:

During wartime, the quality of baseballs used was inferior, as there was something in regular baseballs that was needed to make explosives or O.D. green paint or something, and the balls manufactured were rather lifeless.

I was tempted to group 1946 in as part of the war years as scoring didn’t rebound until 1947. I doubt the caliber of balls was inferior in 1946; I just have this theory that long breaks tend to favor pitchers and that it took hitters a year or so to get back to form after the war ended. Some didn’t recover, such as Cecil Travis, never the same player after four years of combat service. The popular story on Travis was that he suffered frostbite at the Battle of the Bulge. His New York Times obituary quoted him saying the real reason he declined was he lost his timing as a hitter.

V. Post-war years, before strike zone change in January 1963

Year Games Runs Average
1946 2484 9953 4.01
1947 2486 10827 4.36
1948 2474 11327 4.58
1949 2480 11425 4.61
1950 2476 12013 4.85
1951 2478 11268 4.55
1952 2478 10349 4.18
1953 2480 11426 4.61
1954 2474 10827 4.38
1955 2468 11068 4.48
1956 2478 11031 4.45
1957 2470 10636 4.31
1958 2470 10578 4.28
1959 2476 10853 4.38
1960 2472 10664 4.31
1961 2860 12942 4.53
1962 3242 14461 4.46
1946-62 totals: 43246 191648 4.43


One of the things I find most interesting about these years is that run totals didn’t change that much, on average, while otherwise baseball was changing tremendously. The majors were integrated. Teams began to relocate for the first time in half a century and four expansion clubs were added. Transcontinental air travel and night games became commonplace. Despite all this, scoring levels remained reasonably constant most of these 17 seasons never quite returning to the stratospheric highs of the ’20s and ’30s or dipping to Deadball levels.

Run totals for this period, 4.43 runs per game were as close to the average for baseball history, 4.53 runs per game of any of the periods listed here. I assume the balance between hitting and pitching was also as close as it’s been for any sustained period. It was certainly better than it is now.

VI. Third Deadball Era: After strike zone change in January 1963

Year Games Runs Average
1963 3238 12780 3.95
1964 3252 13124 4.04
1965 3246 12946 3.99
1966 3230 12900 3.99
1967 3240 12210 3.77
1968 3250 11109 3.42
1963-68 totals: 19456 75069 3.86


Sandy Koufax entered spring training in 1961 boasting a 36-40 lifetime record with a 4.10 ERA. He had nearly as many strikeouts for innings pitched at that point of his career, though the young lefty was also averaging more than five walks every nine innings. Famously, Koufax’s catcher Norm Sherry told him to throw less hard, and Koufax proceeded to go 32-20 with a 3.11 ERA over the next two seasons.

Then, on January 26, 1963, as recounted by Bill James in the historical abstract, the Baseball Rules Committee expanded the strike zone, stating that it went from the shoulders to the bottom of the knee. Now blessed as well with the best pitcher’s park of the 1960s, Dodgers Stadium, Koufax went on one of the finest runs a pitcher’s ever had. Over the ensuing four seasons before his arm gave out, Koufax went 97-27 with a 1.86 ERA (with an unreal 1.97 cumulative FIP), three Cy Young awards, and a National League MVP.

VII. End of an era? After pitching mound was lowered

Year Games Runs Average
1969 3892 15850 4.07
1970 3888 16880 4.34
1971 3876 15073 3.89
1972 3718 13706 3.69
1969-72 totals: 15374 61509 4


Following the offensive nadir that was 1968, when teams averaged their lowest runs per game in 60 years, Major League Baseball lowered the mound from 15 inches to 10 inches. They did it to help hitters, ostensibly, though it didn’t cause run totals to change that much. In fact, certain pitchers got better while others continued to dominate. There are perhaps a few reasons the lower mound didn’t produce the desired effect.

First, as Jim Bouton wrote during spring training in 1969 in Ball Four:

[Seattle Pilots teammate] Mike Marshall is a righthanded pitcher who was 15-9 in the Tiger organization last season. He’s got a master’s degree from Michigan State. He majored in phys. ed, with a minor in mathematics. He’s a cocky kid with a subtle sense of humor. He’s been telling everybody that the new lower mound, which was supposed to help the hitters, actually shortens the distance the pitcher has to throw the ball. Has to do with the hypotenuse of a right triangle decreasing as either side of the triangle decreases. Therefore, says Marshall, any psychological advantage the hitters gain if the pitcher doesn’t stand tall out there will be offset by the pitchers knowing that they are now closer to the plate.

I recently interviewed former Houston Astros pitcher Larry Dierker, who enjoyed a career year in ’69, going 20-13 with a 2.33 ERA and 8.6 WAR. Assuming the lower mound favored hitters, I asked Dierker how he compensated. He told me he hadn’t even noticed. Dierker said:

What I noticed, when I’m on any mound, is whether it feels comfortable or not. But my arm position was around three-quarters, and I think the higher, steeper mound is really the mound that gives a tall, straight overhand pitcher like Jim Palmer a better advantage. Randy Johnson, when he was with us, the Phillies for some reason or another– I know it wasn’t legal– they had a high, steep mound just like they used to have in Dodger Stadium, and that was the only game that he didn’t pitch well for us. He was complaining about the mound from the first inning on. But he was kind of low three-quarters with his arm position, and I think he preferred a little bit more gentle slope.

Jim Palmer, for his part, averaged 19 wins and a 2.47 ERA from 1969 through 1972, twice finishing in the top five for American League Cy Young voting.

VIII. First 20 seasons after the implementation of the DH

Year Games Runs Average
1973 3886 16376 4.21
1974 3890 16046 4.12
1975 3868 16295 4.21
1976 3878 15492 3.99
1977 4206 18803 4.47
1978 4204 17251 4.1
1979 4198 18713 4.46
1980 4210 18053 4.29
1981 2788 11147 4
1982 4214 18110 4.3
1983 4218 18170 4.31
1984 4210 17921 4.26
1985 4206 18216 4.33
1986 4206 18545 4.41
1987 4210 19883 4.72
1988 4200 17380 4.14
1989 4212 17405 4.13
1990 4210 17919 4.26
1991 4208 18127 4.31
1992 4212 17341 4.12
1973-92 totals: 81434 347193 4.26


There’s this myth veteran sportswriters repeat around Hall of Fame voting time that the implementation of the designated hitter rule in 1973 created a greater offensive era. The myth is used to justify Jack Morris’s 3.90 ERA, among other things. The next time someone trots out the myth, please, show them the chart above. Maybe tell them also that for the years Morris pitched in the majors, 1977 through 1994, teams scored an average of 4.34 runs a game. (So we’re clear, I don’t take much issue with Morris being a future Veterans Committee selection for the Hall of Fame; I just am leery of hyperbole.)

With the exception of a few outlying seasons, notably 1987 where a rabbit ball may have been in use, run totals after the 1960s didn’t rise to major heights until the mid-1990s. Scoring rose slightly, granted, but was below the average for baseball history of 4.53 runs per game. The 1970s and ’80s weren’t an era that favored offense. It was more or less average, with pitchers enjoying a slight edge and small ball an oft-used strategy of the day. The sooner this is better understood, the more that players like Dwight Evans, Dave Parker, and Dale Murphy may get recognition from Cooperstown.

IX. The offensive explosion

Year Games Runs Average
1993 4538 20864 4.6
1994 3200 15752 4.92
1995 4034 19554 4.85
1996 4534 22831 5.04
1997 4532 21604 4.77
1998 4864 23297 4.79
1999 4856 24691 5.08
2000 4858 24971 5.14
2001 4858 23199 4.78
2002 4852 22408 4.62
2003 4860 22978 4.73
2004 4856 23376 4.81
2005 4862 22325 4.59
2006 4858 23599 4.86
2007 4862 23322 4.8
2008 4856 22585 4.65
2009 4860 22419 4.61
1993-2009 totals: 79140 379775 4.8


There still isn’t consensus about what caused run totals to increase so much in the mid-1990s and early-2000s, and I don’t know if there will ever be. It’s a controversial, polarizing subject, and I don’t know if all the variables from the era will ever fully come to light. The common suggested culprits for the spike in offense, I think, are steroids, expansion, weaker pitching and a livelier ball. It’s somewhat of a cop-out, I’ll admit, to say I suspect that a combination of these and other factors engendered the greatest offensive era in baseball since the 1930s. Strictly speaking, though, there’s no quick explanation for the era. There generally isn’t in baseball history. I’m reminded of the Oscar Wilde quote, “The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

X. What’s going on?

Year Games Runs Average
2010 4860 21308 4.38
2011 4858 20808 4.28
2012 4860 21017 4.32
2013 4862 20255 4.17
2014 3676 15037 4.09
2010-14 totals: 23116 98425 4.26


Something’s been happening in baseball over the past five seasons, causing run totals to trend down. I don’t know what the reason is, but we’re clearly in an age for pitchers. It’s why Clayton Kershaw is having the best season of any hurler in 15 years, why Felix Hernandez, Adam Wainwright and others aren’t far off. We’re heading toward the fourth Deadball Era if this trend doesn’t reverse. And if that happens, fans can bet on more rule changes from Major League Baseball to liven the game.

12 Replies to “Run totals throughout baseball history”

  1. Great work! Straightforward in busting the myth that the DH greatly increased scoring – although there may be value in breaking down games with the DH versus those without the DH in the same era. I’m betting that would further support your argument.

    Two other factors, harder to track, may be a lack of parity among teams and the impact of new ballparks – especially the introduction of night baseball and artificial turf. I’ve been struck by seeing how the offensive stars feasted on truly miserable teams in the 50’s and 60’s, for example, padding their already impressive stats.

    Turf really changed the game, although it I’ve not seen any data related to increased scoring.

  2. Lowering the mound makes the hypotenuse 1/12 of an inch closer – 0.086″. I’m sure he was jesting that this would be an advantage to the pitcher. The ball would get there 0.053 milliseconds sooner. Going at 90 mph, the ball takes .458 seconds to arrive.

  3. What is the all time MLB RECORD for average runs scored per game in a season?
    What Team?
    What year?
    How many runs?

  4. 6.9 RPG by the New York Yankees in 1930. 1062 total runs. Note they scored 1067 runs in 1931 but played one more game.
    This is the modern record, the Boston Braves (now Atlanta) scored 1220 runs in 1894 playing only 133 games.

  5. Okay, so I really enjoyed this statistical history of runs scored. Kinda wish it extended into today’s (2021) game, I’m interested if the “dominance of pitching due to sticky substance spin rate” narrative that is splashed everywhere might be more about the hitter’s changing their goal at the plate to increased launch angle and more home runs.
    For what it’s worth, your numbers above show a 0.26 average increase in runs from the 1969-1972 totals to the 20 years after the DH (1972-1992), and that’s not insignificant.
    I ran the splits by league and AL runs scored per game averaged 4.40 while NL was 4.11, or 0.29 runs less. Picking up about an extra run every 3 games will have a real impact on wins and losses. And lest anyone suggest the difference here is just statistical noise, I would like to add that only in one of the 20 years between ’73 and ’92 did the NL average more runs than the AL, 1974 (by 0.05 runs). Conclusion- the DH appears to have increased offense by about 0.29 runs per game, or just over 7% during the 20 years studied.
    Would be interesting to see if this trend continued through today’s era.

  6. Great article! It was refreshing to read how you speculate steroids may not have been the main culprit with offense going up. I do think body armor was also a big reason why offense went up during those years as well especially with Bonds. The livelier ball which has never been confirmed likely helped a lot as well.

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