Chicago White Sox all-time lists: Top 15 batting averages

(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)
(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images) /
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Shoeless Joe Jackson Chicago White Sox
Shoeless Joe Jackson Chicago White Sox /

Top 15 all-time batting averages: 1.

1. “Shoeless” Joe Jackson (.340)

It’s truly a shame how things work out sometimes.

Jackson should have been remembered as hands down one of the greatest players ever to set foot on a diamond.

Some of his numbers early in his career with the Cleveland Indians were video game-worthy long before anyone had ever conceived that term (or video games). For three straight seasons (1911-13), he had no worse than .373, including posting an absolutely absurd .408/.468/1.058 slash over 147 games in 1911. Keep in mind, of course, that seasons were only 154 games back then.

And after coming the Chicago White Sox in 1915 via trade, he elevated them to a championship-caliber team almost immediately.

They won the World Series in 1917 largely behind his .301 average, 17 home runs and 82 RBI. Plus, he led the Sox to the World Series again in 1919 and had one of the best seasons of his career in 1920 (.382/.444./1.033, 12 home runs, 112 RBI).

Then, of course, the Black Sox Scandal hit in the fall of 1920. Jackson and seven other players were banned from baseball for life by Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis for their alleged involvement in throwing the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds.

To this day, Jackson remains on the MLB ineligible list, keeping him out of the Hall of Fame.

Next: Chicago White Sox prospect Luis Martinez

No one may really know whether he truly was part of throwing that World Series. But as a baseball player, Jackson was one of the best to do it. And he still stands at the head of the Chicago White Sox in terms of career batting average.