Yordan Alvarez's 2026 Triple Crown Bid: Now in Jeopardy
He still leads the American League in batting average — but Willy Caminero of the Rays has taken the HR lead (39 to 38) and Pete Alonso of the Orioles leads RBI (97 to 95). With two weeks left, the first Triple Crown since Miguel Cabrera in 2012 is slipping.
A category no one has won in fourteen years
The Triple Crown — leading your league outright in batting average, home runs, and runs batted in at the end of a full season — was once a rough measure of the best hitter in baseball. It's also nearly impossible to win in the modern game, where pitching strategies, defensive shifts, and the explosion of strikeout rates make dominance in all three categories simultaneously nearly inconceivable.
Yordan Alvarez came into September 2026 leading the AL in all three categories. With two weeks left, the chase has gotten harder: Willy Caminero of the Rays leads home runs 39-38 and Pete Alonso of the Orioles leads RBI 97-95. Alvarez still leads batting average at .311. He needs to retake both power categories — or hope the leaders cool off — to become the first Triple Crown winner since Miguel Cabrera in 2012. Before Cabrera, you have to go back to Carl Yastrzemski in 1967. It is that rare.
The Triple Crown winners since 1920
| Player | Year | Team | AVG | HR | RBI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yordan Alvarez | 2026* | Houston Astros | .311 | 38 | 95 |
| Miguel Cabrera | 2012 | Detroit Tigers | .330 | 44 | 139 |
| Carl Yastrzemski | 1967 | Boston Red Sox | .326 | 44 | 121 |
| Frank Robinson | 1966 | Baltimore Orioles | .316 | 49 | 122 |
| Mickey Mantle | 1956 | New York Yankees | .353 | 52 | 130 |
| Ted Williams | 1947 | Boston Red Sox | .343 | 32 | 114 |
| Ted Williams | 1942 | Boston Red Sox | .356 | 36 | 137 |
*2026 stats through September 11. Alvarez leads AL average (.311) but trails HR (Caminero 39, Alvarez 38) and RBI (Alonso 97, Alvarez 95). Triple Crown requires finishing first in all three categories at season's end.
Why Alvarez is different from every other great hitter right now
The modern offensive landscape has made hitting .320 while also leading in home runs extraordinarily difficult. Power hitters tend to sacrifice contact. Contact hitters rarely have elite power. The few who combine both — Shohei Ohtani, Juan Soto — tend to pile up walks rather than RBIs from plate discipline. Alvarez does all of it without an obvious weakness: he punishes mistakes, draws walks when pitchers try to avoid him, and has the kind of barrel control that turns pitches in the zone into doubles or home runs rather than strikeouts.
Aaron Judge returned September 8 from his rib stress fracture, and the AL power race has tightened. More immediately, Willy Caminero of the Rays surged past Alvarez in home runs (39 to 38) and Pete Alonso leads in RBI (97 to 95). Alvarez maintains the batting average lead at .311, but the home run and RBI gaps now require a late push to close. The two weeks left in the regular season are not a lot of runway.
The 2022 World Series: the night the dynasty became complete
Alvarez was the center of what the 2022 Houston Astros were. He put up a 1.019 OPS that regular season. He hit the home run in Game 6 of the World Series at Minute Maid Park that effectively ended the Phillies' last realistic chance. The Astros won that game — and the series — at home. The building shook with 43,000 people who had been waiting for the clean one, the championship without an asterisk.
The scorecard from that night is the record of exactly what happened: every pitch, every half-inning, every Houston at-bat. Framber Valdez on the mound. The bullpen closing it. The final out. All of it on a single hand-lettered sheet from the official play-by-play. That's what Astros fans want on the wall — the World Series clincher from the Alvarez era, before he was this historic.
Houston Astros — 2022 World Series · Game 6
The 2022 clincher at Minute Maid Park. Framber Valdez, the bullpen, Alvarez's game-deciding homer. The official play-by-play, rebuilt in real handwriting — every at-bat, every out. 300-DPI print-ready digital file, instant delivery.
Get the 2022 WS Game 6 — $29 →
Or any Astros game from the last 100 years. Find your game →
What happens if he does it
A 2026 Triple Crown winner changes the conversation. It gives Alvarez an argument for the best-hitter-alive crown that goes beyond advanced metrics — something tangible, historic, and earned in a season when the rest of the league was watching. It also becomes the frame through which the 2022 World Series gets discussed: Alvarez the champion, Alvarez the Triple Crown winner, Alvarez among the best pure hitters of the last century.
There are four weeks left. The AL batting race is close; the home run and RBI leads are more comfortable. September is where these chases are settled — or slipped away. Either way, the 2022 World Series scorecard is already history, already made, already waiting.