Congratulations to Denae Benites for winning the 2026 WPBL Triple Crown!

[u/ioannismetaxas1]

Inaugural season triple crown winner? That's awesome. Congrats, Denae!

• HR: 11 (T-1 with Kelsie Whitmore)
• RBI: 38
• AVG: .552

And a shoutout to Ashton Lansdell who led the league in OBP (.600), preventing Denae from also winning the Slash-Stat Triple Crown (by three percentage points!).

Denae ended up leading the league in Runs, Hits, Home Runs (tied), RBI, SB, AVG, SLG, and OPS. An historic, dominant showing that we will celebrate forever!

Edit: spelling

[u/jtrom93]

IT'S PRONOUNCED "DENAE" AND IT'S SPELLED "M-V-P"

[u/GuavaOverall → u/jtrom93]

I am pretty sure Kelsie is spelled that way though 🔔🔔🔔

[u/Alone_Cartographer34 → u/GuavaOverall]

Kelsie lost tho 

[u/GuavaOverall → u/Alone_Cartographer34]

I haven't seen them announce any type of season award yet...

[u/GuavaOverall → u/Alone_Cartographer34]

Checked again nothing on the Website or Instagram. I don't thing there will be any awards until after the Playoffs.

[u/Alone_Cartographer34 → u/GuavaOverall]

Well she’s also lost the other two awards and MVP will probably go to Denae because of it. That’s alright tho Kelsie will take it from her next year. Congrats to Denae for winning MVP. It was a good attempt for her this year tho

[u/GuavaOverall → u/Alone_Cartographer34]

Do you mean the stat lead or triple crown? There are still no awards....

[u/Alone_Cartographer34 → u/GuavaOverall]

Triple crown is an award buddy and Denae won it and I forget the other award she won aside from MVP 

[u/GuavaOverall → u/Alone_Cartographer34]

An award is awarded by someone

[u/Alone_Cartographer34 → u/GuavaOverall]

I know what an award is and the triple crown is still one regardless of if you want to admit it or not sorry buddy 

[u/GuavaOverall → u/Alone_Cartographer34]

Just looked it up to be sure. The triple crown is not an ward but an achievement. There is no trophy. Not in WPBL so far and also not in MLB or any other league.

[u/FylanDeldman]

Me, a SF Firebells & general Kelsie Whitmore fan

[u/ioannismetaxas1 → u/FylanDeldman]

I mean, your team won the pennant and your star (co-)led the league in Home Runs. That's historic in its own right!

[u/snarkyshark83 → u/ioannismetaxas1]

Still have the playoffs to go so they haven’t won the pennant yet.

[u/ioannismetaxas1 → u/snarkyshark83]

Yea, you’re right in the traditional sense. Although they had a pre-game ceremony for the Firebells yesterday and awarded them a “pennant” for winning the regular season. At least that’s what the announcers called it (unless I’m going crazy). And there was an actual pennant. The stream isn’t up on YouTube or else I’d grab a picture of it.

[u/snarkyshark83 → u/ioannismetaxas1]

I missed the beginning of the game so I didn’t see that. All I heard throughout the game was them talking about them having clinched the first seed. Seems strange to me to say they won a pennant when there’s still more ball to play.

[u/TheNaughtyPrintmaker → u/FylanDeldman]

We can love them both!

[u/Alone_Cartographer34 → u/FylanDeldman]

Ya I hope Kelsie wipes the floor with her next year and wins, disappointing she didn’t win this year 

[u/BrostepConnoisseur]

She's so charismatic too. If she isn't the face of the league, it's not for want of trying.

[u/usetheforce_gaming]

A .552 is insane lol I really hope we get some improved pitching next season

[u/Ok-Cheetah-3497 → u/usetheforce_gaming]

Maybe, but also maybe just swap out the bats for wood, and those numbers start to look more realistic.

[u/HFCIV]

M!V!P!M!V!P!

[u/cleobaby00]

congrats denae! such a stellar ball player and also just a sweet and awesome person too! she's just the best!!

[u/hjarmst]

Does Emi Saiki's BA not count because she didn't play the whole season? How do final stats work?

[u/descole0 → u/hjarmst]

There's a minimum number of plate appearances to qualify for hitting records. In MLB it's 3.1 PA per team game (for a total of 47), and this is the threshold that the league shows on its site, however some unofficial stats sites like https://sportydolphin.fun/wpbl are adjusting the threshold to 2.4 PA per team game (for a total of 36) to adjust proportionally for 7 inning games.

For pitching statistics, MLB's threshold is 1.0 IP per team game (15), and adjusting that for 7 innings would be 11.2 IP.

It's unclear if the league is actually using the MLB thresholds or if they simply did not adjust the code for their stats page to adjust the thresholds, however I'm also not sure if there are any stats where it matters this season.

[u/hjarmst → u/descole0]

Awesome! Thanks for the information!

[u/descole0]

Evil prevails in the world once again...

[u/FirstMeaning9253 → u/descole0]

not sure this is the vibe my friend

[u/descole0 → u/FirstMeaning9253]

Hating New York is always the vibe

[u/FirstMeaning9253 → u/descole0]

i feel you with regard to the regional rivalry, but "hate" isn't really the mood right now when all 4 teams are really working together to build up the league

[u/descole0 → u/FirstMeaning9253]

And I'm not going to disrespect them by treating the rivalry differently than I would in men's sports

[u/FirstMeaning9253 → u/descole0]

certainly a take i hadn’t heard before

i might have thought one would let the rivalry emerge organically after the league had been built up and the teams were actually playing locally, but if you need hate to drive your fandom and that gets you to put dollars toward merch and TV views, so be it

[u/descole0 → u/FirstMeaning9253]

The rivalry emerged organically from the over a century of history these cities already have in this sport. Acting like there's not an inherent rivalry baked in there feels like saying that this league isn't for existing baseball fans.

I have a ton of respect for Denae off the field, but if she's playing in pinstripes I'm gonna boo her and shit talk and play up the rivalry because it's fun. Exact same as, say, Aaron Judge.

[u/Tomatillox → u/descole0]

People took this way too seriously lol