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I'm oddly interested in the National League batting title race, mostly because it's such a weird one: Among the top five guys, there are two stars in Buster Posey and Andrew McCutchen, a former MVP whose career was in jeopardy after a concussion in Justin Morneau, a much-maligned slap-hitting singles hitter in Ben Revere, and a utility man with a .250 career average before the season in Josh Harrison. Harrison is the current leader with a .317 average, and if he does win, I have to think he'd be the most unlikely batting champion ever. (My vote right now is probably Terry Pendleton, who won the batting title in 1991 with the Braves with a .319 mark; in his previous seven years with the Cardinals, he had a .259 average and had hit .230 in 1990.) Morneau, second in the race at .315, sat out Saturday and Sunday with a rib cage strain and is listed as day-to-day, so that could help Harrison. 
Harrison has started 103 of the 130 games he's played in. If he wins, he's likely to start the fewest games by a batting champ since George Brett started 113 games for the Royals in 1980 (not including strike-shortened seasons).
In some ways, Harrison is similar to another surprise Pirates batting champ, Freddy Sanchez in 2006. However, while Sanchez started games at third base (99), shortstop (27) and second base (18) that year, he still started 144 games. Harrison is still more of a true utility guy, having started at five different positions, with his 42 starts at third base leading the way. Harrison wouldn't be in completely unique company, though. In 1950, Billy Goodman of the Red Sox won the American League batting title with a .354 mark while starting at five different positions, mostly in left field (45 games). But he started just 96 games overall and barely qualified for the batting race. MVP voters were so impressed by Goodman's average and versatility that he placed second in the voting that year even though he hit just four home runs and drove in 68 runs. (Among others, Yogi Berra hit .322 with 28 home runs and Joe DiMaggio hit .301 with 32 home runs, yet finished third and ninth in the voting. Ted Williams was injured and played just 89 games ... but still drove in 97 runs and finished 21st in the voting. It's too bad we didn't have sabermetric bloggers back then to debate this!) What's even stranger about that vote is the voters seemed to hold Fenway Park against Red Sox hitters -- fair enough, as the Red Sox hit .335 at home, .269 on the road -- because shortstop Vern Stephens led the league with 144 RBIs and finished even lower in the voting than Williams. Yet they didn't hold it against Goodman, who hit .376 at Fenway, .336 on the road. Goodman was just 24 that year, and while he never won another batting race, he did prove to be the real deal, as he hit .300 in his career. During his Red Sox career, he still primarily remained a full-time utility guy, more or less, except for one year where he started 143 games at second base. As for Harrison, one thing he's done this season is blister fastballs, hitting .357/.390/.594. He also has the 11th-best wOBA against fastballs among qualified hitters. (In fact, McCutchen ranks eighth and Neil Walker 10th, so don't throw too many fastballs to the Pirates.) Most hitters struggle with two strikes, but Harrison has hit .245 -- that doesn't sound great, but it's 12th in the majors. By the way, despite not being a full-time player all season, Harrison ranks ninth among NL position players in WAR. He won't finish second in the MVP voting, but he's a legitimate top-10 candidate.
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