Series: Ben Rice is the point guard even though he hasn’t played in three weeks

Usually, it's the long ball that makes the difference in Major League Baseball's playoffs. But not this year—far from it.

And not just because two small-ball-oriented teams faced off in the World Series. As proof, the home run leader in this year's postseason is a player whose season ended three weeks ago.

We're talking about Ben Rice, who hit four home runs in five playoff games for the New York Yankees. It took him just two games to reach that total—in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series against the Boston Red Sox and in Game 2 of the American League Division Series against the Tampa Bay Rays.

According to Jeremy Frank on Twitter/X, this is the fewest number of games played by a player leading the postseason in home runs since the three-of-five league championship series were introduced in 1969.

Ben Rice's five games played are the fewest by any player to lead the postseason outright in home runs since the playoffs expanded in 1969.

— Jeremy Frank (@MLBRandomStats) October 29, 2026

By comparison, no other player has hit more than three home runs throughout the entire postseason (as my colleague Charles-Alexis Brisebois would say), not even among the two World Series finalists.

In fact, the Milwaukee Brewers won the Fall Classic despite having the second-lowest home run total in all of MLB during the regular season.

Another notable statistic: Rice's nine RBIs in the playoffs tie him for the lead with Jackson Chourio and William Contreras, both of the Brewers.

So we witnessed the triumph of the small ball in 2026, and certain other Major League Baseball teams should take inspiration from this instead of publicly lamenting that they can't afford it.

Oh, and I almost forgot: let's give a shout-out to the little geniuses of advanced statistics while we're at it.

Created by humans, assisted by AI.