Meet the Greatest College Baseball Player You Have Never Heard of: Pete Incaviglia's College Stats and Unbreakable Records

Pete Incaviglia is not a name you might recognize unless you’re a college baseball lifer. But everybody should know the story, career, and records of the man given the NCAA Player of the Century award in 1999.

Nicknamed “Inky,” Pete Incaviglia played baseball at Oklahoma State. There he became the most legendary power hitter in college baseball history.

Pete Incaviglia College Stats

"Inky" was the definition of a power hitter, the human epitome of “swing for the fences”.

In his 1985 campaign, the Junior left fielder hit 48 home runs and batted in 143 runs (RBIs), with a slugging percentage of 1.140

All three of those are records that haven’t been broken since 1985. Not only do they still stand today, the records haven’t been touched.

"Inky" Incaviglia #24

Only two players have hit 40 home runs in a single season since. Just two hitters outside of "Inky" Incaviglia have knocked in at least 130 runs in a season (RBIs). Again, “Inky” had 143 RBIs that season.

Slugging percentage differs from batting average in that all hits are not valued equally. While batting average is calculated by dividing the total number of hits by the total number of at-bats, the formula for slugging percentage is: (1B + 2Bx2 + 3Bx3 + HRx4)/AB..

Pete Incaviglia’s slugging percentage makes him the first and only batter to go eclipse the one-point threshold. The second-best number was .927 by Rickie Weeks in the 90s.

Incaviglia was given the Golden Spikes Award in 1985 for his 48-home run season.

Inky was a generational power hitter

But “Inky” wasn’t just a one-season wonder. The name Pete Incaviglia is filled throughout the NCAA career records. Incaviglia was the first and still the only player to ever smash triple-digit home runs in a career, at exactly 100 bombs.

Pete "Inky" Incaviglia in the majors

Incaviglia didn’t stop trailblazing at Oklahoma State. When he was drafted eighth overall by the Montreal Expos, “Inky” refused to ever step foot on a minor league field. They traded him to the Texas Rangers where he became the 15th player to ever jump straight to the major leagues out of the draft.

Throughout his MLB career, Pete Incaviglia became a one-trick pony. The ball was either going out of the park or “Inky” was getting struck out. Pete Incaviglia paved the way for players like Ryan Howard.

"Inky" played for six MLB teams including the Detroit Tigers and New York Yankees in his 12-year career, hitting 206 home runs and batting .246 for his career.

Inky Incaviglia

Why Pete Incaviglia’s college records will never be broken

For one, the bat "Inky" used in 1985 was made illegal. It was a "wild west" in the 80s before college and major league baseball standardized the bat's hitters were using. They must all pass the BBCOR standard today.

Those bats are much lighter now, adhering to “Drop-3”, meaning they weigh three fewer ounces than how many inches long the bat is. In Incaviglia's time, the bats were incredibly heavy and more powerful when cracking a pitch.

But more importantly, pitchers weren’t throwing with the amount of heat they are today. 90-mile-per-hour pitches were a rarity, not the requisite, in the 90s.

We will never see Pete "Inky" Incaviglia’s record touched. You can count on it.