Since the 2012 regular season in Major League Baseball is officially in the books, we can take some great storylines from the season that was. In Mike Trout, we saw a rookie put up MVP numbers. In the Oakland A’s, we saw a team who were 13 games back in their division at the end of June win their division on the final day of the season and most importantly, in Miguel Cabrera, we saw a player achieve something that has not been done in 45 years: claim baseball’s nearly-forgotten but always-cherished Triple Crown, an honour given to the league’s leader in home runs, runs batted in and batting average.

When Carl Yastrzemski of the Boston Red Sox won the Triple Crown in 1967, no one would have guessed that it would be the last time the feat would be accomplished. Just a season earlier, Frank Robinson of the Baltimore Orioles hit the Triple Crown himself en route to becoming the first (and to date, only) player in Major League history to win Most Valuable Player honours in both the American and National League. By 1967, while Triple Crowns weren’t quite as commonplace as no-hitters, they were frequent enough to be taken for granted. But for the next four-plus decades, while players have led their leagues in home runs, runs batted in or batting average, no player has since ended the season atop all three categories — until Wednesday evening.

Since it had been so long since a Triple Crown winner was last seen, any talk of Miguel Cabrera ending the drought was more of a pipe dream than anything else. After all, Cabrera would have had to hit consistently from April until October while staying healthy. When the Detroit Tigers’ third-baseman was taken out of the game halfway through his team’s season-finale in Kansas City, he was in position to break the 45-year-old drought. Even the Royals faithful, despite their team being a long-time divisional rival with the Tigers, gave Cabrera a standing ovation as he left the field last night. With 44 home runs, 139 RBIs and a .330 batting average, Cabrera winning the elusive Triple Crown could not have come at a better time.

While the sport of baseball has been stained in recent years due to the use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs, most notably from some of the game’s biggest names like Alex Rodriguez and Mark McGwire, whose admission all but tainted his then-record 70 homers in a season in 1998, it’s refreshing to hear the news of Cabrera’s consummation and, to a larger extent, his introduction into the annals of baseball.

For the time being at least, we don’t have to hear about any suspicion of Cabrera using PEDs or compromising the integrity of the game in any other way. Miguel Cabrera didn’t coast his way through the season. Had he played in 130 or 140 games, then there would most likely be doubt swirling around the Triple Crown. But Cabrera played in 161 of the 162 regular season games and literally competed from start to finish. As both a credit to Cabrera and his team, the Detroit Tigers stayed the course despite the brush with history and won the AL Central division anyway. The Tigers remained strong when many teams in a similar position have faltered.

With his new title as ‘Triple Crown Winner’, Miguel Cabrera joins a list of company that even the most casual of baseball fans would have their arm hair standing in attention at the mere sight of the other names. In addition to the aforementioned Yastrzemski and Robinson, the list of Triple Crown winners includes Ty Cobb, Rogers Hornsby, Chuck Klein, Jimmie Foxx, Lou Gehrig, Joe Medwick, Ted Williams and Mickey Mantle, all of whom are Hall of Famers. To say Miguel Cabrera belongs on the same level as any of the aforementioned is a bit premature but not, by any means, dismissive. With all due respect to Yastrzemski, he won the Crown despite sharing the league’s highest average with Harmon Killebrew of the Minnesota Twins. Cabrera accomplished the feat tied with nobody. If he were to win the Triple Crown for a second time like Hornsby and Williams have done before them, then that would warrant a whole new discussion — but let’s give Miggy time to enjoy his first one.

Prior to 2012, Miguel Cabrera was not at third-base but holding the fort at first-base. In fact, during his first four seasons in Motown, Cabrera played first-base in all but 14 games. When the off-season approached following the 2011 campaign, however, the Tigers were coveting arguably the hottest free agent on the market in Prince Fielder, who also happened to be a first-baseman. After signing a mammoth nine-year, $214 million deal with the club this past January, Prince Fielder was the new first-baseman in Detroit which made Miguel Cabrera expendable in the field. While many marquee players would have thrown tantrums or demand trades upon asked to change positions, Cabrera handled the situation with class, moving across the diamond to third without a fuss. With that, Cabrera showed not only the rest of the Tigers but everyone else that he was no bigger than the team, that he was just another player on the roster and while his team was blessed with exceptional pitching from Justin Verlander and Max Sherzer, great offense by the likes of, for one, the aforementioned Fielder, Cabrera’s numbers, not to mention his leadership, certainly cannot go underestimated in Detroit’s success this season.

While Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels put up a phenomenal rookie campaign where he hit 30 home runs, 83 RBIs and hit for a .326 average, this year’s American League MVP Award cannot go to anyone who doesn’t bear the name Miguel Cabrera. While Trout’s season is a great story in itself, winning both the MVP and Rookie of the Year honours in the same season would not be unprecedented. While the Triple Crown is neither unprecedented, it is a title held so much closer to the hearts of the most loyal, passionate and purist of baseball fans than the Freshman MVP.

So much has happened in Major League Baseball since 1967. The reserve clause fell, free agency was born, the sport was introduced to a shipbuilder-turned-owner who fired and hired managers as if it were a bodily function, the Boston Red Sox and Chicago White Sox both broke 80-plus-year championship droughts, the Chicago Cubs won a playoff round, 20 different teams have won the World Series with 14 of those clubs winning on multiple occasions, the once-great Pittsburgh Pirates have endured two-straight decades of losing seasons, one of the game’s greatest players was astonishingly banned from baseball, two work-stoppages (one of which nearly ruined the league altogether) and a near-third averted at the last minute, bottom-feeding franchises like the Mets, Braves and Phillies all found the light and new franchises like the Marlins and Diamondbacks reached the top of the mountain. Yet with everything that has happened in this great game over the last near-half-century, a Triple Crown title has not been won. Thankfully, we don’t have to say that anymore.

America’s oldest pastime has endured a plethora of heartache, an abundance of hurt and a whirlwind of disbelief over and over again since anyone can remember. But with all heartache and hurt comes comfort and healing. Miguel Cabrera’s capturing of the Triple Crown has erased any and all doubt once and for all that, although baseball has had its share of dark days, the old game will never live to witness its own demise.

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Ryan Cowley is a writer at Toronto Standard. Follow him on Twitter @RyanACowley.

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