Actually he came close to being hurt every season. And yes we do have an infamous "if only", here check his stats:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?statsId=3918 You can see a few years where you can make a good argument that "if only" he'd have beaten the record. Also remember the guy gets walked more often than most dogs, that holds down his stats and creates more "if only" action.
Sorry discostu......it just doesn't wash with me. I will tell you why. When I was a YOUNGSTER watching Stan Musial play in the late 40's and all thru the 50's I came to realize that Stan Musial was NEVER considered a HR hitter. Long story short. Sportsmans Park had a 12 foot wall and a 40 ft SCREENED FENCE down the right field line. Today that DOUBLE that Musial hit would be a HOME RUN. He wound up having the NL record for doubles and I did some calculating he should have had at some 250-300 HR's MORE if that screen were NOT there.
That MY FRIEND is an "IF ONLY". As I grew older I realized that it just makes NO SENSE to wonder what could have happend BUT what did happen AND WHY??????
As the years pass I don't remember the stats but I think Stan Musial had 475 HRs and 725 doubles.