best baseball player ever

[futurefields]

babe ruth

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Joe Shlabotnik

 

[Mai72]

Best baseball player ever?

It depends on what position you're talking about? 3rd base? 1st? Outfield? Catcher?

There isn't one best baseball player. There are too many to count.

*Mike Schmidt was the best 3rd baseman that's ever played the game.
*Pete Rose was the best at hitting singles.
*Ozzie Smith was the best shortstop that has ever played that position.
*Reggie Jackson (Mr. October) was amazing.

I could go on...

 

[Printer Bandit]

barry bonds

 

[Slew Foot]

Rusty Kuntz
Dick Pole

 

[brianmanahan]

ty cobb, without a doubt

222/226 votes to get into the hall of fame the first time. higher than anyone else.

.367 career batting average, better than anyone else.

4191 hits, 892 stolen bases, 1938 RBIs

 

[Mai72]

ty cobb, without a doubt

222/226 votes to get into the hall of fame the first time. higher than anyone else.

.367 career batting average, better than anyone else.

4191 hits, 892 stolen bases, 1938 RBIs

Ty played in a much different era.

Do you really think he could have put up those numbers today?

 

[Ichinisan]

Wayne Gretzky

 

[TuSpockShakur]

Ted Williams

/thread

 

[HTFOff]

Most people agree that Ruth is the greatest of all time even though he played with no minority competition and before the age of specialists. It wasn't just that he was out homering entire clubs..he also had 94 wins. D:

 

[BUTCH1]

Ted Williams

/thread

Exactly, the last person to finish the season with an above 400 average in 1941. That's a LOT of years, (74) to hold that record. His eyesight was so keen he could tell someone exactly WHERE on the bat the ball made contact and it was verified with the scuff-mark on the ball, just fucking amazing. Then he gave up 3 of his prime years to fight in WW2 as well, what a shame his son did to him after he died, F-ing horror story IMHO.

 

[soulcougher73]

Ted Williams

/thread

This

 

[brianmanahan]

Ty played in a much different era.

Do you really think he could have put up those numbers today?

yeah i think so

plus he'd have 3 times the HRs because roids

of course, he'd be banned from baseball nowadays for being a racist crazed maniac :awe:

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Exactly, the last person to finish the season with an above 400 average in 1941. That's a LOT of years, (74) to hold that record. His eyesight was so keen he could tell someone exactly WHERE on the bat the ball made contact and it was verified with the scuff-mark on the ball, just fucking amazing. Then he gave up 3 of his prime years to fight in WW2 as well, what a shame his son did to him after he died, F-ing horror story IMHO.

Ted loses out for the same reason Cobb does. Completely different era, pitching sucked and batting averages were higher. To get best ever you have to compare each player to his contemporaries, not to guys who played 100 years earlier in what was essentially a completely different game. Williams was 37/130/.344 which look like gigantic numbers now, but compared to his peers at the time like Dimaggio 34/143/.325 he wasn't that dominant. Those were high numbers to be sure, but it was a different game and those numbers were not all that staggering 50+ years ago.

For dominance versus peers, nobody was close to Ruth. When he retired with 714 home runs there was exactly one player in the history of baseball, ONE, that had more than 300 and that was Lou Gehrig. Ruth reinvented the game, there was nobody that was even in the same universe as him at that time. Nobody has ever been more dominant in their era than Ruth was in his era.

 

[twinrider1]

Charlie Hustle

 

[preCRT]

Ted Williams

 

[BUTCH1]

Ted loses out for the same reason Cobb does. Completely different era, pitching sucked and batting averages were higher. To get best ever you have to compare each player to his contemporaries, not to guys who played 100 years earlier in what was essentially a completely different game. Williams was 37/130/.344 which look like gigantic numbers now, but compared to his peers at the time like Dimaggio 34/143/.325 he wasn't that dominant. Those were high numbers to be sure, but it was a different game and those numbers were not all that staggering 50+ years ago.

For dominance versus peers, nobody was close to Ruth. When he retired with 714 home runs there was exactly one player in the history of baseball, ONE, that had more than 300 and that was Lou Gehrig. Ruth reinvented the game, there was nobody that was even in the same universe as him at that time. Nobody has ever been more dominant in their era than Ruth was in his era.

Valid points, but 74 years and no one has been able to match it?, that's a loooong time.

 

[MongGrel]

Wayne Gretzky

What I might have said, I've never been a baseball fan to be honest.



I could say Pete Rose and run for cover

If I was serious, I'd go with Ted.

 

[BudAshes]

barry bonds

According to their career WAR it goes Babe Ruth, Cy Young, Walter Johnson, Barry Bonds then Willie Mays.

 

[Anubis]

Williams or Cobb

 

[GasX]

Steve Carlton

Just for his 1974 season

27-10 1.97 ERA 310 SO

And to provide the proper perspective. The Phillies were about the worst team in baseball that year. Lefty got NO run support and the Phillies only managed 59 wins all season. That's 45% of the team's wins from one pitcher.

And if that doesn't grab you, then it was Babe Ruth...

 

[brianmanahan]

According to their career WAR it goes Babe Ruth, Cy Young, Walter Johnson, Barry Bonds then Willie Mays.

barry bonds gets DQ'd in my book because who knows how much of his performance was due to steroids

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Valid points, but 74 years and no one has been able to match it?, that's a loooong time.

And nobody is ever going to match Cy Young with 511 wins. And unless the rules of the game change nobody will ever match Cobb's .366 career average. And it's unlikely that anyone will ever get anywhere near Henderson's lifetime steals numbers as sabermetrics has devalued the stolen base. Yes, nobody has matched in in 74 years because the game changed. Just like Williams was unable to match Cobb's lifetime batting average because the game changed for him too. Different players, different eras. It's been 121 years since Hugh Duffey set the single season batting average record at .439, so is he better than Williams since it's been even longer? Of course not. Longevity of a record is meaningless, as the rules of the game change records set in one era become completely unbreakable in a different era and it has nothing to do with the skill of the players.

You can't possibly make the case that Cobb played the same game as Ruth, that Ruth played the same game as Williams, that Williams played the same game as Barry Bonds or A-Rod or whoever you want to pick as the benchmark of this tainted era. Was Cobb the most dominant versus his peers, was Williams more dominant against his peers or was Ruth more dominant against his peers? The answer is Ruth and it's not even close.

 

[BUTCH1]

And nobody is ever going to match Cy Young with 511 wins. And unless the rules of the game change nobody will ever match Cobb's .366 career average. And it's unlikely that anyone will ever get anywhere near Henderson's lifetime steals numbers as sabermetrics has devalued the stolen base. Yes, nobody has matched in in 74 years because the game changed. Just like Williams was unable to match Cobb's lifetime batting average because the game changed for him too. Different players, different eras. It's been 121 years since Hugh Duffey set the single season batting average record at .439, so is he better than Williams since it's been even longer? Of course not. Longevity of a record is meaningless, as the rules of the game change records set in one era become completely unbreakable in a different era and it has nothing to do with the skill of the players.

You can't possibly make the case that Cobb played the same game as Ruth, that Ruth played the same game as Williams, that Williams played the same game as Barry Bonds or A-Rod or whoever you want to pick as the benchmark of this tainted era. Was Cobb the most dominant versus his peers, was Williams more dominant against his peers or was Ruth more dominant against his peers? The answer is Ruth and it's not even close.

Yea, I guess you have to throw in the fact that Ruth was an effective pitcher as well were TW was just "OK" as a left-fielder.

 

[BUTCH1]

What I might have said, I've never been a baseball fan to be honest.



I could say Pete Rose and run for cover

If I was serious, I'd go with Ted.

Real baseball fans will always remember how Pete played the game, hard. I really think they should let him in the HOF despite the gambling issues.