I agree about crowding the plate and what a pitcher should do about it. The rules we have now encourage offense by limiting how a pitcher can claim the plate. Hell, I've pitched guys way inside in softball if they were crowding the plate. Mostly because most of them can't hit an inside pitch- lots of grounders off the handle is a good thing. (Note- don't bother trying this against a guy who's played a lot of cricket the bat control for hitting bad pitches is incredible) Once they back off, it's all outside. Get e'm moving around in the box, and very few can hit at all.
Since it seems to be the Ruth comparison lets look at it from a ab/hr angle
Ruth is number 1 at ab/hr among the non-steroid crowd. 8.48 in 1920 and 3 other times under 10
The only others under 10 and not suspect are Thome, Mantle, Maris and Greenberg.
the entire rest of the 20 seasons under 10 are Sosa, McGwire, and Bonds.
Bautista last year was at 10.54 only good enough for 33rd. His previous seasons were all around 25 ab/hr This year he's only at around 20 ab/hr, hardly a Babe Ruth type number. The top 500 ends just a hair above 15.
At #37 there's Carlos Pena. from 01-05 his best hr/ab was around 14 in 05. His only other under 20 was a bit over 17 with most seasons around 20. Batting average .240's,.250s The less said about 06 the better. For the Red Sox he was horrible, and hardly played.
Then in 07 he hits 46hr .282 average - 10.65 ab/hr!
Followed by a return to ab/hr in the high teens the next few years
Babe Ruth had a season at 10.57 - 1930 36th
and one at 10.85 - 1929 46th
So there's your guy. Carlos Pena 6 years of below average to marginal performance followed by a Babe Ruth ish year.
Then followed by a few seasons of very good but not spectacular performance.
This is actually a lot of fun.
And if the Sox had ever signed Kingman Bonds enhanced 73 would be thought of as merely a nice try. A righty that hits almost exclusively gargantuan popups playing in Fenway! That would have been incredible.
Steve B
So there's
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