1924 World Series footage

[Snapolit1]

Not challenging your research, but I'm not impressed by generational bias. I talk to seniors all the time . . . everything was great in the 40s and 50s. . . no one had any issues . . . . everyone was unfailingly polite . . . my god all the singers were so much more talented than people today. . . . my god the movies were all so much better..... I'm sure you get the idea. I think we all sugar coat the good old days as we get older to more or less degrees. And I think its particularly pronounced in sports.

Originally Posted by Hankphenom

Yes, but I do think that pitcher effectiveness, including the fastball, might just be the closest you can get in all of sports. And in my research, I did pay a lot of attention to the opinions of people who experienced the game close at hand in the "Golden Era" and were still doing that several generations later, into the 1980s, in fact. While certainly not dispositive, and allowing for some generational bias, you have to listen to them. And I don't think I ever came across any of the old timers who claimed that Nolan Ryan was faster than Johnson, not one; or Ryne Duren; or Sandy Koufax; or Herb Score; or Bob Feller (who was always the first to say he thought that Johnson was the greatest pitcher ever and also the fastest); or Lefty Grove; or Dazzy Vance. Who knows what they would have to say about Clemons, or Pedro, or Randy Johnson, or Chapman, etc.? The string runs out when all the old guys are dead. One thing we know for sure is that one of these days, if not already, someone will come along who throws harder than Johnson did. That's guaranteed. Records are made to be broken, as the saying goes, and Walter has lost a lot of them over the years. I can hear him now, saying, "Well, that's just fine," in his Kansas twang. But Larry Ritter didn't name his book "The Glory of All Times" for a reason. To be "The Glory of Their Times" is all any of us could ask for, and those guys knew they were the luckiest sons of bitches ever born, to be where they were doing what they did. That will always have to be enough for them--and for us.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

Not challenging your research, but I'm not impressed by generational bias. I talk to seniors all the time . . . everything was great in the 40s and 50s. . . no one had any issues . . . . everyone was unfailingly polite . . . my god all the singers were so much more talented than people today. . . . my god the movies were all so much better..... I'm sure you get the idea. I think we all sugar coat the good old days as we get older to more or less degrees. And I think its particularly pronounced in sports.

Fair enough. I'm convinced that in my time of the 60s-80s, the music was better, the movies were better, the books were better, TV was better, the food was...no, actually, the food is much better now. I see what you mean.

[Snapolit1]

Originally Posted by Hankphenom

Fair enough. I'm convinced that in my time of the 60s-80s, the music was better, the movies were better, the books were better, TV was better, the food was...no, actually, the food is much better now. I see what you mean.

People always say the music from the 50s and 60s was so great. It wasn’t. There was a ton of garbage music. But that goes away into obscurity and what it played on classic rock stations today is the 1% of hit songs. You hear the one hit wonder …. Not the six terrible albums the same band recorded. Same with movies. The great movies from the 70s are a staple of television. No one plays the bad movies. Television from the 70s and 80s is not 1/1 millionth as good as the production value and quality of what is available to stream today.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

People always say the music from the 50s and 60s was so great. It wasn’t. There was a ton of garbage music. But that goes away into obscurity and what it played on classic rock stations today is the 1% of hit songs. You hear the one hit wonder …. Not the six terrible albums the same band recorded. Same with movies. The great movies from the 70s are a staple of television. No one plays the bad movies. Television from the 70s and 80s is not 1/1 millionth as good as the production value and quality of what is available to stream today.

I couldn't disagree more. Of course, anything in the realm of art is always a matter of taste. You like today's music? Fine, you listen to it to your heart's delight. I have my Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin, Who, Airplane, Dylan, etc., etc., etc., compilations that never get old for me. You like today's TV, with its frenetic editing and ridiculous story lines? Give me my Twilight Zone, Star Triek, Gunsmoke, old movies from the 30s and 40s, etc., reruns any day over that crap, but you binge on today's overproduced vapidity all you want. I can't remember the last time I didn't come out of a movie thinking it was too long, too loud, too jacked up for limited attention spans, but you go see "Barbie" as many times as you like. The movies of my youth were about real people, the real world, things that mattered, which is what art should illuminate, IMO, not just blow away your eyeballs and ears for enough time to get them away from a tiny screen for a nanosecond. And yes, there has always been a lot of junk catering to the masses produced to cash in, but I do think the 60s and 70s actually had more of the cream rising to the top in terms of that, too. "I'm talkin' 'bout my g-g-generation!" and damn proud of it.

[Snapolit1]

Of course Barbie is a great example of fluff.

But it wasn’t nominated for a single academy award.

Try comparing the artistic achievement of Oppenheimer to moves of the 70s.

Originally Posted by Hankphenom

I couldn't disagree more more. Of course,
anything in the realm of art is always a matter of taste. You like today's music? Fine, you listen to it to your heart's delight. I have my Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin, Who, Airplane, Dylan, etc., etc., etc., compilations that never get old for me. You like today's TV, with its frenetic editing and ridiculous story lines? Give me my Twilight Zone, Star Triek, Gunsmoke, old movies from the 30s and 40s, etc., reruns any day over that crap, but you binge on today's overproduced vapidity all you want. I can't remember the last time I didn't come out of a movie thinking it was too long, too loud, too jacked up for limited attention spans, but you go see "Barbie" as many times as you like. The movies of my youth were about real people, the real world, things that mattered, which is what art should illuminate, IMO, not just blow away your eyeballs and ears for enough time to get them away from a tiny screen for a nanosecond. And yes, there has always been a lot of junk catering to the masses produced to cash in, but I do think the 60s and 70s actually had more of the cream rising to the top in terms of that, too. "I'm talkin' 'bout my g-g-generation!" and damn proud of it.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

Of course Barbie is a great example of fluff. But it wasn’t nominated for a single academy award. Try comparing the artistic achievement of Oppenheimer to moves of the 70s.

Of course, there are examples of great movies (and music, and TV, and books, etc.) and lousy ones in every era. "Oppenheimer" would have fit right in the 1970s, that's why it shocked people that it did so well. From Patton, Godfathers I and II, French Connection, Clockwork Orange, through Chinatown, The Conversation, Jaws, Taxi Driver, Animal House, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Star Wars, Blazing Saddles, Network, to Halloween, Apocalypse Now (the original, not the crappy "director's cut,") Alien, etc., the 1970s is regarded as the last golden age of Hollywood. Any comparison you try to make between that decade of movies and more recent ones is going to lose hands down, I believe. But we digress.

[jingram058]

Originally Posted by Hankphenom

I couldn't disagree more more. Of course, anything in the realm of art is always a matter of taste. You like today's music? Fine, you listen to it to your heart's delight. I have my Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin, Who, Airplane, Dylan, etc., etc., etc., compilations that never get old for me. You like today's TV, with its frenetic editing and ridiculous story lines? Give me my Twilight Zone, Star Triek, Gunsmoke, old movies from the 30s and 40s, etc., reruns any day over that crap, but you binge on today's overproduced vapidity all you want. I can't remember the last time I didn't come out of a movie thinking it was too long, too loud, too jacked up for limited attention spans, but you go see "Barbie" as many times as you like. The movies of my youth were about real people, the real world, things that mattered, which is what art should illuminate, IMO, not just blow away your eyeballs and ears for enough time to get them away from a tiny screen for a nanosecond. And yes, there has always been a lot of junk catering to the masses produced to cash in, but I do think the 60s and 70s actually had more of the cream rising to the top in terms of that, too. "I'm talkin' 'bout my g-g-generation!" and damn proud of it.

Totally agree with every word.

As I said, if you think all they were throwing is 85 mph at the major league level in the 1920s, you're dumber than a box of rocks. Ask Ray Chapman about that 85 mph ball that effing killed him. How did you ever successfully make it in life? Certainly not by playing or understanding the game of baseball. My God, I'm 66 years old and I can hit 85 mph, as proven by batting cages a couple of weeks ago. If all they were throwing was 85 mph, and I could time travel, you would be collecting my cards!