Frank A just made a very good point in the post above yours. Ruth didn't have that luxury of only going 5-6-7 innings then having the bullpen come in, he went the distance. Or Ruth's ERA would be even lower and Ohtani even higher if he had to go as deep in a game.

Of course you can come back with Ruth didn't play against everyone he could have played against.

It could go back and forth, bottom line is the final numbers in the book, and Ruth's annihilate Ohtani's pitching & hitting statistics. Not even a comparison. Call me in 10 years, when the Angels still suck.

Trout's been stuck in purgatory 11 years ZERO playoff wins .083 lifetime playoff batting average. Enjoy the money boys, you'll never wear the ring!! Unless they are bidders in Goldin's Auctions.

In fact I'll go on record and say Trout's Rookie Card will sink like a stone once his career is over and he never made a WS appearance.

A rich man's Ernie Banks.

There will some new "best ever" player who will be the hot thing to own.

SELL NOW

Are you referring to Ruth's ERA being so much lower than Ohtani's, even though Ruth pitched in more than 5X the number of games in his career than Ohtani has so far, and that during the dead ball era teams scored less runs than they do now, and thus a reason why Ruth's era was so much lower? Or how about the that fact that of the 147 games Ruth started in his career, 107 of them were complete games, whereas of the 27 games Ohtani has started in his MLB career, he has yet to pitch a single complete game?

love it!!!!!!!!!

In Ohtani's defense, he is not allowed to pitch a full game. They take him out in the 6th inning and let the relievers lose it for him. Had he stayed in some of those games his record would probably be 11 or 12 wins. Angels bullpen pitches like shit.

Some additional pitching comparisons:

Ruth at 94-46 and Ohtani at 9-4, have comparable winning percentages of around .691-.692. But Ohtani has started a total 27 MLB games so true winning percentage based on actual starts is really only .333. Meanwhile, Ruth has 94 wins in 147 starts, for a true winning percentage based on starts of around .693. Now to be fair, Ruth also had 16 relief appeances in his career, leading to a total of 163 pitching appearances lifetime. I doubt all 16 of those relief appearances resulted in wins for Ruth, but even if you factor in all his pitching appearences, he still ends up with an overral winning percentage based appearences of about .577, quite a bit higher than Ohtani.

Nows here's a pitching stat that does favor Ohtani. Over his career so far, MLB batters have averaged hitting only .199 against him, whereas Ruth's career average by hitters batting against him was .224, which though still really good, is a bit higher. Of course, in Ohtani's case the MLB batting average during the years he's pitched in so far is .248, so he's doing .049 better than the league average, not bad at all. Oooohhh, wait though, during the years Ruth pitched the MLB batting average was .332, which means Ruth was .108 below the MLB average, pitching over a much longer period of time and a lot more appearances, the majority of which were complete games.

Ohtani is still considered in the early part of his MLB career, and therefore has a lot more playing to do and stats to put up. However, he's already incurred significant injuries and downtime from playing, and in going forward in his MLB career to get close to some Ruth pitching stats will take an exceptional improvement in some areas for him to begin approaching Ruth. I wish him well, good player.

I think nobody has suffered more statistically for this modern thing than Jacob DeGrom.

League batting average was .263 in 1919.

Is it possible that the reason pitchers 100 years ago were able to complete so many games and pitch so many innings is because they didn’t throw the ball as hard? Sure, maybe Walter Johnson hit the low to mid 90s a few times each game but maybe he and other pitchers only threw that hard in specific spots… and for most of the games they were throwing 80-85, saving wear on their arms.

It doesn't take anything away from the Babe to acknowledge how special Ohtani is and what he is doing in this age of modern baseball and the physical specimens that play the game. The only reason that there is a comparison is the fact that no player has performed to this level as both a pitcher and everyday player since Babe did it for a short period of time back in the day. I don't think there is anything wrong with showing appreciation for both and marvel at what Shohei is doing.

I mean, it’s hard to understand how pitchers of today, with better size, physique and training, break down while pitchers in 1900-1920, who were smaller, were completing every game and throwing 300-400 innings every year, year after year, in shorter rotations. They couldn’t have been throwing as hard.

And how did all of those 5’7 165 pound guys get their 45 ounce bats around on 95 mph fastballs?

That's absolutely the reason. They also didn't strike out nearly as many guys so were throwing fewer pitches to each hitter. This idea that they were all these superhuman endurance machines because they threw a ton of complete games is just nonsense.

Wasn't knocking Ohtani for not pitching complete games. Just noting that since most pitchers get tired as a game goes on, you would normally expect them to be giving up more hits and runs by pitching later into games, which tends to make Ruth's career ERA even more impressive when compared to Ohtani.

And as for Ohtani not getting wins his bullpen blew, that argument cuts both ways. How many more wins/less losses might Ruth have if he had been regularly taken out of games when he did start tiring?

Feller is one guy. And he wouldn't be the fastest guy if he's throwing 98 today. Or even top 15 or 20. If Johnson was really throwing 89 - or 91 - then that's a 7-9 mph jump in 30 years. And the top guys now are throwing 104 or 105 - a 6-7 mph jump since Feller. Except now there's DOZENS of guys throwing 98-101 where back in Feller's day, there was....Feller. There's a physiological maximum for the human body in terms of throwing hard. And now there's a lot more guys that are a lot closer to that max then ever before.

I don't believe for a second that the distances from back then are accurate or measured in the same way as today's home runs.

Are there stats comparing pitch counts across eras?

Stats are just numbers. Figures lie and liars figure, and we have some on this forum.

All numbers aside Brian has summarized the intent of this thread without using a calculator, or an abacus for that matter.

Bravo!

Not arguing, just look at Ruth's Advanced Pitching stats on baseball-reference.com

The .332 is shown as the MLB average supposedly over the years Ruth was pitching, unless I'm reading something wrong.

I think you are for in the American League

1915 .248
1916 .248
1917 .248
1918 .254
1919 .268

How you get .332 for these five years would suggest that you need a new abacus or

perhaps you were looking at On Base Percentage or OBP. I dunno.

And i'm happy with my current accountant.:D

Because baseball is the only sport that matters.

Would The Four Horsemen flourish in today's NFL?

No, tennis isn't even close to the way it was back then. I'm not sure if or how tennis balls have changed over the years, but the old catgut string on a racket had way less tension than the modern string fiber used today. It is a bit like comparing the tension on a large trampoline to the tension on a mini-trampoline. It was way harder to ace your opponent on the serve back then, or even get the serious speed tennis professionals pack today in their swings, chiefly because of the way that the modern metallic rackets can withstand all of that pressure compared to the wooden rackets of yesteryear. Maybe Tilden could have adapted his game to modern equipment and been successful in any era, but my point is that the game has changed considerably over time.

Ruth likely would have pitched for many years if the DH had existed.

Interesting. So did this start to happen in the 70s with that new racket Connors used, or was it earlier?

I'd like to clear something up regarding MPH for pitchers. Nowadays the speed is measured right after release, while back in the day it was measured at the plate, causing speeds to seem much lower compared to today, but actually being the same. Thus Feller's 98 is not equaled by anyone today.

Isn't 500 feet the same today as it was back in Ruth's time? Tell me something - how is it that given today's larger talent pool and better training, diet science, etc., and a more aerodynamically designed baseball to boot, how is it that 500+ foot big league game homers are still exceedingly rare, but in 1921 Ruth hit one in every American League park his played? For anyone to say Ruth was anything even close to an average ballplayer of ANY era is to close one's mind to all evidence and deny the truth . . . that he was an absolute freak!

I'm not sure what they're showing in the Advanced Pitching statistics then. Here's the links for both Ruth and Ohtani, Look for yourself, I'm not making this up. They show the Batting Against Averages of all players against both Ruth and Ohtani over their careers, and then right below those figures they show what they call the MLB Averages. I can't tell how the site is coming up with those specific MLB Average numbers though. Would think/hope they are consistent in the way they are being calculated so that whatever they actually represent, Ruth's is still much lower than whatever they are measuring than Ohtani's is.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/p...ruthba01.shtml


https://www.baseball-reference.com/p...ohtansh01.shtm


And who ever said I wanted to be your accountant???

This is known as doing a deep dive, research-wise, and very well done, Bob.

Sorry - somehow there was a double entry here.

No, it was far later. I used to play tennis pretty regularly in the '70s, and I remember the catgut-strung rackets very well. Jimmy Connors had to use them
along with Bjorn Borg, Arthur Ashe, etc. The modern ones are incredible! I got a firsthand experience with one of those about ten years ago. It is so easy to get some serious velocity on the ball nowadays compared to the effort it took way back then.

Sorry Bob & Rob. I'm afraid you two have done a deep dive in the shallow end of the pool by including four years in which Babe Ruth pitched in a total of 4 games for a total of 31 innings. You really think adding 31 innings and allowing two seasons in the early 30s to skew your statistics is valid.

To further illustrate the futility of your argument, name one year, just one year, in either league where the league batting average was .332?

Just answer the last question if you can.

You may be surprised to learn that in 1930 the National League batting average was .303. I believe the Yankees were in the American League in 1930. 1930 is the only year that any league average was above .300. I just wanted to save you some time.;)

Post #110 reiterated in post #117 is the best explanation of why this thread was started and why it is relevant in baseball history.

You cannot compare eras with numbers, different game, different talent, different century. if you cannot understand that, so be it.

And not to worry, I still love you all.

Perhaps the new inclusion of Negro Leagues status is skewing those MLB figures? I don't know that's the explanation but taking the AL and NL obviously the MLB average could not have been anywhere near .332.

More likely the numbers on the site are wrong.

I don't think anyone has said that 500 feet has changed or that Ruth was an average ballplayer. I think some of us (well, maybe just me) are questioning whether Ruth actually hit as many 500+ foot home runs as has been claimed. I don't think bigger ball parks is the answer because, yes, there were some crazy long distances to center field, but some were way shorter down the lines and to the power alleys (many having been built specifically to fit into a city block).

I guess if someone was able to determine to what field he hit each home run that year, and what row each one landed in, they could work something like that out...and maybe someone has.

And I am not saying that Ruth wasn't the greatest player ever. Just that perhaps some of the quoted home run distances need to be taken with a grain of salt.

I agree with you that that despite today's larger talent pool and better training, diet science, etc., and a more aerodynamically designed baseball to boot, 500+ foot big league game homers are exceedingly rare.

That just makes me question how so many could have been hit 100 years go under worse conditions.

But if anyone could hit 500+ foot home runs in every AL park in a year, it would have been Ruth. I certainly can't say for a fact that he didn't.

That is funny, because in the very first post to start this thread you ended up including all kinds of figures and stats for Ruth and Ohtani yourself. You even asked the specific question, "So how have they done?", which is basically telling everyone to compare their stats. Now, did you tell everyone in your opening post to not start comparing Ruth to Ohtani beyond those single years for both of them? No! But you know darn well that people on here are going to start comparing their overall stats and how you can't compare the two and blah, blah, blah. You can pretty much expect the thread will also get hijacked somewhat in the recurring modern versus old time player comparisons and who is better, and blah, blah, blah again. So why didn't you just leave out all the actual stats and simply say that 2021 and Ohtani is the first time since 1919 and Ruth that we've had a full time pitcher and everyday player in MLB, wish Ohtani well, and leave it at that?

Damn it, I want to know where that .332 comes from, now it's bothering me.

It comes from the table below on Ruth's Baseball Reference page but I have no idea what it represents. The number doesn't make sense to me.

Yes sorry I saw it in the table I just don't know how on earth it is derived.

Here's a question for the good doctor.

If Ohtani pitched back then his career would be over basically before it started right?

He had Tommy John surgery in 2019, what doctor in 1919 is fixing that for him?

GOODNIGHT!!!!!!

.332 is not because of the Negro League stats being included. I checked a few years and the numbers seemed normal. For example, in 1930 the NNL batting average was .277 which would actually have brought the AL and NL averages down.

Yeah that makes sense. Must be some massive database error.

What's odd is that the slugging average of .372 seems to be too low while the BA seems to be too high.

Edited to add: actually .372 may be correct for the average of those eight seasons...it just seems wrong given that the BA is so high.

I looked for a pitcher of roughly the same era (not ERA) and for some reason Stan Coveleski came to mind and his stats have the same issue.

Clearly we are missing something, or as Peter said, there is a database issue.

I did the same for Alexander. There must be some years in that mix they just have way wrong.

HOPE I DIDN'T WAKE YOU.

During my residency, one of the orthopedic residents was Lew Yocum. We were friends. He went on to become the Angels team physician for years and worked in conjunction with Dr. Frank Jobe, his senior partner, (frankjmd). Jobe gave a lot of the credit for modifications of his Tommy John procedure to Yocum. I believe Lew was present assisting in Tommy John's original Tommy John surgery.

Yocum was born in 1947 so technically you are correct. Anesthesia in 1919 wasn't so hot either. I was never trying to say Ohtani is better than Ruth or ultimately will be better than Ruth. Any numbers in the OP were merely presented to show the similarity of the two seasons for a pitcher/hitter. No other season comes close in terms of similarity score. I regret that many think this thread denigrates Ruth. It does not. Nor does it elevate Ohtani to the same level. It is what it is. The thread has had a number of views, but perhaps the launch angle was improperly conceived, but lets not get into a discussion of abortion. The thread has a right to live on Net54.

Speaking of surgeons, looks like Dr. James Andrews is still active at almost 80 years old. That's awesome.

And I'm just saying to those who say Ruth couldn't compete in today's game and Walter Johnson couldn't pitch today....

....that considering how many of today's pitchers have come back from Tommy John surgery, they obviously couldn't play back then. They'd be done before they started.

Also, I'd like to see Bryce Harper & Mike Trout in Afganistan. Like Matty & Cobb went off to War, or the guys who had jobs in the offseason. Not working out all offseason, or coddled and groomed to be baseball players basically since birth. I'd be stunned if Trout knew how to start a lawnmower.

Trout grew up in a middle class suburb, no? He probably cut his grass once or twice lol.

That's okay Frank, because in one of Ohtani's years he pitched in 2 total games for only 1.2 innings. So that skews the stats for him as well, right? At least using your logic it would seem so. Of course, exactly what stats does that skew by the way?

As for the averages, I'm only quoting off the baseball-reference.com site, which I've always been led to believe was a fairly accurate site when it came to statistics. So I do not know the complete nature and origin of the numbers I was quoting as comparisons for Ruth and Ohtani. Someone else mentioned that the recent inclusion of Negro League stats may have had a hand in the seemingly odd numbers shown on baseball-reference.com for Ruth. I had forgotten about that myself, and don't know if that is the reason or not. What I do know is that I was responding to someone else who it looked like was claiming that Ruth's lifetime ERA was only better than Ohtani's because he pitched in the dead ball era. I was merely noting things to dispel such thinking for all dead ball era pitchers, not just Ruth. I only referenced Ruth and Ohtani because they are the players being talked about in this thread. I did not originally hijack your thread to compare Ruth and Ohtani's careers, or ever say Ohtani was better than Ruth or vice versa. i also didn't start the talk about comparing players from one era with another either, I merely joined in the conversation that the thread had morphed into. I actually agree with you about this year being the first comparable year since Ruth in 1919 that you can see someone doing what Ohtani is doing in 2021.

By the way, you mention that stat I got off Baseball-Reference.com and how you illustrate the futility of my argument by doing so apparently. Well, what argument is futile then? That was one of several things I mentioned in regards to countering someone implying Ruth had a good ERA only because he pitched in the dead ball era. That was the argument I was talking about. And even if that figure from the reference site is somehow wrong, that doesn't change any of the other figures I'd mentioned that Ruth has to show he was a good pitcher, dead ball era or not. So by coming after me about the invalidity of my "argument", that must mean you feel that Ruth having pitched during the dead ball era does diminish his stats and accomplishments, and by extension, more or less diminishes the abilities and accomplishments of all other dead ball era pitchers as well, right!?!?!?!?!?

And as for your direct question about naming the single year that either the NL or AL had an average of .332, I never thought that would have been reached either, but merely quoted the stat the reference site had and therefore assumed was correct for whatever numbers went into it. In looking at it further, it probably is an error on the part of the reference site and likely is OBP shown on Ruth's site after all, at least that's my guess. If I instead use the BAs for the years he pitched in, the average will probably be more like .266, which is about .044 higher than his lifetlme BA Against of .224. Ohtani's lifetime BA Against is about .049 better than the MLB BA average during his pitching years then, so the very slight edge goes to Ohtani for this one, but that in and of itself doesn't disparage Ruth's pitching in the dead ball era. So how about this instead since the original comment I was responding to dealt with Ruth's ERA. Off the Baseball Almanac site they show total runs scored by the AL and NL going all the way back to 1901. Using the 10 year's Ruth pitched in, the average total MLB runs (w/o the Negro Leagues) scored came out to be about 10,011 per season. So for all 16 teams back then in both leagues playing full schedules that means that the average over that time was about 4.12 runs scored per game. I broke it down to runs per game because of the shortened 2020 season, and the not yet complete 2021 season. So for 2019-2021, there have been 46,214 runs scored to date, in 9,874 games, or a runs per game total of about 4.68 runs per game. So the difference from back in the dead ball era to the modern baseball era, at least for the specific years we're looking at, was only about half a run per game difference. Not really as big a difference as you may have thought since it was called the dead ball era. And Ruth's career ERA was 2.28, which was about 1.84 lower than the runs per game average for Ruth's time, and that was with him pitching mostly complete games. Ohtani's career ERA is currently at about 3.58, which is only about 1.10 lower than the average runs being scored per game now, and is also based on him only throwing partial games and getting pulled around the 6th innings. Now he is also still getting over and recovering from injury, so hopefully that will improve even more over time, as will his pitching stats then. Regardless, he still has a ways to go if he wants to get closer to Ruth's ERA figures though.

So in response to the poster who downplayed Ruth's ERA because he pitched in the dead ball era, I'll throw this additional info out to replace the error in stats from the reference site, and replace it with this info about how much lower his ERA was against the approximate MLB average, sans the Negro Leagues, for his time. This was not is response to you, or your comments about what people are posting in the thread you started.

Excellent point about comparing players from different eras, medical advances is a huge part in players of today versus yesteryear.