Greatest of all time

[Jlighter]

Originally Posted by pokerplyr80

With a couple of threads about the greatest living player, I figured why not start one to see who everyone's top 5, or 10 of all time are. I'll start it out with mine.

1. Ruth
2. Mays
3. Cobb
4. Williams
5. Mantle

Replace Mantle with Gehrig and you have a list.

[Louieman]

1. Ruth
2. Mays
3. Satchel Paige
4. Bonds
5. Henderson

[Enfuego]

1. Ruth
2. Cobb
3. Mays
4. Gherig
5. Mantle

[Vintagevault13]

1. Gehrig
2. Ruth
3. Aaron
4. Mays
5. Cobb

[Peter_Spaeth]

Ruth Mays Cobb Williams Wagner

then

Aaron Gehrig Musial Mantle Hornsby

would rate pitchers separately

[jerrys]

1. Ruth
2. Cobb
3. Mays
4. Gehrig
5. Williams

[iwantitiwinit]

1. Ruth
2. Gehrig
3. Cobb
4. Williams
5. DiMaggio

[ls7plus]

Originally Posted by Jlighter

Replace Mantle with Gehrig and you have a list.

In a word, no. Gehrig's stats appear so much better because he played most of his career in the era when it was far and away the easiest time to score runs. No relief specialists, no night games, no west coast travel, smaller gloves, no sliders, etc. In reality, Mantle had a higher percentage of runs created as against league average than Gehrig (though not by a lot), one of, if not THE best yardstick for comparing players of different eras, where the game was played under significantly different conditions. Both, by the way, are among just 8 or so players who created more than 200% of league average runs scored during the eras in which they played.

This is a little like author Roger Kahn saying that Stan Musial was the greatest hitter he ever saw, as if it remained a matter of opinion after the sabermetric revolution. No, Roger, no. While Musial was indeed great, you also saw Ted Williams and Mantle--both were demonstrably, objectively and unequivocally greater.

Best player: Babe Ruth

Best hitter: Ted Williams (his CAREER runs created % vs league average of 250% beat Gehrig's best year, 249% in 1927)

Best pitcher: dead heat--Lefty Grove and Walter Johnson

Regards to all,

Larry