Greatest Baseball Player of all time...

Interesting to see how the answer to this question changes over time...

I would have loved to see what Josh Gibson could have done in the bigs...but I'm gonna go with Ruth.

He is still the giant astride the baseball world...I mean what other player is so revered that breaking his second place record would still be a big deal?

I agree with you. Too bad his curse against he Red Sox wore off a few years ago.

:hi:

But his numbers and influence just don't match up...if his career hadn't been cut short so early!

BTW: I hope they follow through and include Kirby's name on the new stadium. I heard "Puckett field at stadium - was being mulled over

Everyone would call it Puckett Field anyway.

It is the all around package, which Kirby had while playing.

I must have read his autobiography about 50 times when I was a kid. He was fast, a great fielder, could hit for power and for average. I was too young to see him play (along with everyone else on your list except for Barry Bonds), but I'm a huge fan just the same :)

There have been times when I thought Mays...I go back and forth alot!

Plus he is a great guy. I've NEVER heard anyone saying anything bad about Wilie Mays.
He also got drafted and served in the Army during the Korean War. Missed about another 55 HR's or so, I figure.
At the very least, Mays is the greatest "all around" ballplayer of all time.

Unfortunately, he had so many health problems that the Army considered him 4F and wouldn't take him for Korea.
He accomplished all he did while sick and drunk as a skunk. He is reputed to have said that if he knew he was going to live so long, he would have taken better care of himself. All the men in his family had died young of Hodgkin's disease.
Can you tell that I'm a Mickey Mantle fan too?

I'm just amazed he accomplished as much as he did, considering his ailments. His mother had to argue with the Docs who wanted to amputate his leg. He was fortunate that penicillin was the new wonder drug at that time & his leg was saved. It continued to bother him for years though. I think that was the start of his alcohol problem, he was self medicating with booze.

I'm not a big baseball fan but I've always been a fan of The Mick due to distant family ties. Plus him being a fellow Okie helps. :)

That he was. But Honus Wagner totally punked him one years when the Pirates played the Tigers in the World Series (1909, I believe). Hey, Honus deserves to be one of the choices too.

Sad, really.

I like the greats: Hank Aaron, Joe Dimaggio, that black shoeless guy, that other guy, and the one who played in the 70s.

Sorry, I'm pitiful at remembering names, especially of sports guys, since I don't care about sports.

Do you mean Shoeless Joe Jackson? He was white and played for the 1919 Chicago White Sox. The team became known as the Black Sox because the players supposedly threw the World Series and Shoeless was supposed to part of the ring. His performance though indicates he did not participate in any attempt to throw the series. He was still expelled from baseball.

But now that you bring it up, I remember the Sox problem and yes, Shoeless Joe Jackson is the one I was thinking of.

But I am distinctly remembering - though surely faultily - a black guy who also played shoeless.

have been in use for 30+ years and *other* than the pedestrian steroid argument there is really little debate that Bonds is the best ever.

He had 2 of the best *seasons* ever, yes. He was, by a long shot, the best player of his generation WELL BEFORE the beefing-up.

But....

He was, in his prime, an outstanding left fielder. But LF is not nearly as important a position as CF (Mays, Cobb, Speaker), SS (Wagner), 2B (Morgan, Hornsby, Collins), or C (Gibson). The runs saved by a great left fielder do not win as many games as the runs saved by the "up the middle" positions. Lest we forget, Bonds also has a rag-arm -- what do you mean he couldn't throw out SID FUCKING BREAM? :o

Bonds absolutely deserves his place in the debate alongside Ruth and Williams as to who was the greatest HITTER ever, and that is independent of the steroid issue (my personal conclusion from my studies in the matter is that 'roids don't do much to help a hitter, anyway -- at least not to the extent that they can help a pitcher). But I'd still place him a couple of spots below his godfather in the overall player rankings.

And I'd even put Willie a couple of spots south of #1.

Anyone who had Hall-of-Fame talent both on the mound and at the plate has to take the cake. For students of the Negro Leagues, Martin Dihigo would be an outstanding comparison (Dihigo didn't hit like Ruth, but was a better pitcher; and could play ANY position in the field, rather than just right and left -- Ruth was still better, but Martin Dihigo was, IMO, a top-twenty all-time player).

Your poll is missing one significant star: Honus Wagner. In 1908, Wagner dominated his league to a greater extent than Ruth ever did. There weren't nearly as many HRs hit in Wagner's day, but his overall offensive performance was comparable to the Babe. Just look at it this way: someone who hits like Ruth, AND plays shortstop like Ozzie Smith (maybe a shred below Ozzie, but not THAT much below). I'd want him on my team. ;)

But you already knew that.

Did the DVDs work?

Outstanding...and thanks for sending along the extra Kirby special!!!!


Now that the stadium was approved I hope they stick to the idea of having Kirby's name on it...even if the have to have a corporate name

Puckett Field at 3M stadium wouldn't be bad...everyone would call it Puckett Field!

Did you watch that game last night...wow!!!

It rocked.

The Twins have hit 6 grand slams this year (after Justin Morneau's salami tonight).

Cuddyer hit two last week! I wonder what the record is for shortest period of time between two salamis? Cuddyer has to be close on that one.

...because no one, not even Ruth, dominated his era like Bonds did. From 2000-2004, Bonds simply was *the* most dominant player of all time. Every opposing manager, every opposing pitcher, had to adjust their entire strategy simply for his sake. His impact on every game he played was overwhelming, and he single-handedly improved the Giants by about 10-12 games all by himself. Not even Ruth did that.
"But what about the steroids"? *They don't matter*. Tbey have *nothing* to do with the issue under discussion. The question is not who was the most Platonically pure athlete in baseball history, who would be the "best" on some absolute weight scale in Heaven. It's who helped his team win the most games. And that man is Barry Bonds. It didn't matter if Bonds corked his bat, used steroids, or went up to home plate in a damned tank. Those games from 2000-2004 are in the books, and his role in the Giant's' victories in those years will never be undone. Any more than the games over the years won by cheating pitchers, or corked bats, or stolen signs, or the greenies and bennies of the 60s and 70s. Or all the games pitched by pitchers on the Juice the past generation--and it's pretty clear that more pitchers used it than hitters. In my opinion, incidentally, Bonds' performances have been less influenced by the Juice than people think, but that';s another matter...Nor does the "over-all" excellence of Mays, say, as a "five-tool" player put him over Bonds or Ruth. Those five tools aren't all of the same importance, and at Bonds' peak, he was a *much* greater hitter than Mays--and hitting is by far the most important aspect of baseball. And Bonds could run and field a little when he was younger, too...

...as an all-around ballplayer. Of course, do you want a fleet-of-foot center fielder who is among the best hitters of his generation (c.f. Mays, Speaker), or a catcher who can mash the shit out of the ball (c.f. Bench, except a much better hitter)? It's a tough decision to make.

In part because of the lack of catching-related knee strain, Charleston had a much longer career....

:) I've got no problem with Oscar Charleston getting voted ahead of Gibson. He was a better player on many levels, but when it came to hitting, Gibson had a level of play no one else has ever had. I guess that same basic argument is held in every sport--the amazing phenom versus the superlative multi-dimentional talent.

Both players are on my list of "Athletes I most wish I had seen."

between Edgar Martinez and Jay Buhner...and yes, i'm extremely biased...:) It's hard to pick between them, Bone is such a bad ass, and Edgar is just so consistant(most of the time)...I wish the HOF was more lenient ot DH hitters, but alas, cause of Edgars bad knee's, he probably won't make it due to the bias against DH's...

because I don't think you can compare ballplayers across eras. Too many variables.

sentimental like that
:hi:

.384 lifetime batting average, 975 home runs, 84 in one season, hit a ball OUT of Yankee stadium. Even if half the stories about him are tall tales, he was still the best.

All time leader in stolen bases, runs scored, and leadoff home runs, and was just passed by Barry Bonds for most walks. One of the best ever--better than several on your list, at least.

And the best quoteman since Yogi Berra.

"Rickey scores runs. Runs win games."

Henderson's quotes are so hilarious you wonder if any of them are true! :rofl:

and may the gods help the three lost souls that voted for Bonds:eyes: :wtf:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/g/gehrilo01.shtml

Just look at those stats!

If he'd lasted just a little longer, he'd have been playing in the majors. No question about it. Today there isn't a team in the majors that wouldn't want him.

As people say, he was a five-tool player.

He also had that sixth sense for baseball that Pele had in soccer or Larry Bird had in hoop or Gretzy in hockey.

Say hey, 660!!!

but not by much

:hide:

Either Mays or Ruth.

That being said, I support his not being in the HoF because of his off-the-field behavior. Roberto was the polar opposite - quite the humanitarian and activist.

...and I voted for Gibson. :thumbsup: Bonds will never touch THAT homerun record.

...there IS no record.

There are guesses and cheerleading.

Fact is, better statistics are kept in Little League games today than were kept in the Negro Leagues. We simply don't have accurate data.

That said, nobody can legitimately argue that Gibson, Oscar Charleston, Martin Dihigo, Bullet Joe Rogan, and Pop Lloyd were NOT among the greatest players ever to step on the field. Even John McGraw said Oscar Charleston was the best player who ever lived.

What a great guy he is. Funny as hell, too.

I could never vote for Clemente as "greatest" (would swing at anything -- though, to be fair, he could hit most of 'em -- though he had a terrific arm and covered a lot of ground, he was very error-prone in right), but he's one of my favorites.

I wish I would have been around to see him play.

Back to Buck: did you get the chance to talk to him about his playing days?

One of my favorite quotes. I did get to see him play and treasure the memories - right field corner to third base on the fly? Amazing.

O'Neill: Yes, we talked a bit about me and my Dad being from Pittsburgh and his memories of playing the Grays and Crawfords. He's just a positive guy, who at 93+ can just hold a crowd in the palm of his hand. Even got the crowd doing a call-and-response spiritual before it was all over.

Got a ball autographed too :bounce:

:thumbsup:

We were at a Phillies game and Buck was throwing out the first pitch. We were seated a few chairs away from him and Ken Burns (I guess the Baseball documentary just came out). I got them to sign a ball that Jeff Kent tossed me before the game. It was a pretty cool experience and he was such a nice guy.

However Lou Gherig deserves a mention. BTW, how weird is it that Lou Gherig caught Lou Gherig's disease? No way am I gonna campaign for VD or cancer or parasites or anything nasty.

(not that your poll is strictly about stats)

Numbers don't mean anything. It's a team sport, unique in the world of athletics. Give me a poll made up of sold day-to-day players, players no one's heard of but who have faithfully taken the field for their teams game after game, year after year, working out, taking BP, going on the DL and working hard to get back, riding the pine through slumps, but always, always, serving as the backbones of their teams.

Kirby Puckett comes to mind. For my team, Brian Downing & Darin Erstad come to mind. There are many others whose names I can't think of, hometown favorites because they work their asses off but remain in the shadows.

Runs are a statistic. The team that scores the most runs wins the game. That simple.

It's looking at the statistics that help people realize that Brian Downing WAS indeed a great player (your Halo's were chock-full of 'em in the '80s: Downing, Grich, a couple seasons of Freddy Lynn). I mean, who else could hit cleanup one day and leadoff the next? Sure, Downing was no speed demon, but when you put together a .290 average with 80 walks, you get a guy who's ALWAYS on base for Chili and Bobby and Don and Wally and Jack to drive in.

I love watching Darin Erstad play center and run the bases. He's a hell of a competitor. But if you have a team made up of 8 Darin Erstads (below-average hitter his entire 10-year career except for in '97, '98, and 2000), you're going to lose.

I always thought Brady Anderson was hot... gorgeous eyes... nice butt... and a sweet smile.

Well, here... see for yourself:

Else how would you get a Brian Downing on base to be driven in by a Chili Davis? :) You make a good point, though.

BTW I caught a foul ball in September 89 at Anaheim Stadium. Chili Davis fouled it off . . . a Nolan Ryan pitch. :woohoo: I wish someone young in my family cared about baseball so it would mean something if I passed it on. Oh, well. I'll sure enjoy the memory, looking at it, holding it from time to time, 'til my time comes.

GOD, I love baseball!

He could get distracted sometimes, but when he was ON? He was like Pete Rose with more talent. That man played the game like it was supposed to be played.

Stan Musial.

-22 years. Career .321 average
-20 time all-star
-3 time NL MVP
-1951 MLB player of the year
-For his career
-#4 all time in hits
-#2 all time in total bases
-#19 all time in triples
-#3 all time in doubles
-#23 all time in homers
-#5 all time in RBI's
-#11 all time in bases on balls

I'd say that's a pretty good career. I shudder to think what Stan Musial would make on todays market.

Sabermetrician Bill James : " was never colorful, never much of an interview. He makes a better statue. What he was, was a ballplayer. He didn't spit at fans, he didn't get into fights in nightclubs, he didn't marry anybody famous. He hustled. You look at his career totals of doubles and triples, and they'll remind you of something that was accepted while he was active, and has been largely forgotten since: Stan Musial was one player who always left the batter's box on a dead run."

Babe Ruth without a doubt.

There may have been better athletes, and maybe even better hitters, but none of them ever led the league in home runs and wins in the same year.

Then again, Ruth's lifetime ERA was 22% better than the average of his peers. To put this in perspective, Steve Carlton's ERA (and I don't think anyone will argue that Lefty was NOT a Hall of Fame pitcher) was only 15% better than the league (albeit in a much longer pitching career).

So -- a batter who was TWICE as good as his league (career OPS+ of 207) AND a pitcher who was more effective during his brief pitching career than Steve Carlton, and they're both the same guy?

:wtf:

It's a record that just makes you say...how the HELL did he do that? Particularly with that body. He even stole a lot of bases, and he was a great right-fielder. He could do it all.

His batting stats are the best in MLB history AND he was the top left handed pitcher of his era. Sure, Mays was a great all around player, but the outs he saved on D don't compensate for the extra outs he made on O compared to Ruth.

Nobody dominated his era like Ruth did. In fact, Ruth's numbers are the most dominant in baseball history. IMO, only Negro Leaguers have any sort of an arguement. Ruth's numbers are that good, ask somebody into sabermetrics.

An unhittable pitcher for several years, then the greatest hitter of all time. No contest.

Williams, Cobb, Mantle, Mays, Aaron, Spahn, Cy Young, Joe Jackson, and a few others are in the next tier, but Ruth stands alone, IMO.

Willie Mays is spelled with an ie.