bad link, that's not Barry Bonds.

pgh9fan: I don't think The Splendid Splinter would hit the top three. I know Ty Cobb and Honus Wagner were better and I wouldn't have a problem if someone said that Pete Rose was better. And, none of them were frozen after death.

...

Are you being contrarian just for the sake of being contrarian, or are you just being an nuisance?

Cobb was pretty damned great, and Wagner was pretty damned great, while Rose was just great. Williams, thought, is (almost always) universally regarded as the best all-around hitter in MLB history... and his peers always ranked him at the top.

/some players were greater, all around... like mays and dimaggio
//but teddy ballgame *owned* the plate
/and i could give a fark about the farking red sox, for the record

*thought = *though

/and BEST SWING EVAR

That's funny, this article isn't about Babe Ruth.

pgh9fan: I don't think The Splendid Splinter would hit the top three. I know Ty Cobb and Honus Wagner were better and I wouldn't have a problem if someone said that Pete Rose was better. And, none of them were frozen after death.

That's a decent troll, I guess.

Even Rose admits he couldn't hit like Williams.
(But admit in the Rose way. He didn't have near Williams or anyone else's talent. He just out-hustled everyone.)

/Charlie Hustle

donnielove: A 69 year old story gets a greenlight? Must be Fark.

69?

Yeah, that's Fark.

puffy999: That's funny, this article isn't about Babe Ruth.

Ruth ran pretty good for a fat man.

Of the players with the top 10 lifetime batting averages, Williams is the only person born in the 20th century (and is 3 slots ahead of Ruth). Williams's all-time best lifetime OBP of .482 is 8 points higher than #2 Ruth, and Williams was second only to Ruth in lifetime slugging (.634 to Ruth's ridiculous .690).

Ruth, Cobb, and Gehrig-- not to mention Speaker, Wagner, Jackson, and Hornsby) all played in an earlier era, one in which the strategies of the game were different. Ruth and Hornsby thrived in the live ball era, which inflated batters' numbers. Pitchers had to cope with greater restraints on them, and that also led to batting advantages.

Hell, even some of the rules of hitting were different before the second world war-- until 1931 or '32, a batted ball that bounced over an outfield fence in fair territory was considered a home run (instead of an automatic double, as we rule it today), and umpires called long flies to the bleachers home runs only if they stayed fair until the ball vanished behind a wall or into the seats. The ball was different. And so on.

The others in the list (excluding Rose, because he's barely in the discussion) also all played in the days before integration. Very, very few serious arguments can be made to suggest that Williams was not the greatest hitter of all time, and none of them has been presented yet.

CheekyMunky: Cool followup bro:

I found the story, and I had a few details wrong. Most of them aren't particularly significant, but there's one big one I apparently forgot in the years since I read it... Williams was 54 years old at the time.

Believe it or not, I came in here to make this same reference. Luciano's books are fantastic, and I've never forgotten that particular tale. Or the one about the Nash Rambler the league gave his crew to drive to games that wouldn't make left-hand turns.

Sorry, it was a Nash Metropolitan, not a Rambler. Still funny as hell.

pgh9fan: I don't think The Splendid Splinter would hit the top three. I know Ty Cobb and Honus Wagner were better and I wouldn't have a problem if someone said that Pete Rose was better. And, none of them were frozen after death.

3016

3016

That's the number of singles, doubles, and triples combined hit by Hank Aaron. Without hitting a single home run, Aaron STILL would have had a HOF hitting career. Think about that.

/Williams was probably better, but Aaron was that damn good.

John Paul Jones: Believe it or not, I came in here to make this same reference. Luciano's books are fantastic, and I've never forgotten that particular tale. Or the one about the Nash Rambler the league gave his crew to drive to games that wouldn't make left-hand turns.

I like the story about the guy tripping on acid, and it takes Luciano plus the security guard and about 4-5 cops to subdue the guy.

Teddy F*cking Baseball. Indeed.


Brad_Will: bgddy24601: Spanky_McFarksalot: 'There goes the greatest hitter who ever lived.'"

for some reason I read that as 'hitler" instead of hitter.

You know who else was a great Hitler?

Ty Cobb?

That's a spikin'.

bgddy24601: DrBenway: Teddy F*cking Baseball. Indeed.


Brad_Will: bgddy24601: Spanky_McFarksalot: 'There goes the greatest hitter who ever lived.'"

for some reason I read that as 'hitler" instead of hitter.

You know who else was a great Hitler?

Ty Cobb?

That's a spikin'.

If you had no arms I would kick your ass

I've got to remember to watch Cobb again. Which brings us to this:

puffy999: That's funny, this article isn't about Babe Ruth.

"He ran okay for a fat man."

xpisblack: The others in the list (excluding Rose, because he's barely in the discussion) also all played in the days before integration. Very, very few serious arguments can be made to suggest that Williams was not the greatest hitter of all time, and none of them has been presented yet.

1) Agreed on Rose being overrated. Not much power for a guy who played very little of his career up the middle on defense, even for his era. Average patience for his day. And for all the photos of him sliding like a maniac, his base stealing actually hurt his teams-- 198 SB and 149 CS is worse than 0 SB and 0 CS. Rose had two major skills-- good contact and longevity. But a complete hitter needs power and patience as well. Williams had all of these in spades-- for longevity, just look at his age 41 season, where he hit .316/.451/.645, or his age 38 season, where he hit a ridiculous .388/.526/.731 in 546 PA.

2) While Ruth played in a better overall offensive era, he also outperformed his peers by a wider margin. (OPS+ 207, to Williams' 190.) Integration is a factor, although Williams played a good chunk of his career in a non-integrated league, and another good chunk in a barely-integrated league. You could also just as easily make the case that Williams' career preceded the globalization of baseball, and he was largely only competing against Americans. (I don't think that argument is worth much, but there it is.) There are always rules changes-- Williams hit in generally smaller parks than Ruth, as a counter-example, and the most fair thing to do is compare each player to his peers.

2B) To be fair, when you compare players to their peers, you're less likely to see massive outliers as time marches on. As the late Steven Jay Gould pointed out in Full House (the best book about baseball and evolution!), one trend that has been consistent over the history of baseball is that the standard deviation of performance gets tighter. Modern players grow up with organized leagues and tournaments available from the time they can walk. Players are scouted in high school in probably two dozen countries. They train 12 months a year, whereas in Williams' era it wasn't uncommon to just take the winter off. The strategy has evolved, and teams are managed closer to optimally, unless Dusty Baker is involved. Etc. All of this means that even on very bad teams, there's more raw talent available and the waste gets cut faster, even accounting for expansion.

gameshowhost: and BEST SWING EVAR

I think Ken Griffey Jr. had the sweetest swing.

Eric_Stratton_rush_chairman: I believe Ty Cobb who said Shoeless Joe was the best hitter he ever saw.

That's, like, his opinion, man.

Best hitter in baseball history?



Sadaharu Oh

868 HR
2170 RBI
.634 SLG

Sin_City_Superhero: Best hitter in baseball history?

If you want to go there, I'm the best hitter in baseball history. Last year I hit .726 with 20HR in 18 games in my semi-pro league.

RonwellQuincyDobbs: Agreed. We also don't know if Ruth would have been able to hit the slider. Ted is number one in my book.

We also don't know if Williams could have hit badly scuffed baseballs or the spitball, which was weirdly partially legal during Ruth's prime. We don't know if either of them could hit the split-finger fastball, the cutter, the circle change, or the shuuto. You could make this argument against any player, and can probably keep making it the future as new variants become popular or fade away.

FWIW, Wikipedia credits Chief Bender for being the inventor of the slider, and he predates Ruth by a touch.

JohnBigBootay: Fixed. Why do people do this? That the man served in the military at all is remarkable, but every time I see someone mention it they always say he did what he did despite 'serving 5 years in the marines mid-career'. No, he did not. He played a full 150 game season in 1942, then he misses 43,44,45 in the service and he played a full 150 game season in 1946. He missed three years of baseball while in the service. No need to exaggerate.

You might want to ask yourself why Ted only had 12 PA in 1952 and 110 PA in 1953 before you get all huffy. Hint: Not injury. Other hint: One of his wingmen in 1953 is still alive, and had a pretty good career in other occupations.

JohnBigBootay: chimp_ninja: You might want to ask yourself w

so what you;re saying is he went to Korea too...

Didn't just go. They offered him a desk job, and instead he volunteered to fly a shiatload of combat missions.

So yes, I'd count that as 5 years missed due to military service, which is what you got all snarky about above.

JohnBigBootay: Sin_City_Superhero: I think Ken Griffey Jr. had the sweetest swing.

That fat fark ain't even in the conversation. Pretty swing - sure. he's probably 70% the hitter Ted was. A better fielder for the first ten years for sure. But about 6% the human being.

1) Ken Griffey Jr. was a vastly better defender, even in his later years. In his prime, he was one of the best outfielders in baseball, and he played a good CF until he was 36. Ted Williams was an iffy corner outfielder.

2) Williams was obviously a better hitter.

3) Aside from his extremely impressive military service, Ted Williams was kind of a miserable bastard. Griffey was one of the best-liked players of his era, he's responsible for the annual Jackie Robinson tributes, and he's done a lot of philanthropic work. 6%?