So my post yesterday got me thinking… who are the 10 greatest players of all time?
Players whose careers are finished – so no A-Rod or Ken Griffey Jr., I’m not sure they would be on the list but let’s count them out. No Barry Bonds, either, because I cannot attribute what amount of his achievements are to steroids are what portion is just talent which would launch him into the top ten of all time. The same goes for A-Rod. No pitchers either, that would really confuse things.
Ok, so doing this off the top of my head might be a mistake, but Jimmie Foxx came off the list and was replaced by Stan Musial (sorry Stan). I would think people might place some of these guys in a slightly different order. But I think (without pitchers) these are the ten guys.
1) Babe Ruth. Never a discusion or a doubt. He’s the Bambino, enough said. That doesn’t even include the fact that he could have been one of the greatest pitchers.
2) Ty Cobb. 96 stolen bases one year. 11 batting titles, etc, an excellent defender as well. Some baseball enthusiasts who depise the HR might even put him at the top of the list. But Ruth changed the game, and Cobb played it to perfection at the time he played.
3) Lou Gehrig 8 seasons of top five MVP, 3 seasons of 170 RBIs or more. He was an RBI machine in every sense of the word. He had seasons which were just as impressed after Ruth had left the Yankees too.
4 tie) Joe DiMaggio. Most people cite his 1941 season where he hit in 56 straight games. I like his 1937 season where he hit .346, 46 HRs, 167 RBIs, scored 151 runs and only struck out 37 times! I am also equally impressed with his 1948 season, late in his career where he drove in 155 runs and hit .320 with 39 HRs and struck out only 30 times. ONe of the more famous statistics of Joe D. was the fact that he hit 361 HRs and struck out 369 times for his career.
4 – tie) Willie Mays. One of the greatest all around players. It is difficult to put him ahead of DiMaggio. If you wanted to flip the two of them, you could. Consider that Mays career high in RBIs is 141 and he struck out almost twice as frequently as DiMaggio but still not bad for a power hitter. Mays defenders would say that DiMaggio played in better lineups for most of his career. I think the ballparks are a wash, death valley in Yankee Stadium for Joe D. and Candlestick (for most of his career) for Willie. It’s so close.
6) Ted Williams. The greatest hitter of all time? Perhaps that’s Ruth. But, consider the fact that he lost time to WWII and Korea and not only is he a great American, but his productivity probably would have surpassed Gehrig. The only thing that holds him back is that defense hardly interested him at all.
7) Hank Aaron. Longevity and consistency. Consistently around 40 HRs over his long career. Again, this gets back to what you like – consistency over a long time, or the high ceiling player.
8) Stan Musial. If he had a little more power, he would be higher. 7 batting titles, about 10 times in the top 5 for MVP voting. Truly the dominant player of the National League in the 40s and 50s.
9) Honus Wagner. The greatest shortstop of all time. A run producer and baserunner like nobody has seen.
10) Rogers Hornsby. Two triple crowns in 1922 and 1925 have to get you into the top ten.
Others that are real close…. Frank Robinson… who I put at #10 but I went with Hornsby because of the two triple crowns and then there’s Hank Greenberg and of course Mantle who all should be included in the top 15.
Some might say this is a Yankee heavy list, but objectively speaking, they have won 27 titles and how did they get that many? Because they were lucky enough to have some of the greatest players. Among the 3 Yankees on this list, there are 14 world series wins.
I should probably do a top ten pitcher’s list (which will be even more difficult). Let’s see…. Johnson, Matheson, Koufax, Alexander, Grove, ……