Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth
Bill James ranks Wagner 2nd, Cobb 5th.
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In this case Bill James is flat out wrong. As great as Wagner was, none of the numbers compare. I'm not just talking about overall career numbers because Cobb played a few years longer, but their 162 game AVERAGE goes as follows: At Bats: Cobb 611 / Wagner 605, Runs: Cobb 120 / Wagner 101, Hits: Cobb 224 / Wagner 198, Doubles: Cobb 39 / Wagner 37, Triples: Cobb 16 / Wagner 15, Homers: Cobb 6 / Wagner 6, RBI: Cobb 103 / Wagner 100, Steals: Cobb 48 / Wagner 42, Walks: Cobb 67 / Wagner 56, On Base Percentage: Cobb .433 / Wagner .391, Career Slugging Percentage: Cobb .512 / Wagner .467, and finally Career Average: Cobb .366 (highest of all-time) / Wagner .328 (37th highest of all-time). In Wagner's best season he hit .381 while Cobb had 9 seasons better than that including 3 over .400 (his best was .420). Bottom line is it's not even close. There isn't ONE facet of hitting that Wagner was better than Cobb. Although one of the greatest ever, Wagner gets a little more love than he deserves because of the position he played and the mystique of a baseball card. One can make a strong argument that Cobb was the greatest ever (I'll still go with Babe), and I'd put Wagner a few spots behind them both after the likes of Hornsby, Gehrig and possibly Musial, but just ahead of Lajoie, Speaker, and some of the other legends of the game. Not that any of this matters because it's all opinion, but the Sporting News ranked Cobb 3rd best (after Ruth and Mays) and Wagner 13th (their top-ranked shortstop).