Which pre-war stars could play today?

[pitchernut]

If you all are talking about time warping a player from one era to another... I would think that a player from 1910 could handle not only the warp but playing the game better than a player from 2010. Just imagine for a player from 1910 everything relating to baseball would be such an improvement trainers, showers, clean facilities even food in the club house, (did they even have club houses back then?) way better equipment etc etc. Now drop in a player from 2010 into 1910... maybe after five days huddled in the corner crying for mom they may snap out of it maybe, but after that the stench, hygiene wasn't even known, no trainers, food was way blander and the equipment sucks, I'm not certain but wonder if they even called games due to weather. This would make a great movie.

[Kawika]

Originally Posted by pitchernut

This would make a great movie.

Barry Bonds time warps back to the 1905 New York Giants. Demands his own clubhouse. McGraw rips his head off, literally. Movie over in 11 seconds. Rated R for coarse language and scenes of extreme violence.

[pitchernut]

Originally Posted by kawika

barry bonds time warps back to the 1905 new york giants. Demands his own clubhouse. Mcgraw rips his head off, literally. Movie over in 11 seconds. Rated r for coarse language and scenes of extreme violence.

thats too funny

[pitchernut]

just a scenario but imagine warping a 1910 Cobb to lets say the 2010 Yomiuri Giants (Japanese MLB).. that could be interesting

[mr2686]

Time warp Bonds to the 1905 Giants. Bonds to McGraw "Do you have any Roids"? McGraw to Bonds "Yes, why do you think I stand a lot in the dugout"?

[uffda51]

Originally Posted by mr2686

Time warp Bonds to the 1905 Giants. Bonds to McGraw "Do you have any Roids"? McGraw to Bonds "Yes, why do you think I stand a lot in the dugout"?

Can we send Scott Boras back to 1905? And Frank McCourt?

[steve B]

I've never bought into the idea that the talent is watered down because of expansion or anything else. If there are so many pitchers who aren't ML material right now compared to any era with 16 teams why has the overall batting average been nearly the same since 1940? And lower quality hitters can't be blamed, if they're hitting so often against bad pitchers

http://www.baseball-almanac.com/hitting/hibavg4.shtml

I also don't buy that todays players are that much stronger. The weight training as built up some impressive strength, and homers are up. But many old time players built up strength through off season jobs that involved a lot of manual labor.
Stuff like farming - try slinging 100 Lb feed sacks all day sometime.
Or other jobs. Not prewar, but Aaron supposedly worked on an ice truck. I'm sure I could find a bunch of very physically demanding jobs checking prewar players.

And the point about how long a ball stayed in the game is a good one. Ruth hit 60 hitting dirty mushballs. How many would he hit hitting clean new tight ones?
Foxx hit some very long homers too, some of them haven't ben matched by the steroid crowd. Deep upper deck at yankee stadium, one of 3 fully out of Fenway to the right of the flagpole... The others were Mantle and Rice. (Nomar would have had #4, but they added a bit of wall that's now gone)

So weaker? I don't think so.

And no ammount of training will help make a good hitter. Unlike another poster I'm a terrible hitter. Never faced a real curve, but I did try a 90mph + batting cage. I was very happy to get one audible foul tip out of 60 pitches. And I'm pretty sure there's not much I could have done to improve a whole lot.

Steve B