Top 10 Players Of The Deadball-Era

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Posted By: Sean

Any Position at all......
some would be king kelly,christy mathewson,cy young, rogers hornsby etc
whats ur top 10?

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Posted By: MVSNYC

i'll throw these guys in the discussion...

cobb
jackson
wagner
speaker
johnson

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Posted By: brock

Tris Speaker

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Posted By: Mark T

1) Hans Wagner
1a) Ty Cobb
3)Christy Mathewson
4)Joe Jackson
5)Walter Johnson
6)Cy Young
7)Miner Brown
8)Nap Lajoie
9)Tris Speaker
10)Ed Delahanty

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

I agree with Mark T above with Wagner at #1.

When you forget about what "we" think, based on what we see with player stats and the like, the thing to do is go back and read what players of the day thought.

Players from the dead ball era thought Wagner was the best ball player ever. Those that played with Wagner, Cobb, Ruth, Jackson, Mathewson, Young, Johnson... they too thought Wagner the greatest ball player EVER.

I saw Koufax and Gibson pitch against one another. I saw Drysdale throw. Saw the Big Unit, Carlton, Seaver, Soto, Maloney, Bunning, Short, Marichal, Vida Blue, Dave Stewart, Dwight Goodin, Kerry Wood... Saw Lee Smith muscling balls past folks in the late innings. Saw Bob Veale. From what I've read about folks that saw these guys and older ones play, based on the overlapping of time, I gotta figure that Walter Johnson threw the hardest, Smokey Joe Wood was with him for a few years, and Feller threw pretty hard, too. Having said that, I can't think of anyone who'd throw in at you like Drysdale and Gibson, unless it was Maglie, who I didn't get to see...

The guys on Mark's list were great players. The only way we can know, 100 years removed, is to believe "them that'uz there seein' it". Wagner was the man.

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Posted By: peter chao

Wagner was the most versatile of the deadball players. He had the skills to play virtually every position on the Diamond and the arm to pitch if he wanted to do. He could run like the wind and hit the ball to virtually any spot in the stadium.

Peter C.

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Posted By: Peter_Spaeth

Wagner
Cobb
Johnson
Speaker
Mathewson
Young
Collins
Lajoie
Jackson
Walsh

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Posted By: howard

Wagner may well have been better than Cobb but I would not put huge stock in their contemporaries opinions. Wagner seems to have been as universally well liked as Cobb was detested. I'd bet this had more than a little to do with how players ranked them.

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Posted By: Mark L

Rather than guess about ulterior motives, I prefer to trust the general opinion of the best baseball minds of the deadball era. (which the old timers called "inside baseball" rather than the prejorative "deadball"). Along with the ten greats listed by Peter Spaeth, I will mention that oldtimers had a lot of repect for Willie Keeler way back when.

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Posted By: fkw

Side note about the DEAD BALL

Ed Walsh
How can a guy with a league leading 1.27 ERA have a 18-20 record in 1910????? Wow

Did they let his teammates bat???

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Posted By: G. MAINES

Cobb was the American League's answer to Willie Keeler. Actually, Keeler outhit Cobb while he was in the NL (.371 to .366). With the Highlanders though, Keeler couldn't average .300.