The All Century Team - A Retrospective

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Posted By: peter chao

Steve,

In 1973 Jim Palmer had better traditional numbers the baseball writers look at, also most of us old-timers consider Jim Palmer a better pitcher overall career-wise also.

Peter

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Posted By: howard

Nice to conveniently forget to mention Ryan's 16 losses that year and that Palmer only lost nine. Palmer's winning percentage was further above his teams than was Ryan's. I'm not a big fan of winning percentage as a measure of a pitchers effectiveness but you brought it up. Also, despite Ryan's terrific hits per/9 innings rate Palmer actually gave up fewer base runners per/9.

I think it would have been fine if Ryan had won the Cy that year but his not winning it just is not the travesty you make it out to be.

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Posted By: Neal Kane

<<You can not have current fans voting for an all time team with players they have seen vs. players they have not seen. No one with a brain can take a vote like that seriously. As is typical of the current MLB M.O., they are trying to "contrive moments" for "store bought" fans, thinking they are playing a part of some "baseball history" which most people have not studied enough to really give an educated opinion on. That said, and my biased opinion aside, Ripken over Wagner? Give me a F.ck.n. break!>>

So I guess you saw Honus play? I would have loved to see some of those guys in technicolor

Ripken would have kicked ass back in Honus day ...

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

I’m sure that today’s baseball players are, generally speaking, better conditioned athletes than those of 100 years ago. And I would guess that the skills required for success in hitting, pitching, and other baseball tasks, those that transcend pure physical ability, have also improved over the years. But it is difficult to compare players from different eras; each has to judged relative to the standards of the times in which they played. Was Ripken as great in his era as Wagner was in his? That is certainly something that can be debated.

I try to imagine Cap Anson, somehow transported by time machine to the year 2000, stepping up to the plate to face Randy Johnson -- a Twilight Zone sort of scenario. I imagine that Cap would find the sight of the Big Unit rearing back and cutting his fastball loose rather intimidating. (He might find the fighter jet flyover before the game a bit disturbing as well.) Similarly, I don’t think Barry Bonds would have any trouble handling Cy Young’s best pitches. But I could be wrong, there’s no way to ever know.

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Posted By: Mark L

Eric,
I don't understand why the average player's skills would be better in modern baseball. There was a greater premium on executing plays during the era of "inside baseball" (known to detractors as the Deadball Era). In addition, it is my impression that kids played a lot more baseball, amateur and professional, before reaching the majors way back when. Finally, baseball was THE team sport for a long time and attracted the best athletes. OK, these arguments don't clinch the argument, but they've persuaded me that there is at least an argument.

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Posted By: Eric Brehm

Mark,

I guess I was thinking that today’s players would benefit from 140 years of continued development of the 'science' of hitting and pitching; that they would have more techniques to choose from now to maximize their performance. Pitchers certainly have a greater variety of pitches to throw now – slider, split finger, and so on. Not so sure about hitting. Maybe eye-hand coordination is all that really matters and some say Ted Williams was the best in that regard. You’re probably right that team play was more skillful in the old days; perhaps some of that has been lost.