[ls7plus]

Purely from the objective side of it, he created 162% of league average runs created during his career, the (Bill James) stat I believe is most valuable in comparing players between eras, which places him in the top 3-5 of all second basemen of all time, and rates in that category with a very good slugging first baseman or outfielder; is rated the fourth second baseman of all time by Bill James and 10th by baseball-reference.com, based on JAWS, which goes by career and 7-year peak wins above replacement; won an MVP (as well as a batting title, .342) in 1949, despite the presence of Stan Musial and an awesome season by Ralph Kiner (54 HR's, 127 RBI, .310 BA), and placed consistently highly in the MVP voting in other years; was a six-time all-star and had a .311 lifetime batting average, .409 career on-base-percentage, and .883 OPS (which again, would be quite good for a slugging first baseman or outfielder); scored 100 runs 6 times; and, with Babe Ruth, was the most important player in the history of the game, opening the door to such greats as Mays, Aaron and all other great players of color. And he did all that despite coming into the league at age 28, undoubtedly missing out on a few prime years of production.

Personally, I think he was also the most heroic player of all-time by far, bar none. These should qualify as pretty good reasons. The original poster's comments are some of the silliest I have ever seen--best to do your homework before inviting ridicule!

Larry