Ruth came along at the absolute perfect time for his skills and style. This timing allowed him to become the larger than life player we all know and grant him title of best ever. What if Ruth came along 20 years earlier, or 20 years later - while still would have been awesome, probably not quite as awesome as it was. Ruth blossomed at the single biggest change ever to occur in the entire history of baseball.
The transition from Dead Ball era to Live Ball era makes it so very difficult, if not impossible to lump all Pre-War players together.
Stats aside, lets look at what the baseball community thought of the top players when the first Hall of Fame voting happened.
1. Cobb - 222 votes
2, tie. Ruth - 215 votes
2, tie. Wagner - 215 votes
4. Mathewson - 205 votes
5. Walter Johnson - 189 votes.
The largest percentage difference in voting was with Mathewson over Johnson.
Does this mean Cobb was better than Ruth - we don't really know, but overall the votes would put the feather in Cobb's cap. Same with Matty vs. Johnson.
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