OT: Bonds, Clemens, Sosa to be on HOF ballot

[packs]

These era debates are so strange to me. There is no way today's players are better than the players of Ruth's era. That is not to say that Ruth played against ALL of the best players, but I would say the average major leaguer (in whatever league they played in) was better then. I'd say the average minor league player was better too.

When Ruth played the game EVERYONE in America played baseball. You had to beat out everyone to get a spot on a team. Now hardly anyone plays baseball. There are so many other sports. Today you only get the best baseball players on a baseball team. When Ruth played you had the best athletes in the country period on every baseball team you went against.

[HOF Auto Rookies]

Originally Posted by packs

These era debates are so strange to me. There is no way today's players are better than the players of Ruth's era. That is not to say that Ruth played against ALL of the best players, but I would say the average major leaguer (in whatever league they played in) was better then. I'd say the average minor league player was better too.

When Ruth played the game EVERYONE in America played baseball. You had to beat out everyone to get a spot on a team. Now hardly anyone plays baseball. There are so many other sports. Today you only get the best baseball players on a baseball team. When Ruth played you had the best athletes in the country period on every baseball team you went against.

The athletes today are absolutely amazing physical specimens to the human body. The fundamentals in today's game are FAR superior than the days of Ruth, the talent level and playing ability. Just because more people played a sport, doesn't necessarily make it the better generation. Ruth played against the best of his era, and the players today are playing against the best of there era. There are far more in professional baseball than there were in Ruth's day, so I completely disagree with the minor league part as well.

You still need to beat out everyone to get a spot on a team. How often do you just walk up to a team and are automatically on it because no one tries out? Never.

[sycks22]

Originally Posted by HOF Auto Rookies

The athletes today are absolutely amazing physical specimens to the human body. The fundamentals in today's game are FAR superior than the days of Ruth, the talent level and playing ability. Just because more people played a sport, doesn't necessarily make it the better generation. Ruth played against the best of his era, and the players today are playing against the best of there era. There are far more in professional baseball than there were in Ruth's day, so I completely disagree with the minor league part as well.

You still need to beat out everyone to get a spot on a team. How often do you just walk up to a team and are automatically on it because no one tries out? Never.

Physical specimens alright. Coffey, Colon are in top physical shape.

[HOF Auto Rookies]

Originally Posted by sycks22

Physical specimens alright. Coffey, Colon are in top physical shape.

Did I say it was everyone, did I specifically just mention baseball? Have you seen Adrian Beltre, or most NBA and NFL players?

[Runscott]

There were plenty of players with long careers who probably had thoughts on the general skill level from one period to another. Most of what I heard the guys on the 'Glory of Their Times' cd say was that the modern players could probably play with the old-time players....no, the debate wasn't whether or not the old-timers could play with the modern generation.

There was also some mentioning of the '60s players being babies, pulling themselves out for any little injury. Funny, given that players from the '60s say the same thing about today's players. There certainly is a missing degree of toughness to today's players, despite easy access to conditioning, diet, etc., that the old guys didn't have.

[MW1]

http://www.theonion.com/articles/tur...-basebal,6581/

[HOF Auto Rookies]

Originally Posted by MW1

http://www.theonion.com/articles/tur...-basebal,6581/

Hilarious

[glynparson]

you are failing to count the large growth in population, particularly latino who do play baseball. combine this with the globilization of ther sport and the increase in training and scouting techniques and there is absolutely no way they were better ball players back then. I find this notion laughable. Today it is a 365 day a year job for ball players. not so back then when many needed to work second jobs. Athletes are better in every recordable sport why not in baseball?

[packs]

Todays best athletes don't play baseball. They play football and basketball. But in Ruth's era those athletes were playing baseball. Like I said, today is just the best baseball players on a team. In Ruth's era it was the best athletes in the country on a baseball team.

I don't agree with you guys at all. Baseball was just as much a 365 day a year sport back then. You had barnstorming tours, exhibition games, winter leagues, cuban leagues, baseball was at its highest point in its existence. All the same year round games you have now. Add that to the fact that baseball players today have to cheat to even come close to putting up the numbers guys like Ruth and Hornsby and Gehrig put up. And they did that against some of the greatest legends of the game. How can you say that when today's players cheat they still come up short but are better than past players? You would say its because competition has gotten better. I would say athleticism and skill level went down amongst baseball players. Not amongst athletes in general.

[Peter_Spaeth]

It is generally a fruitless exercise to compare players across too much separation of time. Suppose if you magically transported Barry Bonds back to the 20s and he was far better than Babe Ruth. So what, it doesn't undermine Ruth's achievements in any way, which can only be evaluated in the context of his time.

I think athletes do generally get better over time -- we have proof of this in the evolution of objective track and swimming records (among others) and I see no reason this wouldn't be true for other competitive sports. But that said, I don't think it matters.

[barrysloate]

Do you know what Babe Ruth's regimen was? He would eat four hot dogs, drink two beers, toss a medicine ball around for fifteen minutes, and then take a schvitz. That's how he kept in shape.

[packs]

Well I work out every day of my life and I can't hit 60 home runs in 151 games or hit 342 lifetime. Guess what? Neither can anyone else even with their fancy trainers, machines, and specialized drugs.

If Ruth had been born in 1964 instead of 1895, and had benifited from a few generations of evolution, better nutrition and training, he would have been 6'7 and 270 pounds and absolutely dominated MLB.

Had Bonds been born in 1895, and utilized that era's approach to nutrition, training, drinking and tobacco-smoking - and had no access to steroids - he might have been one of the top players (maybe a fast Mel Ott) but he probably would have been 5'9 and 150 pounds and might not have hit 500 HRs. Heck, even in the era Bonds played in, he was only a .280 hitter before and after steroids - I know batting average isn't a terribly important statistic anymore, but for someone considered to possibly be the "greatest ever", I think that's a pretty amazing stat (his grand total of 2 HR titles and 1 RBI title are pretty astounding also).

I just don't see how you make any case for Bonds being greater than Ruth. Or Mays. Or Williams. Or Musial. Or Wagner, Cobb and maybe a few others. Stolen bases are, IMO, very overrated; playing great defense in left field is IMO far less important than most other positions; drawing walks is great, but most of those were during the steroids years (and I also believe - because I like conspiracies - that there was an "understanding" among managers during Bonds' last few years to walk him when convenient to try and prevent him from catching Aaron).

[packs]

Ruth would be a monster today. He's a star in any era you put him in. Doesn't matter one bit. The guy out hit two entire leagues. Greatest ever.

[Zeusenbauer]

Allowing a known PED user into the Hall would set a dangerous precedent, because if Sosa is in, how could voters logistically keep out stars of the era like Juan Gonzalez or Bagwell? Furthermore, as far as I know the Hall has no policy for removing a person who has already been enshrined, so I suspect the philosophy is to wait a few years to see how this era settles in the minds of the baseball galaxy. Personally, I have come to feel that the great players of the era should be enshrined because I am not willing to wipe out a decade of baseball history because of gaudy stats that don't fall in line with the time periods around them.

This is a Hall of Fame thread, which means individual performance, but I wonder why few people examine the effect PEDs might have had on team standings and even winning pennants and the World Series. Red Sox fans had the catharsis of 2004, and yet Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz have been accused of juicing, and there is no discussion about the authenticity of their team's victory. Is it inconsistent to judge individual players and yet give the teams they played on a pass? 1989 Athletics, what about them?

Baseball fans, and perhaps people in general, seek simple and clear answers, but upon reflection when has baseball ever offered a simple answer to the questions that arise? Every single aspect of and around the game is up for scrutiny, right down to every pitched ball that the hitter doesn't swing at. Strike or ball? It's not clearcut; it's up to the umpire's interpretation, and Livan Hernandez pitched to the most egregiously large strike zone in in the 1997 game that I have ever witnessed. But it's now in the books, forever. Could baseball fans arbitrarily say that Mel Ott should be punished because he hit most of his home runs at a field where an umpire might call 'infield fly rule' on a ball hit to the warning track? Do fans punish Ed Walsh or Burleigh Grimes because they used a pitch that would be eventually deemed 'unfair'? Should Yankee fans feel embarrassed because Jeffrey Maier turned a non-home run into a home run? When fans left baseball after the 1994 strike and said they would never return, well they have their reasons and that is their prerogative. Speaking for myself, I have not and most likely will not leave this game, because the game is beautiful, even though the players and the owners sometimes (often) behave deplorably. How the game was in the Steroid era may not have been (in hindsight) totally permissable, but neither should pre-1947 Major League Baseball be. There is no way to wrap a neat package around this. It's complicated, just like us. Can we possibly conceive in 2012 how we might feel about this PED baseball era in 2062? Is George High Pockets Kelly truly worthy of Hall of Fame enshrinement? He sure has a good nickname though.

Anyway, first post ever. Apologies for the length.

Nat