Could Gehrig have handled the pressure?

[martingale]

Interesting topics Billy.

About Gehrig - He was undoubtedly a superstar. If there was no Ruth, I don't think he would have felt any more pressure or that his play would have been affected. Why? Because in Ruth's absence the media would have focused on somebody other than Gehrig who could fill that "celebrity" role, playing the part by providing interesting quotes and giving the reporters juicy stories to tell. For example, after Ruth left the Yankees, the media focused on DiMaggio, a rookie from San Francisco, not on Gehrig. Day after day, the papers tended to highlight DiMaggio's performance over Gehrig's.

About the era before TV - Agree with you that there was more of a frenzied fan atmosphere. I think back then, the lack of TV and the relative lack of comparable audiovisual entertainment options magnified the thrill experienced by the average fan at a baseball game. Did this translate into more pressure for the players? Hard to say, but I'm inclined to say no.

[vintagesportscollector]

RE Gehrig, I would also add that without Ruth the Yankees of that era may not have been the "Yankees" that won so many titles and garnered the attention. It still would have been New York, but quite possibly less attention, less pressure and a lower pedestal. Maybe they don't go on to have all that success and Gehrig goes on to play his career with less pressure as attention shifts/spreads to other teams. What if the Yanks didn't win any titles in the 20s and 30s? Would the pressures be a fraction of what was created from their success?

[billyb]

VintagenSports,

Not so sure there would have been less pressure on Gehrig if the Yanks were not winning as often. The fans, as I mentioned, were probably more on the frenzied side, and probably more impatient. The "bums" terminology may have been used more. The players hear that, and press to have the fans ease up on them.
I do believe the fans of the before TV era, created a bit more pressure on the players, back then, they do now. We will never know, even with all those Yankee wins, regarding the teams who finished just behind them, what kind of pressure they may have gotten from their fans, just to finish ahead of the Yanks. The Yanks probably created pressure on those teams as well as the fans of those teams.
Interesting thoughts guys.

[Runscott]

I'm not seeing anywhere in the Gehrig-era Yankees line-up where pitching around anyone was an option.