From: dzappala@caldera.usc.edu (Daniel Zappala)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Sandberg (was Re: Ty Griffen)
Date: 22 Jan 1993 13:38:45 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
Distribution: world
Reply-To: dzappala@caldera.usc.edu (Daniel Zappala)
NNTP-Posting-Host: caldera.usc.edu


In article <2355@blue.cis.pitt.edu>, genetic+@pitt.edu (Dr. Dave) writes:
|> Thus spake 00bjgood@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu:
|> >> 
|> >So who do you think was better? And please don't say Joe Morgan. 
|> 
|> >Maybe if you
|> >go back before 1950 you could make a case. 
|> 
|> That's primarily what I had in mind.  Rogers Hornsby was an offensive force
|> on the level of a Mickey Mantle or Stan Musial.  Sandberg is (most years)
|> merely well above-average for a second baseman, with a few outstanding years
|> by any measure thrown in.  Of course, Ryno is an excellent defensive player,
|> while Hornsby was marginal to bad.  But it takes (I claim) more of a defensive
|> difference than is physically possible to make up the offensive gap.
|> 
|> Eddie Collins was also better than Sandberg, and for a long long time.
|> 
|> Nap Lajoie has much better numbers than Sandberg, but I'll concede that it's
|> too much of a stretch to compare a modern player with a turn-of-the-century
|> player.

Charlie Gehringer should be in this discussion too:  

From clari.sports.baseball:


	BIRMINGHAM, Mich. (UPI) -- Hall of Fame second baseman Charlie
Gehringer, a lifetime .320 hitter, has died. He was 89.
	Gehringer, born in Fowlerville, Mich., May 11, 1903, spent his entire
19-year career with the Detroit Tigers. He hit .321 in three World
Series appearances covering 20 games.
	Gehringer, who was named the second baseman for baseball's first All-
Star game in 1933, was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1949. Gehringer
was the American League's Most Valuable Player in 1937 when he led the
league in hitting with a career-high .371 batting average and added 96
runs batted in and 14 homers. Gehringer's chief rival for the MVP Award
was Joe DiMaggio. Only a sophomore with the New York Yankees, DiMaggio
had batted .346 with 46 homers and 167 RBI.
	It was a very close race, but the writers voted the award to
Gehringer, perhaps the most under-publicized truly great player in
baseball history.
	Gehringer, known as ``The Mechanical Man'' for his smooth and
graceful play at second and for his quiet demeanor, played more than 100
games every season from 1926 through 1941 and led the league in games
played four times.
	Gehringer signed with the Tigers in 1924 after impressing Detroit
manager Ty Cobb in a workout, and he broke into organized baseball with
the London club of the Michigan-Ontario League that year. He had a brief
trial with the Tigers at the close of that season but was farmed out to
Toronto of the International League, where he hit .325.
	He took over as the Tigers' second baseman and manned the position
for 16 consecutive seasons, playing in 2,205 games. He ended his playing
career in 1942.
	Standing 5 feet, 11 inches and weighing 180 pounds, Gehringer was a
model of efficiency. He glided to his left and right with equal skill,
made textbook pivots on double plays and threw unerringly.
	Gehringer never received the publicity of such other Hall of Fame
second basemen as Rogers Hornsby, Frank Frisch, Nap Lajoie and Eddie
Collins, but there are experts who would argue that he was a superior
all-around player to them all.
	Following his retirement, Gehringer rose to the rank of lieutenant-
commander in the Navy during World War II. He went into private business
after the war but served as vice president and general manager of the
Tigers from August, 1951, to October, 1953, and as vice president from
1953 until 1959.
	In 1929, Gehringer batted .339 and led the league in games, runs,
hits, doubles, triples and stolen bases, as well as leading second
basemen in fielding percentage. He had seven consecutive seasons of 200
or more hits.
	Gehringer batted over .300 in 12 of 13 consecutive seasons and hit .
298 in the only year he missed. Gehringer's highlights include hitting .
356 in 1934, .354 in 1936 and .325 in 1939. He was 11 for 29 in the 1934
World Series and 9 for 24 in the 1935 World Series.
	He drove in more than 100 runs in seven seasons and hit 40 or more
doubles in six seasons, including a career high of 60 in 1936. Although
not a home run hitter by modern standards, he hit between 10 and 20 in
12 seasons.
	``All the Tigers do is wind him up on opening day,'' former Boston
Red Sox outfielder Doc Cramer remarked, ``and he runs perfectly for the
rest of the season.''