From: niepornt@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (David Marc Nieporent)
Subject: Re: Best playes of All Time
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 06:51:51 GMT

In article <BzLG6v.Gxy@unix.amherst.edu> ddsokol@unix.amherst.edu (D. DANIEL SOKOL) writes:

>The reasons why
>on the bench
>1B Greenberg, Foxx- definately better than McCovey.  Look at lifetime stats,
>	year by year comparisons and the fact that these two guys were the
>	impact players that McCovey never could be.

First of all, what the &*^(*& is an "impact player"???

Secondly, did you try looking at their stats *in context*?  Sure,
Greenberg and Foxx had good *raw* statistics (not that McCovey didn't,
also), but you have to adjust for the fact that the league as a whole
hit much better in Greenberg/Foxx's day.

>2B Carew- he won how many batting titles?  Much better than Morgan.  I think
>	that he was the best hitter of his day although I can't say the same
>	for his defense.  His bat and speed more than make up for this
>	shortcoming though.
 
Of course, the object of the game of baseball is not to get hits in a
high percentage of at bats.  It's to score a lot of runs.  And Morgan
helped his team do that more than Carew did.  Superficially, they had
similar stats, but Morgan compiled a large number of his in the Astrodome.

And furthermore, Morgan had *more* speed, so your argument about speed
is silly.  

And Carew's defense was so good, they moved him to first base.  Morgan,
on the other hand, played 2nd his entire career.

>RP Gossage- I always liked the Goose.  His fastball was unhittable in his peak
>	years, clocked at 100 mph.

True, but was he as *good* as Fingers?  That's the question.  Not
whether he threw harder.

>SP Ryan, Feller- nobody was ever as dominating in their pitching as the two
>of them (and Koufax but he's beyond argument)  These guys had amazing
>speed.  If not for WWII Feller would have had some more amazing years.
>Clearly the dominant pitchers of their eras though.

This is silly.  Koufax, certainly, was dominant, though for a short
time.  But Ryan?  He's the opposite.  He's been good for an incredibly
long time.  He's a certain Hall of Famer.  But he has rarely, if ever,
been the best pitcher in the league.  Certainly not for more than 1 year
in a row.  

Getting lots of strikeouts is nice, and it's important.  But keeping the
other team from scoring is *more* important, and Ryan has just never
done that as well as the best pitchers of his time.

>As for the catchers- Harnett had the power and average that most players in the
>NL at that time didn't have.  I wouldn't say that Carter, Lombardi, Fisk were

Huh?  What makes you say that?  Sure, Hartnett hit for power and
average.  But so did the rest of the league.  More than him, in fact.

>on hids level.  The others sure were but none were significantly better or
>worse.  This position was the hardest call for me.  As for Dickey, I think

What makes you say that?  Bench had more power in a harder era.  For
that matter, so did Berra.

>that he was better than any other Yankee catcher (Yogi, Elston Howard, Thurmon 
>Munson to name a few).  He had an amazing bat and knew how to control

Why do you call his bat amazing?  It wasn't *that* great.  Better than
Yogi?  How?

>the ball game.  A real staying power for the Yankees that was on the team from
>the late 20's till the early 40's so that he could help with the transition
>from Ruth to Gehrig to DiMaggio.  A true Hall of Famer.

>I tried to include only 25 people onto my team to make it a bit more
>realistic in terms of team size.  Sure the case could be made for Musial,
>Hielman, Speaker, Seaver, Vaughn and Collins but I didn't have room for them.

You could have bumped the people worse than them.  That might have made
some room.

-- 
David M. Nieporent   | Is it too early to start making predictions for 1993?
niepornt@phoenix.    | Probably, but that never stopped me before.
   princeton.edu     | ALE: Baltimore ALW: Chicago NLE: Montreal NLW: Atlanta
Baltimore Orioles 93 | AL MVP: Cal Ripken  AL Cy Young: Mike Mussina
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