Pitcher would be the other one, and to a much greater extent.
Bullshit. He *created *the standard that home run totals matter. Or led the fan base and the media to think so, in an effort to build up a guy everyone liked, which amounts to the same thing. What do you think changed to turn home runs from hotdogging to The Most Revered Stat in the Game? And do you think there’s some other reason than Barry Bonds now holding the record for it to start to be discounted?
If anyone has a factual basis for saying that a player playing against the standards of the time is due to his prescience or omniscience rather than ego and stubbornness, let’s hear it. Otherwise it’s just manufacturing excuses.
Which would rather strongly suggest that he was disinterested in existing standards. Ruth started hitting massive numbers of home runs because he disregarded the prevailing notion that trying to hit home runs wouldn’t work. He was, by defnition, someone who was not beholden to the standards of his time. You said a player like that deserved less credit. I disagree, and Babe Ruth is a perfect example.
Yes, baseball followed Ruth, but the fact remains Ruth is the best example of the phenomenon. That’s why baseball followed him.
Nobody has claimed that, though. You’re the only one to mention “prescience” or anything of the sort. Who cares WHY a player played the way he did? Whether a player was “ahead of his time” because that’s just the way he played baseball, or because he was stubborn and wilful, or because of a physical characteristic, or because he was a genius or had ESP or whatever, is not relevant. What matters is how much he helped his team win.
Bumped because of Barry Larkin’s election into the HOF today. Except for the Veteran’s Committee selections, Larkin was the only one who made it this year. Jack Morris felt short and somehow Bagwell missed again.
Anyway, there’s now another MLB Baseball HOF thread so this probably redundant.