Top Three Greatest Baseball Players Ever?

[redjet]

Bonds
Ruth
Mays

[tommy251]

Ruth
Mantle
Mays

[tutall]

ty cobb
babe ruth
ichiro

ichiro? i dont think he makes top 5 active players... just my opinion though... what kind of facts or stats do you have to back it up? He had the record for hits but tony gwynn and wade boggs had a lot of hits as well and i dont think either is close to top 3

Its not a perfect evaluation since it ranks everyone of those stats equal and doesn't take defense and games played into the equation...but I'm sure if you did that with those two as well it would basically come out the same way. Ruth would be ahead of the others with Aaron and Cobb a step back with Bonds, Mays, Gehrig, and Williams all lumped together.

So with that being said I can see how people could leave them out of their top 3 of all time.....I mean just because they think he's #5 all time or something doesn't mean that he sucks or something.

you also must remember bonds has one thing all the rest dont have,... more years to play... here are my adjusted stats assuming he plays 2 more years and breaks the Home Run record

-1 140 more hits passes babe ruth, -2 more for home run record, 152 more RBI's puts him in third there -3 more points, if he can raise his batting ave .002 in the next 2 years there he gains another point... i dont have the time to make all the adjustments in the scores but that puts him ahead of the pack and close to ruth with a 24.... give ruth at least one more and aaron one more and it is not aaron 27, ruth 21, and bonds 24.... then would you say he is top 3? plus this math, although i like the reasoning and stats as proof dont take into account the walks and runs scored he has produced, MVP awards, Gold Glove awards etc..... plus his pure dominance of pitching

[pwaldo]

you also must remember bonds has one thing all the rest dont have,... more years to play... here are my adjusted stats assuming he plays 2 more years and breaks the Home Run record

Sorry but my crystal ball doesn't work for baseball players.

I know he can do more that's one of the reasons why I don't like including current players because they can always add to statistics or lower their averages. The only way you can rank Bonds fairly is after the guy is done and then you know what he finishes at.

plus this math, although i like the reasoning and stats as proof dont take into account the walks and runs scored he has produced, MVP awards, Gold Glove awards etc..... plus his pure dominance of pitching

Well I didn't really have the time to break it down by everyone's stats so I just whipped this together. Actually its not even that accurate because like I said it ranks everything equal when in reality they're not.

I just wanted to show with the "major" stats that you'd have a case for not including Bonds. I mean if he was #1 in every catagory or something then I'd say you couldn't leave him off your list but really all I saw was a lot of "equal" players.

And using awards to compare people only works to a point since not all awards were handed out when all of these players were playing plus the "rules" for the awards has changed over the years.

For example the MVP was absent from 1915-1922 and up until 1956 there was no Cy Young award meaning pitchers were seriously considered for the MVP award. (Yes I know they still can and do win the MVP award now but if you compare the amount that won the award before the Cy Young its a lot lower than now). When Ruth was playing you were also limited to only one MVP and then you weren't able to win another. (That's why he didn't win one when he hit 60 HRs....btw they later changed that stupid rule near the end of Ruth's career). They also only starting handing out Gold Gloves in 1957. etc. etc. etc.

Also I don't get what "pure dominance of pitching" is since all of these guys seem to have it. But I guess that's just subjective so you can believe what you want when it comes to that meaning it has no place in comparing stats to one another.

I mean if you want I can probably get together and compare guys that won the most awards and stuff that played in eras when the awards were awarded but I don't think it would be that different. I mean Mays has more Gold Gloves then Barry does. Williams has 2 Triple Crowns and 5 TSN Player of the year awards to Barry's zero Triple Crowns and 3 TSN Player of the year awards.

Even All Star appearances favor the other "modern" players over Barry:

Barry Bonds - 13
Hank Aaron - 21
Ted Williams - 17
Willie Mays - 20

But the whole point of this was to show that you could pick any 3 of these guys for your top 3 and you really couldn't argue against a person doing so. All of these guys are great and I'm sure if you included a top 10 list or whatever then EVERYONE would include these guys but when you are limited to just 3 guys then its very tough to break down a sport that is over 100 years old and only pick 3 guys.

[calripkenjr32]

1. Barry Bonds
2. Ted Williams
3. Mickey Mantle

[Archuleta]

No Pitchers Is The Top 3?

[calripkenjr32]

No Pitchers Is The Top 3?

Can't think of any pitchers that could be in the top 3..Seaver and Clemens probably in top 10 though.

[GriffithCW]

John Rocker
Oil Can Boyd
Ozzie Canseco

[Archuleta]

John Rocker?

[JeterCollector_BC]

Willie Mays is the greatest baseball player ever, IMO.

He could do everything.