When looking for the greatest baseball player of all-time from a statistical standpoint of view, it is impossible to really make a case for anybody but Babe Ruth. He towers above the competition in so many ways, dominates in so many ways, that it is relatively easy to say he is the greatest baseball player of all-time.
Let’s look at the numbers, and at the end we will look at one critical element that is often overlooked by those who make comparisons.
What are probably the four most important offensive statistical categories are listed below, with the players who are first and second in the all-time rankings for each category. (Run average and RBI average are calculated out by dividing a players total Runs scored or total RBI’s by the number of official at-bats. Calculated out just like batting average, but for Runs and RBI’s.)
The All Time Leaders
On Base Percentage:
1) Ted Williams – .482
2) Babe Ruth – .474
Ted Williams is ahead of the Babe here, but by less than 2%.
Slugging Percentage:
1) Babe Ruth – .690
2) Ted Williams – .634
Babe is ahead of Teddy Ballgame by over 8%.
Run Average:
1) Babe Ruth – .259
2) Lou Gehrig – .236
The Babe is ahead of longtime teammate Gehrig by almost 9%.
RBI Average:
1) Babe Ruth – .263
2) Lou Gehrig – .249
The Babe leads Gehrig by about 5%.
In the four most improtant offensive baseball categories, Babe Ruth is the all-time leader in three of the categories by an average of better than 7%, and is second in the other category by less than 2%. To be an average of 7% better than your next competitor in any important stat is a huge margin. And that’s what the Babe is in three of the categories. He simply towers over the competition.
Babe Ruth is the greatest offensive player in Major League Baseball history.
One Other Important Element
Babe Ruth was a tremendous pitcher at the beginning of his career. Many people forget this when comparing Babe Ruth with other players. The Babe was not just a pitcher, he was a great pitcher. Let’s look at his pitching record.
Babe Ruth the Pitcher
The Babe’s record as a pitcher was 94-46. Good for a winning percentage of .671. That puts the Babe in 7th place on the All-Time retired list, and 8th place on the current list. Here is the greatest offensive player in history, and in well over 100 pitching starts (148 actually) the Babe has a better winning percentage than all but 7 other pitchers. Think about that for a second.
Over the bulk of his pitching career, from 1915-1919, the Babe’s record was 87-45. A .659 winning percentage. The teams he pitched for had a combined record of 423-297 over that time frame. So the Babe’s winning percentage was .071 better than the teams he played for. Very few pitchers have ever done better than that. The Babe also pitched to 82% of the League ERA over his pitching career. Another excellent number.
In the World Series, the Babe was as good as anybody as a pitcher. He started 3 games, won all three, completed two of the three, and threw one shutout. His team won both World Series he pitched in.
Babe Ruth and the World Series
In a 20 year career, the Babe appeared in 10 World Series. His team won 7 of those. So in half the years he played, his team made it to the World Series. In over one-third of the years he played, his team won the World Series.
The Babe batted .326, had an OBP of .467, and slugged .744 in 41 World Series games. His record above as a World Series pitcher is also stellar.
Any way you want to look at the statistics, Babe Ruth comes out as the greatest baseball player of all-time. He dominated the game as a hitter, and was also one of the best pitchers in the history of the game. He consistently led his teams into the World Series, as both a pitcher and a hitter, and his teams won the World Series far more often than not, in large part because of Babe Ruth’s tremendous play in the Fall Classic.
Babe Ruth is the Greatest Baseball Player of All-Time. It is difficult, if not impossible, to imagine anyone ever being a better player.
