Babe Ruth Wasn't That Good

Okay, so that's kind of a lie: Babe Ruth was pretty good. And, beyond having been good, he was a central figure in the development of baseball. As the first person to figure out that, hey, hitting lots of home runs is a mighty good idea, he introduced the game to a whole new era. But I do think that, in a certain way, one can give him a little bit too much credit for having been the first guy to figure out that home runs are good. To show how this is so, I'll compare him to Barry Bonds.

From 1914 through 1935, Babe Ruth his 714 home runs, leading the majors twelve times in fourteen years. His on-base percentage was .474, and he led the majors ten times. His slugging percentage was .690, and he led the majors thirteen times out of fourteen years. All of that is very impressive. From 1986 through 2007, Barry Bonds hit 762 home runs, leading the league twice including a year when he hit 73. His on-base percentage was .444, and he led the league ten times including leading the majors six of his last seven years. His slugging percentage was .607, and he led the league seven times. All of that is rather impressive as well. Which was more impressive? Well, according to the Wins Above Replacement statistic, Bonds accumulated 171.8 WAR as a hitter, while Ruth racked up 172.0. So, very similar.

 But the way I see it, all of this gives Ruth too much benefit. Yes he was good, and yes he was ahead of his time. But those are kind of separate things. It makes sense, kind of, to say that we should value hitting accomplishments less in a high-run environment and more in a low-run environment. But do we really think that the fact that Ruth was the first guy to decide to try to hit home runs makes him a better player? Should the fact that, for the first few years of his career (like 1920, when his adjusted OPS was 255), no one else in the league had caught on that home runs were the way of the future really make us boost our impression of how good Babe Ruth was?

Or, to put it another way, Bonds led the league ten times in OBP and seven times in slugging in a league where there was lots of power hitters, and lots of power pitchers who were accustomed to facing power hitters. Where all the ballparks had reasonable short fences (Ruth benefited from having Yankee Stadium build for him, remember). Stats that adjust for league average penalize Bonds for playing in an era of lots and lots of sluggers (which, as a kind of adjustment for the steroid thing, is kind of appropriate, but still...), and they give Ruth a boost for playing in an era without too many other sluggers. That might be right if we're thinking about how valuable the players were, but if we're thinking about how good they were, I'm not sure it makes sense.

OH, AND ALSO: Babe Ruth didn't have to face black pitchers. Like, I dunno, Satchel Paige. Sure, Bonds probably used steroids. There's a difference, though: while Bonds boosted his own performance quasi-illicitly, the caliber of pitching opposing him received a boost from that same source. Ruth, on the other hand, got to face a league of pitching shorn of all the good black pitchers, but didn't have to give up some portion of his own skill in exchange. So really, Ruth had a bigger immoral competitive advantage than did Barry Bonds. Just sayin'.