Babe Ruth, Pitcher.
Babe Ruth would have been one of the best pitchers in his generation had he stayed a pitcher rather than going to the outfield. Being sold to the Yankees made his change full-time to the outfield much more possible because the Yankees already had a very good rotation and Ruth’s bat was obviously going to be just as prolific if not moreso than his pitching arm.
He really only spent four seasons as a full-time pitcher, from 1915 to 1918. He was still primarily a pitcher in 1919, but the Red Sox realized how much of a hitter he was, and he spent much more time in the lineup as an outfielder(111 games) than he did as a pitcher(17 games).
Now, many of these stats are on some level archaic because it was a different time period. This was a time period known for dominant pitching, and Ruth was definitely part of that. However, we can look at his stats compared to league average(as I did in the last post), and that will give us an idea of how dominant he was.
Ruth’s career ERA was a sterling 2.28. Obviously in today’s game that would make him the best pitcher in the league, but again, let’s consider it compared to Ruth’s era. The league average ERA over his pitching years was 2.86, so Ruth’s ERA was about 21% lower than the average pitcher. If we applied this to today’s ERA’s, the 2006 American League had a league average ERA of 4.56. An ERA 21% lower would equate to a 3.63 ERA, which is pretty darn good and would have put him in the top 10 in the AL in ERA.
Ruth also won the ERA crown one year, in 1916, with a 1.75 ERA. That same year, he was in the top 5 on many other categories, including: Win % (5th, .657), Wins (3rd, 23), Innings (3rd, 323.2), K’s (3rd, 170), Games Started (1st, 41), Shutouts (1st, 9) and Complete Games (4th, 23). If the Cy Young had existed, he surely would have won it this year.
He was also in the top 5 in many pretty important categories the other years of his career too, including 2nd in wins, innings and games started in 1917, 1st in complete games, and 5th in both K’s and Shutouts. He one of the best bets to win a game for his team during this time as well, in the top 5 in win % in both 1915 and 1918 as well.
In fact, his career winning % ranks 14th all time, among eligible players(100 decisions minimum to qualify) with a .671 winning percentage. This winning percentage puts him in the company of modern stars like Roy Halladay, Roy Oswalt, Roger Clemens and Tim Hudson as well as all-time greats Cristy Mathewson, Lefty Grove and Sandy Koufax.
Now, to look at Ruth’s WHIP compared to league average of his time. These stats are compiled from the 1915-1918 seasons, when he was most active as a pitcher.
Stat Comparison – Ruth / League Average / % better Ruth is
WHIP – 1.088 / 1.261 / 15.9%
WHIP is of course, Walks + Hits per Inning Pitched, or more simply, how many baserunners a pitcher allows. If a pitcher allows very few, you can bet that the pitcher is probably very successful, since there’s no one on base to score. Ruth let basically 16% fewer people on base than the average pitcher, showing that he was very good there as well. His career WHIP is a little higher, as he was later often used here and there, but obviously being out of practice never had the level of success as a regular pitcher. That career average was 1.15, which places him 70th all time in WHIP.
He was also a stellar postseason pitcher though, once posting 29 consecutive scoreless innings in World Series play(This was a record for 43 years). I know being on World Series teams can’t be an entirely individual achievement, but in his few years pitching in Boston, he was on three World Series championship teams during Boston’s most successful years. His total postseason line is: 2-0, 0.86 ERA in 31 innings pitched with a 0.935 WHIP. This was in three games pitched, over the 1916 and 1918 World Series.
So, if anyone has any doubt that Ruth is the best player ever, when you take his dominance with the bat and you, on top of that, look at the fact that he was probably one of the top 5 pitchers in baseball over a 5 year span before moving to the outfield in New York full time, the conclusion seems pretty obvious.
Update: I had some other links, but I screwed the links themselves up. Once I find those pages again, I'll re-link them, but for now, since I screwed it up, I'm just taking those down.
He really only spent four seasons as a full-time pitcher, from 1915 to 1918. He was still primarily a pitcher in 1919, but the Red Sox realized how much of a hitter he was, and he spent much more time in the lineup as an outfielder(111 games) than he did as a pitcher(17 games).
Now, many of these stats are on some level archaic because it was a different time period. This was a time period known for dominant pitching, and Ruth was definitely part of that. However, we can look at his stats compared to league average(as I did in the last post), and that will give us an idea of how dominant he was.
Ruth’s career ERA was a sterling 2.28. Obviously in today’s game that would make him the best pitcher in the league, but again, let’s consider it compared to Ruth’s era. The league average ERA over his pitching years was 2.86, so Ruth’s ERA was about 21% lower than the average pitcher. If we applied this to today’s ERA’s, the 2006 American League had a league average ERA of 4.56. An ERA 21% lower would equate to a 3.63 ERA, which is pretty darn good and would have put him in the top 10 in the AL in ERA.
Ruth also won the ERA crown one year, in 1916, with a 1.75 ERA. That same year, he was in the top 5 on many other categories, including: Win % (5th, .657), Wins (3rd, 23), Innings (3rd, 323.2), K’s (3rd, 170), Games Started (1st, 41), Shutouts (1st, 9) and Complete Games (4th, 23). If the Cy Young had existed, he surely would have won it this year.
He was also in the top 5 in many pretty important categories the other years of his career too, including 2nd in wins, innings and games started in 1917, 1st in complete games, and 5th in both K’s and Shutouts. He one of the best bets to win a game for his team during this time as well, in the top 5 in win % in both 1915 and 1918 as well.
In fact, his career winning % ranks 14th all time, among eligible players(100 decisions minimum to qualify) with a .671 winning percentage. This winning percentage puts him in the company of modern stars like Roy Halladay, Roy Oswalt, Roger Clemens and Tim Hudson as well as all-time greats Cristy Mathewson, Lefty Grove and Sandy Koufax.
Now, to look at Ruth’s WHIP compared to league average of his time. These stats are compiled from the 1915-1918 seasons, when he was most active as a pitcher.
Stat Comparison – Ruth / League Average / % better Ruth is
WHIP – 1.088 / 1.261 / 15.9%
WHIP is of course, Walks + Hits per Inning Pitched, or more simply, how many baserunners a pitcher allows. If a pitcher allows very few, you can bet that the pitcher is probably very successful, since there’s no one on base to score. Ruth let basically 16% fewer people on base than the average pitcher, showing that he was very good there as well. His career WHIP is a little higher, as he was later often used here and there, but obviously being out of practice never had the level of success as a regular pitcher. That career average was 1.15, which places him 70th all time in WHIP.
He was also a stellar postseason pitcher though, once posting 29 consecutive scoreless innings in World Series play(This was a record for 43 years). I know being on World Series teams can’t be an entirely individual achievement, but in his few years pitching in Boston, he was on three World Series championship teams during Boston’s most successful years. His total postseason line is: 2-0, 0.86 ERA in 31 innings pitched with a 0.935 WHIP. This was in three games pitched, over the 1916 and 1918 World Series.
So, if anyone has any doubt that Ruth is the best player ever, when you take his dominance with the bat and you, on top of that, look at the fact that he was probably one of the top 5 pitchers in baseball over a 5 year span before moving to the outfield in New York full time, the conclusion seems pretty obvious.
Update: I had some other links, but I screwed the links themselves up. Once I find those pages again, I'll re-link them, but for now, since I screwed it up, I'm just taking those down.
posted by Matt at 6:19 PM
2 Comments:
Without a standard deviation your stats are virtually useless. The fac that fielding was pathetic to say the least on the whole in that era brings up the question as to how good were the people he had on his team. I'm going out there but I'd venture to say the red sox were in the upper echoelon (spelling?) of that era like they are today in most areas of the game.
Fielding being pathetic is exactly why there were a lot of UNEARNED runs, however that doesn't play in on ERA and WHIP.
He's still considerably better than the league average on all of those stats and in the top 5 on so many categories that arguing me on this one is really weak, hoop.
I'll tell you what, though. If you write a post that uses a combination of expert opinions and statistics that show that Babe Ruth wasn't that great, I'll give you equal time and post it right here on my blog.
If you're interested in that, let me know and when you write it, email it to me either in plain text or in an HTML file(if you have links you want to cite, go ahead and link them, or if you don't know how, just send me the links and tell me where you want them to be). Then send it to me at mtalken at gmail dot com
Post a Comment
<< Home