Bonds and Aaron from guys with ties to both

#1
TennNC

TennNC

a lover, not a fighter
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#1
Interesting quotes from some guys who played with or coached for/against both for extended periods. Dusty Baker, Frank Robinson, Joe Torre, Felipe Alou, amongst others.

The Official Site of Major League Baseball: News: Major League Baseball News

Theme is that they're both exceptional players, among the 10 or so best ever. Aaron was not as exciting, was more subdued, consistently delivered results at the plate and in the field. And might be less appreciated b/c of how he rarely had amazing plays but just performed at a sound, high level all the time.
 
#2
#2
The best description of Aaron I've heard was that he was just like Willie Mays except he wore the right sized cap and it never flew off.
 
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#3
GAVol said:
The best description of Aaron I've heard was that he was just like Willie Mays except he wore the right sized cap and it never flew off.
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That's utterly laughable. The day Aaron could carry the bags of Willie Mays never existed. The fact all of Barry's detractors are venerating that bitter old fool makes me even happier that Bonds is going to erase the only record that gives Aaron relevance.
 
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hatvol96 said:
That's utterly laughable. The day Aaron could carry the bags of Willie Mays never existed. The fact all of Barry's detractors are venerating that bitter old fool makes me even happier that Bonds is going to erase the only record that gives Aaron relevance.
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Come on. All Aaron has said is that he's an old man and doesn't want to fly around the country following Bonds for two weeks, and the way Bonds has been hitting for the last month and a half, it might be longer than that. That makes him "a bitter old fool"? What does Aaron's presence in the stands have to do with what Bonds is accomplishing? Like the Selig "controversy," this is pure media-driven crap at its thickest. What does who's sitting in the stands have to do at all with what's happening on the field?

There's no question that Mays was vastly the greater player, and that if you swapped the ballparks they played in over their careers, Mays would probably have hit 850 homers and Aaron would be down around 600. But Willie Mays was one of the two greatest players of all time. Just because Aaron doesn't measure up to that standard doesn't mean he wasn't a great player himself.
 
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#5
Vercingetorix said:
That makes him "a bitter old fool"?
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No, what makes Hapless Hank a bitter old fool is his 30+ years of incessant yammering about how he's never gotten proper credit because he's not considered on the level of Ruth and Mays. Note to Hank: The reason you're not mentioned in the same breath as those guys is the fact that it slanders Mays and Ruth to share a sentence with the likes of you.
 
#6
#6
I can't really say that I've ever heard Aaron himself make that argument, although I've of course heard plenty of idiots make that argument on his behalf. But I've never blamed Aaron himself for other people's claims about him.

We are in complete agreement that it's crazy to even compare Aaron to Mays. Aaron was a very-good-to-great home run hitter who enjoyed a very long career playing in homer-friendly parks; Mays was one of the immortals. Aaron wasn't better than Mays or Ruth any better than collecting that 4,191st hit suddenly made Pete Rose better than Ty Cobb.
 
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hatvol96 said:
That's utterly laughable. The day Aaron could carry the bags of Willie Mays never existed. The fact all of Barry's detractors are venerating that bitter old fool makes me even happier that Bonds is going to erase the only record that gives Aaron relevance.
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Hat - I'm guessing you never saw Mays or Aaron play, live or on TV, and if you did, you were too young to know what was going on.

So, why are you so adamant that Aaron is basically an irrelevant player or Mays is vastly superior? If someone had played with both, against both, coached both, and had a strong opinion based on observation, I could understand.

The information I can find would tell a different story: stats, for one, and comments from many I've read would lead me to believe that over both of their careers Mays was probably regarded as a better, but not vastly superior player overall - he probably had a stretch of 5-10 years where he was the best in the game, maybe ever. I'm not claiming to know the absolute answer - just collecting information and trying to come to a sound conclusion.
 
#8
#8
wbarron said:
The information I can find would tell a different story: stats, for one, and comments from many I've read would lead me to believe that over both of their careers Mays was probably regarded as a better, but not vastly superior player overall - he probably had a stretch of 5-10 years where he was the best in the game, maybe ever. I'm not claiming to know the absolute answer - just collecting information and trying to come to a sound conclusion.
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It pains me to say it, but IMO Mickey Mantle had about an eight-year stretch when he was not only better than Mays, he was a lot better. Mays's peak was never as high, but he sustained it a lot longer, so there's no question his career value was a lot higher than Mantle's. But for a few seasons there in the late 50s and early 60s, there's no question who the best player in baseball was.
 
#9
#9
Vercingetorix said:
It pains me to say it, but IMO Mickey Mantle had about an eight-year stretch when he was not only better than Mays, he was a lot better. Mays's peak was never as high, but he sustained it a lot longer, so there's no question his career value was a lot higher than Mantle's. But for a few seasons there in the late 50s and early 60s, there's no question who the best player in baseball was.
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If not for the injury / drinking issues, there would be no debate about the best player of that era. Mantle was the guy, but Mays never really enjoyed the lineup protection that Mantle did.
 
#10
#10
wbarron said:
Hat - I'm guessing you never saw Mays or Aaron play, live or on TV, and if you did, you were too young to know what was going on.

So, why are you so adamant that Aaron is basically an irrelevant player or Mays is vastly superior? If someone had played with both, against both, coached both, and had a strong opinion based on observation, I could understand.

The information I can find would tell a different story: stats, for one, and comments from many I've read would lead me to believe that over both of their careers Mays was probably regarded as a better, but not vastly superior player overall - he probably had a stretch of 5-10 years where he was the best in the game, maybe ever. I'm not claiming to know the absolute answer - just collecting information and trying to come to a sound conclusion.
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When intelligent people debate the issue of who the greatest player of ll time is, Mays is always in the discussion. I've never heard a single, credible person ever attempt to interject Aaron into the debate.
 
#11
#11
hatvol96 said:
No, what makes Hapless Hank a bitter old fool is his 30+ years of incessant yammering about how he's never gotten proper credit because he's not considered on the level of Ruth and Mays. Note to Hank: The reason you're not mentioned in the same breath as those guys is the fact that it slanders Mays and Ruth to share a sentence with the likes of you.
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They look comparable to me:

Hank Aaron:
AVG .305
HR 755
RBI 2,297
SLG .555

Barry Bonds:
AVG .298
HR 753
RBI 1,973
SLG .607

Willie Mays:
AVG .302
HR 660
RBI 1,903
SLG .557

Babe Ruth:
AVG .342
HR 714
RBI 2213
SLG .690
 
#12
#12
Mays could have done a lot worse than having Willie McCovey hitting behind him.

Injuries basically destroyed Mantle's career, and yet he was still a first-ballot HOFer. Imagine what his numbers would look like if he hadn't been so brittle.
 
#14
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hatvol96 said:
When intelligent people debate the issue of who the greatest player of ll time is, Mays is always in the discussion. I've never heard a single, credible person ever attempt to interject Aaron into the debate.
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He's not in the debate. Longevity as a strong suit is a tough argument.
 
#15
#15
That .342 avg for Babe is simply amazing. I'm surprised Bonds won't be a career .300 hitter with all the watered down pitching he faced.
 
#16
#16
hatvol96 said:
When intelligent people debate the issue of who the greatest player of ll time is, Mays is always in the discussion. I've never heard a single, credible person ever attempt to interject Aaron into the debate.
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When you consider the fact, Babe Ruth was an all-star pitcher before he became an every day slugger, IMO Ruth was the greatest.

His lifetime .690 slg % will probably never be broken. When he set the single season HR record with 60, the closest player to him had 28. He was in a league of his own.
 
#17
#17
oklavol said:
They look pretty comparable to me:
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Mays's stats are lower than they should be because he played most of his career in Candlestick Park, a stadium which favored pitchers. Aaron's stats are better than they should be because he moved to a stadium known as "The Launching Pad" in his early thirties, so instead of declining throughout his thirties like most players did, he continued to hit homers at about the same rate.

Also, there's no question that the people who watched them both play considered Mays to be the vastly superior player. The debate throughout the 50s and 60s was always Mays vs. Mantle; Aaron was regarded as very good but not quite great. Part of the distaste directed Aaron's way when he was chasing 714 was because that was a record that was supposed to be broken by someone with stature, like (for example) Willie Mays. Like Roger Maris, Aaron was largely considered at the time to be kind of an imposter, as someone who was not quite good enough to hold the record.

There can of course be plenty of biases in contemporary accounts -- Mays started his career in NY, Aaron played in a backwater; Mays was charismatic, Aaron was aloof -- but when you're evaluating players that you're too young to have seen, stats and contemporary accounts are all you can go on. I'm satisfied that Mays was not only a better player than Aaron, but a much better player.
 
#18
#18
hatvol96 said:
When intelligent people debate the issue of who the greatest player of ll time is, Mays is always in the discussion. I've never heard a single, credible person ever attempt to interject Aaron into the debate.
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There's a big difference between saying he's not in the debate of the greatest player ever and that he's irrelevant.

He leads all-time in total bases, HR and RBIs and batted .305. Name 10 players who performed at a higher level for their career than Aaron.

I'll start it: Ruth, Mantle, Mays, Williams, Cobb, Gehrig

Debatable: Musial, Honus Wagner, DiMaggio, Bonds

Interesting take on this whole thing:

The Baseball Guru - Rating the Top Baseball Players of all Time: The Extrapolation Method by Eric Gartman
 
#19
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wbarron said:
There's a big difference between saying he's not in the debate of the greatest player ever and that he's irrelevant.

He leads all-time in total bases, HR and RBIs and batted .305. Name 10 players who performed at a higher level for their career than Aaron.

I'll start it: Ruth, Mantle, Mays, Williams, Cobb, Gehrig

Debatable: Musial, Honus Wagner, DiMaggio, Bonds

Interesting take on this whole thing:

The Baseball Guru - Rating the Top Baseball Players of all Time: The Extrapolation Method by Eric Gartman
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but you're arguing for his longevity and sustaining his level of play for a long period, which matters to some degree, but not when talking about the greatest.
 
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#20
I'll add this about Ruth, in 1 year he hit more home runs, then everyone else in both leagues did combined.
 
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#21
JZVOL said:
I'm surprised Bonds won't be a career .300 hitter with all the watered down pitching he faced.
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To be a career .300 hitter, a player normally needs to be a .320-.330 hitter during his prime in order to offset the inevitable hit his average is going to take during the last years of his career. Until what we'll call his late-career explosion, Bonds was never that high of an average hitter -- .295 to .315, something like that.

It really is a shame that Bonds decided to go the steroid route. Before that he was a great, great player anyway -- a first-ballot HOFer and probably the greatest player of the modern era. Unfortunately, he's now put himself in a position where people are going to forget that, and instead regard his whole career as a fraud. And that's too bad.
 
#23
#23
BigPapaVol said:
but you're arguing for his longevity and sustaining his level of play for a long period, which matters to some degree, but not when talking about the greatest.
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Okay. Then what do you think constitutes the greatest? Greatest for a season? 5 seasons? 10 seasons? Career?

George Foster had arguably one of the best seasons ever in 1977. Same with Hack Wilson in 1929-30. Should they be in the debate?
 
#24
#24
wbarron said:
Okay. Then what do you think constitutes the greatest? Greatest for a season? 5 seasons? 10 seasons? Career?

George Foster had arguably one of the best seasons ever in 1977. Same with Hack Wilson in 1929-30. Should they be in the debate?
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This is a big question. If you think about a player's career as a line graph, by calling someone "the greatest," do you mean the highest point on the line or the total area underneath the line?

Either one is a legitimate way to look at it. But you have to at least be clear what you mean. See Mantle/Mays discussion above -- Mantle's peak was unquestionably better, but Mays's career value was just as unquestionably higher. At his best, Sandy Koufax was a vastly better pitcher than Warren Spahn, but over the course of his career, Spahn was roughly as valuable as Koufax and Don Drysdale combined. Was Koufax or Spahn "greater"?
 
#25
#25
I think the real point of all this is that it's endlessly debatable. Deep down we probably don't want an agreed upon answer, b/c then the debate is over.

I'm less passionate about players I didn't see, although I am amazed at stats from generations back. But I can say that, based on players I've seen, in my opinion, Bonds is the best in my lifetime, with or without juice (I'm 32, btw).
 
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