Around Baseball 2021

[John_Havok]

It's not a fair comparison though. Grichuk strikes out when pitchers are throwing 90-100 MPH.

 

Almost nobody struck out in Ruth's era, because pitchers threw maybe 75mph tops?

 

For a hitter from today, facing 75mph on a daily basis is batting practice. Any hitter from today would likely hit 200 HRs a season if they were just sent back in time to the 20s.

 

Thats why its not fair to compare "talent" from era to era. Giancarlo Stanton would hit a HR nearly every AB facing 75mph.

[Laika]

Williams:

 

Age 22 - 221 wRC+

Age 23 - 209 wRC+

Age 24 - WWII

Age 25 - WWII

Age 26 - WWII

Age 27 - 215 wRC+

Age 28 - 207 wRC+

 

Age 33 - 12 PA (Korean War)

Age 34 - 110 PA (Korean War)

 

Without the war interruptions, he would be #1 in career WAR.

 

Nah he's still be short, even if he pumped out injury free seasons.

[Jimcanuck]

It's not a fair comparison though. Grichuk strikes out when pitchers are throwing 90-100 MPH.

 

Almost nobody struck out in Ruth's era, because pitchers threw maybe 75mph tops?

 

For a hitter from today, facing 75mph on a daily basis is batting practice. Any hitter from today would likely hit 200 HRs a season if they were just sent back in time to the 20s.

 

Thats why its not fair to compare "talent" from era to era. Giancarlo Stanton would hit a HR nearly every AB facing 75mph.

 

Walter Johnson estimated to be at 98 MPH. Bob Feller who came up shortly after Ruth retired, was measured at 100 MPH.

 

Charlie Gehringer, the HOF second baseman with Detroit, batted against Feller, Lefty Grove, and Walter Johnson and said that Johnson, who pitched in Ruth’s era and earlier, threw much harder than Feller.

[John_Havok]

Walter Johnson estimated to be at 98 MPH. Bob Feller who came up shortly after Ruth retired, was measured at 100 MPH.

 

Charlie Gehringer, the HOF second baseman with Detroit, batted against Feller, Lefty Grove, and Walter Johnson and said that Johnson, who pitched in Ruth’s era and earlier, threw much harder than Feller.

 

And if you believe either of those... I've got some oceanfront property in Alberta you really need to get a look at. Old timey stuff like that was 100% exaggerated at every opportunity to sensationalize. There were few ways to even reliably clock speeds that high back then. There's also a difference in how hard they could throw max effort off the field vs what they did in games.

 

Didn't you know? Satchel Paige threw 105 mph with pinpoint command according to the legends.

[Jimcanuck]

And if you believe either of those... I've got some oceanfront property in Alberta you really need to get a look at. Old timey stuff like that was 100% exaggerated at every opportunity to sensationalize. There were few ways to even reliably clock speeds that high back then. There's also a difference in how hard they could throw max effort off the field vs what they did in games.

 

Didn't you know? Satchel Paige threw 105 mph with pinpoint command according to the legends.

 

Feller was measured. Primitive methods compared to today, to be sure.

 

You have no evidence to back up your 75MPH tops assertion. None.

[John_Havok]

Feller was measured. Primitive methods compared to today, to be sure.

 

You have no evidence to back up your 75MPH tops assertion. None.

 

True, that's just a guess based on avg velocity increases that have been reliably obvserved from the 60's onward.

 

Yes Feller was clocked that hard outside of games, never in a game and was clocked using a Lumiline Chronograph, which was developed in WW2 to measure the speeds of anti-tank rounds. How accurate was the Lumiline Chronograph? Nobody really knew. It was just the best guesses they had based on the tech of the time. Its not like they really need to measure anti-tank round velocities down to the 10ths of a MPH, or even to a whole MPH number.

 

I've researched this stuff to death, there was NO way to reliably clock pitching speeds with any degree of accuracy. Even early radar in the mid 50's had huge swings in their numbers because the tech was still so new at being used for that kind of thing.

[keggy]

Strongly disagree. Ruth had more power and WAY more hitting ability than K machine Grichuk.

 

Montages comparing 1950s gold medal gymnasts versus modern day

https://i.imgur.com/TR800XI.mp4

https://i.imgur.com/wmlTA22.mp4

 

James Corbett, lineal heavyweight champion of the world defending his title in 1894

https://gfycat.com/peskyresponsibleamericanratsnake

 

Future lineal heavyweight champion Mike Tyson as a 15 year old child in the 1980s

https://gfycat.com/jubilanthandmadeindianpalmsquirrel

 

Kareem Abdul Jabbar at the 1977 Slam Dunk Contest. Kareem was considered the greatest basketball player of all time before Michael Jordan. His dominance led to a racially-motivated rule change to ban slam dunks.

 

googled for recent slam dunk contest gifs. I don't even know who this is.

https://i.makeagif.com/media/2-14-2016/KNp0Tp.gif

 

If you prefer numbers I can show you 100m dash stats from 1900 to 2000. If you prefer more skill based sports I can show you golf drive distances since the 1980s.

 

I honestly can't think of a single sport including chess and video games where modern players wouldn't dominate players from 100 years ago.

[wilko]

Montages comparing 1950s gold medal gymnasts versus modern day

https://i.imgur.com/TR800XI.mp4

https://i.imgur.com/wmlTA22.mp4

 

James Corbett, lineal heavyweight champion of the world defending his title in 1894

https://gfycat.com/peskyresponsibleamericanratsnake

 

Future lineal heavyweight champion Mike Tyson as a 15 year old child in the 1980s

https://gfycat.com/jubilanthandmadeindianpalmsquirrel

 

Kareem Abdul Jabbar at the 1977 Slam Dunk Contest. Kareem was considered the greatest basketball player of all time before Michael Jordan. His dominance led to a racially-motivated rule change to ban slam dunks.

 

googled for recent slam dunk contest gifs. I don't even know who this is.

https://i.makeagif.com/media/2-14-2016/KNp0Tp.gif

 

If you prefer numbers I can show you 100m dash stats from 1900 to 2000. If you prefer more skill based sports I can show you golf drive distances since the 1980s.

 

I honestly can't think of a single sport including chess and video games where modern players wouldn't dominate players from 100 years ago.

 

I agree. You could also argue that if you insert a player from this generation and plunk them in 1930's baseball, they would also struggle. When you're comparing all time greats you have to take it with a grain of salt. People love history and like to remember it that way. I think it's more of a generational thing.

[Jimcanuck]

Montages comparing 1950s gold medal gymnasts versus modern day

https://i.imgur.com/TR800XI.mp4

https://i.imgur.com/wmlTA22.mp4

 

James Corbett, lineal heavyweight champion of the world defending his title in 1894

https://gfycat.com/peskyresponsibleamericanratsnake

 

Future lineal heavyweight champion Mike Tyson as a 15 year old child in the 1980s

https://gfycat.com/jubilanthandmadeindianpalmsquirrel

 

Kareem Abdul Jabbar at the 1977 Slam Dunk Contest. Kareem was considered the greatest basketball player of all time before Michael Jordan. His dominance led to a racially-motivated rule change to ban slam dunks.

 

googled for recent slam dunk contest gifs. I don't even know who this is.

https://i.makeagif.com/media/2-14-2016/KNp0Tp.gif

 

If you prefer numbers I can show you 100m dash stats from 1900 to 2000. If you prefer more skill based sports I can show you golf drive distances since the 1980s.

 

I honestly can't think of a single sport including chess and video games where modern players wouldn't dominate players from 100 years ago.

 

Golf distance increases are predominantly equipment/technology.

 

There is no question athletes today are on average physically stronger / faster than their counterparts from 100 years ago (Pineda types notwithstanding). However, I do not believe the gap is as great as you think. There is a line of MLB fireballers Johnson, Feller, Gibson, Ryan, Johnson, Verlander all throwing 100 MPH or close to it. There was never some massive leap in fastball velocity from one generation to the next. A slow increase generation to generation, sure. Nothing close to 75 MPH to 100 MPH across those 5 generations of pitchers.

 

Grichuk in 1920 hit 200 HRs? Give me a break.

[Dick_Pole]

Pitching is about maximizing mechanics. The human body has some maximum potential velocity before the arm falls off. IIRC something around 110 MPH. Science and nerd stuff has allowed pitchers to approach that maximum speed of their pitches over the years but the human body hasn't evolved over the last 100 years to significantly boost the potential velocity of the arm. There must be some people on this board who have managed to touch 75 MPH throwing a ball with nothing much more than little league or high school coaching. Certainly some men 100 years ago could have topped that speed with regularity, considering they did this for a living, practiced a lot and received the best possible training/coaching at the time.

 

Humanity today consistently underestimates the achievements and abilities of previous generations. Everything from the pyramids being built by aliens to top athletes being a bunch of bumpkins off the street that Joe Blow could easily beat out in a foot race today. They should have had Lou Ferrigno play Babe Ruth instead of fat John Goodman.

[connorp]

Anyone who didn't compete when blacks were allowed to play should just automatically be disqualified. I don't care what anyone says, you cannot be considered the best if you never went up against the dominant athletic race.

 

Uh. I don’t think anyone is going to take that as gospel. Maybe they’re more likely to be faster? In the NBA or NFL, sure. Also, remember there was no NBA or NFL to take away athletes. It’s not a sound argument. You’re just basing on principle really.

[Dick_Pole]

Anyone who didn't compete when blacks were allowed to play should just automatically be disqualified. I don't care what anyone says, you cannot be considered the best if you never went up against the dominant athletic race.

 

Let's take away that word athletic in your last sentence and see how well your comment is received.

 

Will some 300 pound Norwegians compete against Kenyans in long distance running? Probably not. But if the sport is power lifting my money's on the white guys. There is no such thing as "dominant athletic race". The comment would have made more sense if you talked about the exclusion of blacks (as well as international players) as a watered-down talent pool only for the fact that the best players were segregated into leagues by race and never played against each other.

[Jimcanuck]

Babe Ruth in his 20's had a physique quite similar to Mike Trout.

 

Hell, fangraphs has the Babe at 6'2", 215 lbs, and Trout at 6'2", 235 lbs.

[John_Havok]

Pitching is about maximizing mechanics. The human body has some maximum potential velocity before the arm falls off. IIRC something around 110 MPH. Science and nerd stuff has allowed pitchers to approach that maximum speed of their pitches over the years but the human body hasn't evolved over the last 100 years to significantly boost the potential velocity of the arm. There must be some people on this board who have managed to touch 75 MPH throwing a ball with nothing much more than little league or high school coaching. Certainly some men 100 years ago could have topped that speed with regularity, considering they did this for a living, practiced a lot and received the best possible training/coaching at the time.

 

Humanity today consistently underestimates the achievements and abilities of previous generations. Everything from the pyramids being built by aliens to top athletes being a bunch of bumpkins off the street that Joe Blow could easily beat out in a foot race today. They should have had Lou Ferrigno play Babe Ruth instead of fat John Goodman.

 

Everything you say is true, except that it ignores several key concepts, and I'll focus on pitching in my example. Today's pitchers, you can see most of them are max effort to get the velocity they get. Even watching old footage of games you can tell the pitchers then were not. Then you also have to take into account that IF Walter Johnson was throwing 100mph consistently as Jim suggests, he would have been doing so every game from start to finish? There wasn't 5 man rotations back then. His arm just didn't need to recuperate after throwing that hard for the entire game day after day? That is HIGHLY unlikely, therefore it's reasonable to assume that he was not, in fact, throwing 100 mph in his games and his in game velocity was quite likely much lower, or his arm would have fallen off.

 

Could he have thrown 100mph outside of a game max effort? Sure, I can't say it's impossible, but I can make reason based judgements that the way pitching worked back then it was highly unlikely that he was doing so in games.

 

second, what did they actually do for training? Almost nothing in fact. There was no studying pitching mechanics, no weighted ball programs, no real understanding of kinesiology (which only began being truly studied in the 60's), these guys literally just showed up at the ball park and tried to hit the catchers mitt. Repetition was their only real training.

[Omar]

Montages comparing 1950s gold medal gymnasts versus modern day

https://i.imgur.com/TR800XI.mp4

https://i.imgur.com/wmlTA22.mp4

 

James Corbett, lineal heavyweight champion of the world defending his title in 1894

https://gfycat.com/peskyresponsibleamericanratsnake

 

Future lineal heavyweight champion Mike Tyson as a 15 year old child in the 1980s

https://gfycat.com/jubilanthandmadeindianpalmsquirrel

 

Kareem Abdul Jabbar at the 1977 Slam Dunk Contest. Kareem was considered the greatest basketball player of all time before Michael Jordan. His dominance led to a racially-motivated rule change to ban slam dunks.

 

googled for recent slam dunk contest gifs. I don't even know who this is.

https://i.makeagif.com/media/2-14-2016/KNp0Tp.gif

 

If you prefer numbers I can show you 100m dash stats from 1900 to 2000. If you prefer more skill based sports I can show you golf drive distances since the 1980s.

 

I honestly can't think of a single sport including chess and video games where modern players wouldn't dominate players from 100 years ago.

 

Chess is a sport?

[connorp]

Everything you say is true, except that it ignores several key concepts, and I'll focus on pitching in my example. Today's pitchers, you can see most of them are max effort to get the velocity they get. Even watching old footage of games you can tell the pitchers then were not. Then you also have to take into account that IF Walter Johnson was throwing 100mph consistently as Jim suggests, he would have been doing so every game from start to finish? There wasn't 5 man rotations back then. His arm just didn't need to recuperate after throwing that hard for the entire game day after day? That is HIGHLY unlikely, therefore it's reasonable to assume that he was not, in fact, throwing 100 mph in his games and his in game velocity was quite likely much lower, or his arm would have fallen off.

 

Could he have thrown 100mph outside of a game max effort? Sure, I can't say it's impossible, but I can make reason based judgements that the way pitching worked back then it was highly unlikely that he was doing so in games.

 

second, what did they actually do for training? Almost nothing in fact. There was no studying pitching mechanics, no weighted ball programs, no real understanding of kinesiology (which only began being truly studied in the 60's), these guys literally just showed up at the ball park and tried to hit the catchers mitt. Repetition was their only real training.

 

I mean.. why not take Nolan Ryan as an example. It’s accepted he threw 100mph, isn’t it? He also turned in 300+ innings regularly early in his career. So that kind of disproves your “highly unlikely”

[Jimcanuck]

I don't think Nolan Ryan did much of mechanics, weighted ball, etc either. And I doubt Pineda has been to a gym even one day in his life and yet there he was throwing 95/96 or whatever.

 

Of course The Big Train was getting up to 100 MPH. Nolan Ryan is basically his clone.

[Abomination]

That was a hell of a dig by Rizzo!

[John_Havok]

I mean.. why not take Nolan Ryan as an example. It’s accepted he threw 100mph, isn’t it? He also turned in 300+ innings regularly early in his career. So that kind of disproves your “highly unlikely”

 

Ryan didn't pitch every game.'

 

We were talking about Walter Johnson in 1907 vs today. Comparing the late 70s to today is far closer.

 

And Ryan was the unicorn, he is not representative of the average pitcher of the 70s or 80s.

[Jimcanuck]

Ryan didn't pitch every game.

 

According to Fangraphs, Walter Johnson max'ed out at 371.2 innings in a season. Nolan Ryan, 332.2. Not that far apart.

[John_Havok]

According to Fangraphs, Walter Johnson max'ed out at 371.2 innings in a season. Nolan Ryan, 332.2. Not that far apart.

 

But, like I said, it's not impossible, just improbable.

 

I just looked at Walter johnsons 1914 season as an example. He pitched 51 games that year, mostly pitching 1 day, getting 2 days off, then pitching again. Some starts he threw, had only 1 day off then threw again. THere were a few instances of having 4 days rest, but they were not the regular situations, those were few and far between.

 

So ... does it seem likely that a guy in 1914 threw nearly 400 innings of baseball over 51 games, throwing 100mph and not needing regular rest of at least 4 days? I'm leaning towards no.

 

Then keep asking that question with the velocity dropping until it makes sense and you'll likely arrive at the conclusion that pitchers back then didn't even come close to the velocity of todays starting pitchers.

 

Nolan Ryan's biggest workload year was 1974, 41 starts, and he had minimum 3 or 4 days rest between starts. I didn't look close enough to see if 3 days or 4 happened more often.

Edited September 25, 2021 by John_Havok

[Dick_Pole]

Everything you say is true, except that it ignores several key concepts, and I'll focus on pitching in my example. Today's pitchers, you can see most of them are max effort to get the velocity they get. Even watching old footage of games you can tell the pitchers then were not. Then you also have to take into account that IF Walter Johnson was throwing 100mph consistently as Jim suggests, he would have been doing so every game from start to finish? There wasn't 5 man rotations back then. His arm just didn't need to recuperate after throwing that hard for the entire game day after day? That is HIGHLY unlikely, therefore it's reasonable to assume that he was not, in fact, throwing 100 mph in his games and his in game velocity was quite likely much lower, or his arm would have fallen off.

 

Could he have thrown 100mph outside of a game max effort? Sure, I can't say it's impossible, but I can make reason based judgements that the way pitching worked back then it was highly unlikely that he was doing so in games.

 

second, what did they actually do for training? Almost nothing in fact. There was no studying pitching mechanics, no weighted ball programs, no real understanding of kinesiology (which only began being truly studied in the 60's), these guys literally just showed up at the ball park and tried to hit the catchers mitt. Repetition was their only real training.

 

I get what you mean but we are talking about Walter Johnson, not Pud Galvin here. Johnson's career high IP for a season was 371. We had pitchers hitting that mark as recently as the 1970's. By the time he hit early 30's MLB was exiting the dead ball era and he never threw over 300 IP in a season. You stated that based on trajectory from 50 years ago that you estimated that no one threw above 75 MPH (paraphrasing, too lazy to check your exact comment) during Johnson's time. If pitcher workload didn't change much between the 1920's and 1970's, is it also fair to say that max effort and likely velocity didn't change much?

 

I'm somewhere between your 75 MPH and Jim's 100 MPH. Doubtful he did 100 with regularity but he was almost certainly consistently above 75 along with many other pitchers.

[connorp]

Ryan didn't pitch every game.'

 

We were talking about Walter Johnson in 1907 vs today. Comparing the late 70s to today is far closer.

 

And Ryan was the unicorn, he is not representative of the average pitcher of the 70s or 80s.

 

As Jim said, the IP isn’t really far off. It’s only unbelievable based on the IP they throw now. While Ryan was a unicorn, there were other guys in his era and right before like Gibson, Feller, Carlton, etc that it’s accepted they threw in the 90’s with nasty stuff. Really I think it’s much less about any kind of physical evolution in baseball, it’s just a matter of more kids being exposed to baseball and playing it as a sport and developing their skills.

[Jimcanuck]

To be clear I never said Johnson regularly threw 100 MPH. The available anecdotal reports are that he threw harder than Feller, who was measured at 100 MPH max (measured at the plate, mind you, not out of the hand - big difference). So let's say Johnson sat 94 and topped at 98. Seems reasonable?

 

https://everything-everywhere.com/jesse-owens-vs-usain-bolt-who-would-win/

 

The above is an interesting read on Jesse Owens. They got Andre DeGrasse to run on same conditions that Owens ran under, and DeGrasse did 100 m in 11 seconds.

[BTS]

Soto has reached base in 12 straight PA

[Jimcanuck]

Soto has reached base in 12 straight PA

 

OBP up to .471

 

Ted Williams has a .482 OBP for his career.... crazy. I could see Soto coming close to that, though.

[BTS]

OBP up to .471

 

Ted Williams has a .482 OBP for his career.... crazy. I could see Soto coming close to that, though.

 

Imagine owning 2021 Juan Soto and not winning your fantasy league

 

[Abomination]

Imagine owning 2021 Juan Soto and not winning your fantasy league

 

 

It's like the Trout curse.

[Jimcanuck]

Imagine owning 2021 Juan Soto and not winning your fantasy league

 

 

Soto dynasty value took a hit this year with the general suckage of the players around him.

[BTS]

It's like the Trout curse.

 

I owned Trout for like 5 years in BORED and never won s***. The pain was real.