Who's on baseball's Rushmore?

Walter Johnson and Babe Ruth

Sunday, July 22, 2007

THE BERGEN COUNTY RECORD

Forget the allegations, the rumors and the off-field behavior. Put aside your personal dislikes for a moment. With all that said, one could argue that based solely on on-field accomplishments, if baseball had its own Mount Rushmore, the faces carved in stone would be Barry Bonds, Babe Ruth, Roger Clemens and Willie Mays. Of course, not everyone's criteria will be the same, so we ask members of The Record's staff to present their Mount Rushmore candidates :



Hank Aaron and Willie Mays

John Balkun
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Ted Williams
Pete Rose

Pete Caldera
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Jackie Robinson
Roger Clemens



Ty Cobb and Joe Jackson

Vinny DiTrani
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Ted Williams
Hank Aaron

Bob Klapisch
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Ted Williams
Hank Aaron



Ted Williams

Ian O'Connor
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Jackie Robinson
Hank Aaron

Steve Popper
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Jackie Robinson
Walter Johnson



Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle

John Rowe
Babe Ruth
Willie Mays
Christy Mathewson
Jackie Robinson

Tara Sullivan
Babe Ruth
Jackie Robinson
Cy Young
Alex Rodriguez






Lou Gehrig


Here's my list:

Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron.

Others strongly considered for this list include (in no particular order): Walter Johnson, Mickey Mantle, Lou Gehrig, Honus Wagner, Cy Young, Joe DiMaggio, Stan Musial, and Ted Williams.

It's notable that no writer selected Cobb while some made head-scratching choices like Pete Rose, Roger Clemens and Alex Rodriguez. I guess the writer who picked Clemens took into account the fact that he has won seven Cy Young awards while Cy Young never won one.



Stan Musial

It pained me to no end to leave Mantle off my list and add Mays to it. Mantle's world series record totals of 18 homeruns and 40 RBIs, 12 AL pennants, seven world series titles, and 3 AL MVP awards sure do speak loudly. Never mind the 1956 Triple Crown and four league HR titles. Mays hit .239 with 0 homeruns and six RBIs in the four world series in which he played. His team only won one of those (1954). Those numbers are rarely discussed when talking about the great career of Willie Mays. To be fair I'll go ahead and mention that he was the first player to ever amass 500 homeruns and 3,000 hits and he played in a record 24 All-Star games. Mays also matched Mantle in league homerun crowns (4) and batting titles (1, 1954).