Babe Ruth and Barry Bonds are two of the most iconic players in MLB history. It's only right then, that we kick off our "Who Was Better?" series by debating the legacies of perhaps the two most noteworthy players in the history of the sport.
What Advantages Did Each Have?
Barry Bonds had a monster 2002 postseason run.(Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)It would be malpractice to write this article and not acknowledge the credible connections that Bonds had to performance-enhancing drugs.
Beyond the common sense test of looking at a before-and-after picture, failed PED tests linked to Bonds from November of 2000 were seized from the BALCO labs. There's not really a serious argument to be made that he didn't use PEDs for a portion of his career.
Additionally, just by the fact that he played from 1986-2007 and Ruth played from 1914-1935, Bonds had better luxuries available to him. Travel was smoother for Bonds than it was for Ruth, and with medical advances, it was probably easier for Bonds to recover from injuries than it was for Ruth. Bonds also played at a time where the regular season was 162 games long, while the season was 154 games long for most of Ruth's career.
This isn't a one-sided discussion, though.
The legend goes that Ruth once attempted to inject himself with "extract from sheep testicles," with the thought being that it would increase his testosterone. Now, Ruth was one-and-done on this strategy because he got sick after attempting to do this. Still, it was an attempt to gain an unfair advantage, one that would be deemed cheating by today's standards. Who knows how else Ruth attempted to enhance his performance.
There's also not really a debate to be had that Bonds faced better competition. By the time Bonds broke into the league in 1986, players played baseball year round and didn't have other jobs, unlike in Ruth's era. While Bonds certainly appears to have benefitted from the use of PEDs, so too did many of the opponents he played against. The biggest difference between the competition that the two faced is illustrated by Bonds, who wouldn't have been eligible to play during Ruth's era because of his skin color. Ruth never faced a player that wasn't white.
With better nutrition and recovery methods available to him, the guess here is that Ruth would have been able to succeed if he played in Bonds' era. But we'll never know for sure if he would have been as great in another era with increased competition.
Who Had a More Dominant Peak?
Babe Ruth had an iconic peak.(Wikimedia Commons)It was almost certainty chemically ehanced, but Bonds' 2001 season is seen by most as the most dominant season in MLB history, as he slashed .328/.515/.863 with 73 home runs, 137 RBIs, 177 walks, a 1.379 OPS and a staggering 11.9 bWAR.
Still, while Bonds may have had the most dominant individual season in the minds of most, there's actually some evidence that Ruth may have been even more dominant at his peak.
The advanced metric WAR 7 takes a player's seven best single-season WAR totals (they don't need to be in order) and combines them to give an idea of how dominant a player was at their peak. Bonds' 72.7 WAR 7 is incredible, but falls well short of the 84.8 WAR 7 that Ruth finished his career with.
According to FanGraphs' version of WAR, 2002 was actually Bonds' most dominant individual season, as he posted a 12.7 fWAR. Ruth topped that mark four different times during his career.
In 1923, Ruth hit .393, while Bonds peaked a .370 in 2002. That said, Bonds tops Ruth in the highest single-season on-base percentage, slugging percentage and OPS.
The truth here is that you could probably make a case for either having had the more dominant peak. We would lean Ruth over a full seven-year span, but if you're more hyper-focused on two or three seasons, you could certainly make a case for Bonds. The important thing to remember is not to discount the 1923 and 1927 seasons that Ruth had simply because you weren't alive to follow them in the same way you may have been for Bonds' peak.
EDGE: Ruth
Who Has Better Counting Numbers?
Barry Bonds is one of the greatest fielders in MLB history.(Donald Miralle/Getty Images)This is worth discussing, but you also need to remember that Ruth made his Major League Debut in 1914, and didn't get over 400 at-bats in a season until 1919, because the Boston Red Sox employed him primarily as a pitcher during his time with the team. So while he and Bonds both played in 22 major league seasons, this isn't exactly a fair comparison.
Ruth popularized hitting home runs in mass quantity and was the Home Run King with 714 career roundtrippers until he was surpassed by Hank Aaron in 1974. Aaron finished his career with 755 home runs, a mark that Bonds passed in August of 2007, ultimately finishing with 762 home runs.
Bonds topped Ruth in hits and doubles, but not by a staggering amount when you consider that he had nearly 2,000 more career plate appearances than Ruth. Even with 1,448 more at-bats in his career than Ruth, Bonds finished his career with less RBIs, though Ruth certainly benefitted from playing with significantly better teammates during his career than Bonds did. Perhaps the most surprising nugget is that Ruth had 59 more triples in his career with Bonds, but some of that may have to do with how ballparks were designed during Ruth's era. Then again, Bonds played quite a few games at Oracle Park, perhaps the stadium best geared to hit triples at in today's game.
The place that Bonds really separates himself at is on walks. With 2,062 career walks, Ruth is third in MLB history on bases on balls. Still, Bonds is No. 1 with 2,558 career walks, a mark that will likely never be broken.
EDGE: Bonds
What Do The Sabermetrics Say?
Babe Ruth is one of the most iconic athletes in history.(Fox Photos/Getty Images)As we outlined above, Ruth comfortably tops Bonds in terms of WAR 7, a rather surprising development if you watched Bonds in the early 2000s.
Ruth also tops Bonds in offensive WAR, as Ruth finished his career with a 154.4 offensive WAR, as compared to Bonds' 143.6 offensive WAR. Ruth is first in MLB history in this metric, while Bonds is third, one spot behind Ty Cobb.
Additionally, Ruth is baseball's all-time leader in OPS, which combines on-base percentage and slugging percentage. Ruth finished his career with a 1.164 OPS. Bonds' career ended with a 1.051 OPS, which is fourth in MLB history.
OPS+ adjusts the statistic based on the parks that the players played in. Ruth is also first in history in that mark, with a 206 OPS+. Bonds is third in MLB history with a 182 OPS+.
Bonds tops Ruth as the career leader in weighted runs created, which Baseball Reference defines as "a set of formulas developed by Bill James and others that estimates a player's total contributions to a team's runs total." Bonds sits at 2,892, while Ruth is No. 2 in history with a 2,718 mark.
Weighted runs created is one of the few sabermetric marks where Bonds tops Ruth. Even though these statistics were nearly 100 years away from being invented when Ruth played, they give you an idea of just how dominant he was during his career.
Of course, the most widely used sabermetic is WAR. Bonds and Ruth didn't play during the same era, nor did they play the same position, so this statistic should be taken with a grain of salt. Still, Ruth is the all-time leader in bWAR, Baseball Reference's version of the metric. Ruth is first with a 182.5 bWAR, while Bonds is fourth (second among position players) with a 162.8 bWAR. Some prefer FanGraphs' version of WAR, which is called fWAR. Ruth has a 168.4 fWAR, while Bonds sits at 164.4. It should be noted that Ruth's pitching does factor into both of these numbers.
EDGE: Ruth
What About Fielding?
Barry Bonds spent his entire career in left field.(Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)In 2020, we're still in the very early stages of being able to properly quantify how effective a player is as a fielder beyond just watching them and making an assessment off of that.
Defensive Runs Saved is perhaps the most widely used sabermetric that attempts to gauge how valuable one is as a fielder, but that statistic wasn't tracked until the 2002 season, when Bonds was 37 and Ruth was, well, pretty far out of the picture.
Though Bonds declined pretty rapidly later in his career as a defender, he did win eight Gold Glove Awards, and was a pretty tremendous defender during the parts of seven seasons that he played with the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Gold Glove Award wasn't first introduced until 1957, and without the ability to consistently watch games from across the country during Ruth's career, it likely would have just amounted to a popularity contest if in place during his time in the league. There's an argument to be made that it still is that in some senses.
While Bonds was probably best-geared to be a DH later in his career, he finished his illustrious career with a 7.6 defensive WAR. Ruth finished his career with a -2.3 defensive WAR. Bonds also topped Ruth in fielding percentage, as he posted a .984 career fielding percentage, compared to a .968 mark from Ruth.
From the limited information that we have available, you're left with the feeling that Bonds was a better defender than Ruth, though it's hard to quantify exactly how much better he was. This is one area that we may never have a clear answer on.
EDGE: Bonds
So, Who Was Better?
Babe Ruth and Barry Bonds are two of the greatest players in MLB history.(Scott Krava/RADIO.COM)With a more dominant peak, we're going to give the edge to Ruth here. Though Willie Mays would certainly need to be included in the discussion, it's fair to wonder if Ruth and Bonds are the two greatest position players in MLB history, just based on their resumes. We'll, of course, never know what Bonds' career numbers would look like without the assistance of performance-enhancing drugs, nor will we know how great Ruth's numbers would be if he faced African-American, Latino and Asian players. In some senses, not having answers to those questions almost makes this debate more fun to engage in.
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