Babe Ruth Gallery

sabrjay wrote:

jbonie wrote:The hobby sort of forgot about Babe Ruth due to his career coming at a time where there weren't many great sets, but he is clearly the greatest baseball player of all time, with the exception of Martin Dihigo. I wouldn't be surprised either to see The Babe's cards take off in price in the coming years.

That's a big reason the first card I added to my Gang of 10 was Dihigo. Just not that many out there and when collectors start learning just how great he was, I won't have to worry about getting priced out.

I was only teasing about Dihigo, I don't really think he was the greatest baseball player of all time. That said, he put up very good numbers at an advanced age. We can only speculate as to what he would have been like as a pro in his prime. He's kind of like Louis Sockalexis in that way.

I actually like your card and think it could be a good investment because those Cuban League cards are very exotic. They are kind of like E cards where the aesthetics are not that good but there is scarcity. I think that owning a Cuban League card is appealing.

I know my Negro Leaguers pretty well. To me it's a toss up between Ruth and Dihigo for the best ever. Ruth was a better hitter, but Dihigo was a much better pitcher. Neither one was a slouch in either department, so it's pretty much a wash.

I don't think you can really tell because Dihigo was pitching against much weaker competition than Ruth was. In the Negro Leagues, Dihigo had a 2.92 ERA while Ruth had a 2.28 ERA against MLB competition, suggesting Ruth was far superior. However, Dihigo was well into his thirties for some of those years so it isn't a fully fair comparison. As such, I think it is really left to the imagination to think of how Dihigo would have done in his prime.

The tragic thing really is that due to the racial segregation that happened during that time period, we are left to speculate as to how good some amazing players may have really been against top competition - sadly, this will forever be a mystery left to the imagination.

When it comes to comparing players I don't rely too much on stats, especially with Negro Leaguers. I look more at what contemporaries thought of them and where they were on the team. Dihigo was the #1 pitcher on the teams he played for almost all of his career and many MLBers that played with him in Cuba say he was the best all around player they ever saw. This is coming from players who saw Ruth, Williams DiMaggio other greats play.

We've got Whitney with Dog... Ruth with Bird... what other player/animal cards are there?

I'm a Ruth collector, and I show the images of many of the Ruth cards on my PSA Registry page here: Link

glchen wrote:I'm a Ruth collector, and I show the images of many of the Ruth cards on my PSA Registry page here: Link

Wow! That is outstanding! I've never even seen some of that stuff. Great Collection!

And welcome to the board.

That is really neat to look at, nice collection, thanks for sharing and welcome to the board

Awesome Ruth Collection Gary!

Here is a tough one not seen often-