In defense of the Babe
Binx No Latin players??? OK, Ruth never had to face Dolf Luque... but only because Luque, who was Cuban, spent 22 years in the National League, 1913-1935, a period that covered Ruth's, by the way. (I had Luque's Fleer card.)... And remember, the American South was so poor at the time that there was no need to look elsewhere for kids whose only opportunity in the world was on a ballfield....Baseball and Boxing were the only sports in which full-time professionalism was possible... so all top athletes gravitated toward baseball if they wanted to be professionals.
Ruth did not face black pitchers, but he neither did he face watered down pitching staffs.... Blacks making up 10 percent of the available population would mean that the bottom 10 percent of major league pitchers of the time were frauds. If you consider eight pitchers per team for 16 teams, the Babe faced the American League half of 13 non-major league pitchers. BUT, with expansion, the number of non-major league pitchers increased by 16, 32, 64....112, which does not count the expanding number of pitchers on roosters nor the high paying opportunities in other sports that would drain talent from baseball.
Timnes change. Give the Babe his due. Were he playing today, Ruth would no doubt spend almost as much time working out as eating, drinking and screwing -- though I would hope not... Anyway, I think Ruth as he was then was still faster, quicker and a better fielder than Carlos Lee, to name just one. Think of Ruth as a talented Jose Conseco....