Letters to the Editor
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@KStone
I just re-read my last post and I think I may have come across as some kind of apologist for segregation, rest assured that I am not. It remains the greatest blight on the game (and America in general). I agree with you 100%, were the game integrated then yes, the record book would look alot different, that's without question. There's a pretty good chance that it would have been Gibson's record that Aaron broke for example.
However, I'm just not that convinced that it would've had that great an effect on the career totals of Ruth individually. I mean, an influx of top notch hitters wouldn't really have much of an effect on the number of homeruns he hit. Granted, having to face potential ace pitchers of colour would. I'm just not sure how much. Again, it assumes that there would only be better than the best black pitchers...which is not a sure thing. And also, who's to say that the Yankees, who I'm pretty sure were also the premier team during Ruth's era, wouldn't hire the elite black pitchers themselves? In fact, one could argue that were Gibson and Bell hitting behind Ruth, his homerun total would be even higher!
In the end it's all just a bunch of bar-stool pontificating - but then isn't that what makes baseball so awesome?
One last thing: There was not "disingenious deflection" on my part. Rather, my taking the reality of Ruth's era comes from spending far too many years studying history and realizing that no matter how much we wish it were different, you simply have to take any historical era at face value.
cheers,