Happy Babe Ruth Day!

1947 was a whale of a year for Major League Baseball. Jackie Robinson became the first African American to play professional baseball and went on to win the inaugural Rookie of the Year award; the Yankees won the World Series, beginning their dynasty of the Golden Era, winning 9 of the next 15 championships. 1947 also bid farewell to one of the greatest sluggers that ever lived. 

On this date in 1947, the Yankees honored Babe Ruth and his service to the team and the league with a speech before the Sunday afternoon game against the Washington Senators (This link has the New York Times article recounting the Babe's speech and the day's festivities). Ruth, debilitated and weakened by operations battling his esophageal cancer, took the microphone at home plate and thanked the New York fans for their loyalty. He also mentioned the importance of teaching young men baseball because according to Ruth, the world only has one sport, and that is baseball. In a raspy and fragile voice, the Babe shared his feelings and with a feeble arm waved to the Yankee faithful for one last time. 

Courtesy of Life Magazine.

Yankee fans were no strangers to sad farewells. Lou Gehrig's "Luckiest Man" speech on July 4th of 1939 brought even the toughest of souls to tears, when even Babe Ruth came back to hear what his teammate had to say. Fast forward eight years to 1947 to Babe Ruth Day, when an aura of nostalgia combined with melancholy settled into the House That Ruth Built to watch the man that changed baseball kiss it goodbye forever. 

Ruth passed away in August of 1948.

Let's take a look at his career. Ruth is obviously most famous for his 714 home runs, a plateau that seemed completely insurmountable to the pre-integration fans. The fact that no one would touch his single season record until 1961 is a good testament to how far ahead of the game he was in terms of power numbers. He set the single-season home run record 4 years in a row. 

The called shot, the Curse of the Bambino, Murderer's Row, the Inaugural Hall of Fame induction class; all things associated with the Babe that baseball fans will never forget. But I want to point some things that go unnoticed in his career.

-Average. Ruth wasn't a Carlos Pena or Adam Dunn of today; he was a slugger with average too. His .342 career average places him 9th all time (he also hit .393 in 1923). In that 1923 season, he hit .459 in 31 games in July, hit .414 against right-handed pitchers, .418 in the second half of the season, and .406 in Yankee wins. Wow.

-On base percentage. Because of his bat control and high average, Ruth's on-base percentage is also astronomical, landing him at .474 for his career, second all-time behind Ted Williams' .482. In his 1923 MVP season, he had an on-base percentage of .545. That means literally more than half of his plate appearances resulted in him reaching first base safely. I don't even know what to say about that. 

-He never struck out more than 100 times in a season. 

-He flirted with 6,000 total bases in his career (6th all time). 

Happy Babe Ruth Day to you and yours. Take a minute to appreciate not only how talented of a hitter (and pitcher!) he was, but also what a tremendous gentleman he was and what he did for the game of baseball. 

Thanks for reading.