he did without doubt! What might he have accomplished with a good back?
@Bigun And better legs.
But you know? For a long enough time, now, I've been sick to death of all the what-ifs regarding Mickey Mantle---because what
was was more than great enough. And you should be, too.
For the longest time I've heard Mantle discussed in terms of "what might have been" and how he "didn't live up to his potential" and all that stuff. And I suspect, based on a lifetime's reading, that the number one reason goes back to Casey Stengel, his first Yankee manager. Stengel was so enthralled with Mantle's complete talents that he got into his head that the kid just
had to bust the record books apart. (A frequent remark of Stengel's that's cited in this regard: "Can you imagine what [John] McGraw would say if he saw this kid?") But the two were bound to clash otherwise, on two grounds: 1) Stengel was a great baseball teacher and knew it, and he couldn't understand why 2) Mantle wasn't always willing to listen and learn. (Mantle himself admitted as much in later years.) It became such a common theme with Stengel that both those who covered the Yankees in his years and those who followed, especially when Mantle's leg and other physical issues became more acute as the years went by, started taking up the theme of unrealised potential. No matter what Mantle did, that theme trailed him like cans tied to a bridal couple's rear bumper, for the rest of his career and the rest of his life.
Last year, I began tinkering with a concept I call
real batting average. It started when a fellow baseball nut spoke of "complete hitting" in terms of the traditional batting averages and proclaimed that Tony Gwynn was a more "complete" hitter than another player whose name I forget right now, based on Gwynn having a higher traditional batting average---even though the other player did a
lot more with the bat than Gwynn did. That got my mind working---the batting average as we know it takes hits and divides by official at-bats. Just saying it, I knew by instinct something was wrong, because a) official at-bats don't account for every trip you take to the plate, and b) it treats all your hits equally.
So after pondering that---and reading two books which threw the idea in my face without suggesting a formula, I came up with the
real batting average idea and formula: Total bases (TB) + walks (BB) + intentional walks (IBB, and why shouldn't a man get credit when the other guys would rather you take your base than their heads off!) + sacrifices + hit by pitches. (They want to plunk you, let it be to your credit and on their heads.) And divide that sum by plate appearances. The reason for leaning on total bases? All hits are not equal, and total bases acknowledges that. (Anyone telling you a single equals a double equals a triple equals a home run, you should tell them to go back to school.) In other words, I added up everything a player does at the plate to help create runs and help his team win and divided it by every trip he took to the plate.
I ran those numbers accordingly. I looked at Hall of Famers post-war/post-integration/night-ball era, including Mickey Mantle---players who played all or most of their careers in that time---and one certain player of today who could retire after this coming season ends (he won't, but you get the idea) and be an overqualified Hall of Famer already. Now, look very carefully at where Mickey Mantle stands with his real batting average among Hall of Fame center fielders of the aforesaid time frame:
Mickey Mantle not only has the highest RBA of
any Hall of Fame center fielder of that time, he has, by my calculation, the second-highest RBA of Hall of Famers at any position in that time. (Only Ted Williams has a higher one: .737.) And you notice the only other player at or past Mantle's RBA level is a certain Angel of today.
Potential?? This guy may have been the most complete player who ever put on a major league uniform (it only begins with his being the most powerful switch-hitter in the game's history), pending the final outcome of Mike Trout's career and acknowledging that his nearest equal in his time and place was (and remains) Willie Mays, and he did it for a team that won twelve pennants and seven World Series while he wore their uniform. (The only Yankee on more pennant winners and World Series champions: Yogi Berra.) And if Mantle's life overall is a cautionary tale on how unwanted fatalism bred excess in the middle of off-the-chart success, there's no argument there, but strictly as a baseball player Mickey Mantle earned the right to be seen (thank you, Bill James) not for what he
could have done or
might have done or
should have done or
would have done but what he
did done.
So love Mickey Mantle the ballplayer for what he actually was, not what someone
thinks he should have been. Because what he actually
was was way off the charts.
