Mike Piazza vs Josh Gibson

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Nice baseball card

Piazza Gibson.JPG

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Two legendary baseball powerhouses.

Gibson 1.jpg...Piazza 1.jpg

[Yankillaz]

Piazza. Easily.

[SHOELESSJOE3]

My gut is that Josh Gibson was a similar hitter to Jimmie Foxx- tremendous power with a good average. I am pretty confident that Gibson was a top 5 Negro League hitter ever. But I have Piazza slightly ahead of Foxx. Piazza on the road batted .340 and slugged .605 over a 10 year run. He was a monster at the dish. I think Gibson would have been really close. But the tie goes to the guy with the actual stats. I do see a case for Gibson. He had to have been very good to get the reputation that he had.

My question to the doubters is this: how many Negro Leaguers as highly praised as Gibson flopped in MLB? I doubt that there are many.

Even if not many highly praised did not fail, how does that figure in this discussion.
I and I would suppose many others do not see Josh as failing, but we will never know his performance level in MLB.

In no way with all due respect to Gibson can I say to Mike, Josh was better than you, even though he never played MLB.
Lets lead with the brain and not the heart. Terrible injustice done to some of the great black players, never given a chance because of skin color. But we have to deal with the facts, no way to know how Josh would have compared to Mike had he played MLB.
For sure there is the possibility he may have out performed Mike, but we don't know.

[ol' aches and pains]

Who the hell knows? I know that Gibson was great, but I never saw him play, and absent any reliable stats, I have no way of knowing if he was as good as or better than Piazza.

[SHOELESSJOE3]

Who the hell knows? I know that Gibson was great, but I never saw him play, and absent any reliable stats, I have no way of knowing if he was as good as or better than Piazza.

For some reason or another some just don't see it that way.
Makes sense to me, through no fault of their own some of the best, some of the greatest were denied playing MLB because of skin color.
I'm not going to judge them on such scant stats or the fact that a number of white players,managers heaped praise on them. Still can't change the fact they were never tested over a career in MLB.
Could some of the great blacks been better than Cobb, Dimaggio, Hornsby and Piazza.
For sure, could have been, how do we know one way or another if they never played MLB.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Mike Piazza is just one of three players to hit a home run out of Dodger Stadium.

Here's a Rob Neyer article about Josh Gibson's famous Yankee Stadium home run. He mentions two newspaper accounts. I'll try to track down the articles.

Did Gibson hit one out of Yankee Stadium?

[3and2Fastball]

For some reason or another some just don't see it that way.
Makes sense to me, through no fault of their own some of the best, some of the greatest were denied playing MLB because of skin color.
I'm not going to judge them on such scant stats or the fact that a number of white players,managers heaped praise on them. Still can't change the fact they were never tested over a career in MLB.
Could some of the great blacks been better than Cobb, Dimaggio, Hornsby and Piazza.
For sure, could have been, how do we know one way or another if they never played MLB.

I'm not completely convinced that MLB teams were better than the best Negro League teams of the 10's-30's....

[bluesky5]

I'm not completely convinced that MLB teams were better than the best Negro League teams of the 10's-30's....

Nor am I...

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Nor am I...

Well if Bobby Bonds played back in the 1920's-30's...

[Herr28]

Well if Bobby Bonds played back in the 1920's-30's...

Nobody would have heard of him, because he wouldn't have been allowed to play MLB. And a lot of people here would just shrug off anything he did as being less than major league quality because he didn't have any major league stats. Even if he wrecked major league pitchers when able to play white teams, he'd still be pooh-poohed because those stats wouldn't be taken seriously. And even if he was one of the best hitters in his league, year in and year out, he'd be blown off because of a lack of stats (disregarding the stats that have been collected and posted) and/or laughed off by suggesting that all of his stats were compiled against semipro or town teams.

What if he tore up such all-time great pitchers (depending on when he played in the Negro Leagues) like Smokey Joe Williams, Satchel Paige, Cannonball Redding, or Hilton Smith? Well, eh, that would be passed over by simply saying we don't know how good those guys were (even though they beat pennant winning major league teams in match ups, or handcuffed major league hitters in exhibition games). No matter what major league players/managers/executives said, even those who are well known as the best at finding top-notch talent, we'd just ignore their praise and awe at his prowess. After all, what would John McGraw, or Walter Johnson, or Ty Cobb, or Babe Ruth, or Dizzy Dean, or Bob Feller, or Branch Rickey know about talented baseball players?

No, Bobby Bonds in the Negro Leagues wouldn't mean much. We probably wouldn't have heard his name at all. Maybe, if he was one of the top 2 or 3, he might get an honorable mention in somebody's ranking game here. Maybe not.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

............................
Piazza 2.jpg...Gibson 3a.jpg

[pheasant]

I'm not completely convinced that MLB teams were better than the best Negro League teams of the 10's-30's....

Let's suppose the NeL was of lesser quality for a moment.

Then, I'd even be more impressed with a guys like Satchel Paige. Consider this: Satchel Paige didn't even enter MLB until he was at least 41 years old. The fact that he put up an ERA+ north of 120 in MLB as a washed up old guy is remarkable. If he did this despite previously playing in a league that supposedly didn't prepare him well enough to do well in MLB, then he has an even stronger case for being #1 all-time. No matter how you slice it, Satchel was phenomenal. To me, a lower LQ in NeL does nothing to take away from guys like Satchel Paige or Josh Gibson. And even if NeL had lower quality, it would have only been due to the lack of tools they had that MLB got to enjoy. So although I believe it's possible that the quality was lower, I believe the talent level was every bit as good.

And lastly, everybody talks about how tough the accommodations were in the 1930s for MLB. But what about NeL baseball? Imagine taking a slow bus everywhere over bumpy roads. Imagine not being able to use the bathroom at every stop? How many modern players(or even MLB players from the 1930s) would hack it in that league under those conditions?

If I was drafting a team to play in 2014 and had the choice between Satchel Paige and W. Johnson, I'd roll the dice with Satchel Paige.
What I don't know is if I'd take Satchel over a guys like Randy Johnson and Greg Maddux(my #1 and #2 guys respectively). My gut is to take RJ and Maddux. But I could be wrong there.

Gibson makes a compelling case too. My gut is that Gibson hit like Jimmie Foxx and fielded like Mike Piazza. If that's the case, then I'd take probably take Piazza. But it's possible that Gibson hit like Lou Gehrig. If that's the case, then he's my #1 catcher.

[Bucketfoot]

Oh its Piazza, the man was a world class hitter.

Can't see how you can doubt Gibson that much, sounds like he did
everything really well. I like the Jimmie Foxx analogy, add in Gibson's
Throwing arm etc that's Johnny Bench.

[Los Bravos]

Lets lead with the brain and not the heart.

Let's also not be patronizing.