When you think about baseball, you think about Babe Ruth. When you think about basketball, you think about Michael Jordan. You have Wayne Gretzky for hockey. People usually don’t think that any athlete could be better than any of these people at their sport, until now.
Is Miguel Cabrera the next Babe Ruth, or even better? We won’t know for sure until Cabrera’s career is over. He’s only 30 and still has a lot of good years left in Major League Baseball. I think when it’s all said and done, when you think about baseball, you’ll think about Miguel Cabrera from now on.
Babe Ruth
Babe Ruth played 22 years in Major League Baseball. Surprisingly, there are a lot of people who don’t know that he started out playing for the Red Sox. He played for Boston for six years until they sold him to the New York Yankees. That’s where the “Curse of the Bambino” came from. The Red Sox didn’t win a World Series ever since they traded Ruth until the “curse” was broken in 2004. The rest of Babe’s career was spent in New York where he played 15 seasons, except for his very last year, playing for the Boston Braves. During his 22-year career, Ruth hit a total of 714 HRs, 2,213RBIs, and batted .342 overall.
He was the All-Time Home Run leader until Hank Aaron passed him in 1974. In 2007, Barry Bonds passed Aaron with a total of 762 career home runs. However, I don’t think Bonds should even count because of the steroids he was taking.
One more thing a lot of people don’t know about Babe Ruth is that he was an All-Star pitcher. He had a career ERA of 2.28 and win-loss record of 94-46. Any pitcher today would kill to have those stats! He went down hill big time during his last couple years in the league though, and disgracefully retired from the game with the Braves.
Miguel Cabrera
Miguel Cabrera has only played 11 years in the Majors. He’s been an All-Star and a Triple Crown Award winner. He’s played 5 seasons for the Marlins and 6 with the Tigers. Miguel has hit 365 HRs, 1,260 RBIs, and batted .321 overall so far in his career. So as of right now, Cabrera has played exactly half of the amount of years than the “Sultan of Swat” has. Lets just say that Miguel stays healthy, and plays 11 more seasons at the same pace he is now. He will have 730 HRs and 2,520 RBIs, topping Babe Ruth. Obviously, playing that many years itself is an amazing accomplishment. Playing at the caliber that these two players have is even more amazing.
The biggest difference between Miguel Cabrera and Babe Ruth is that Ruth was a pitcher and outfielder. Cabrera has played first and third base his whole career. Anyone who watches baseball knows that these days pitchers can’t hit. So, even though Miguel could top Ruth in batting, he will never have the pitching stats Babe did. Could he really ever be “better” than the “Great Bambino” then? We’ll have to wait and see how the rest of Cabrera’s career ends up and then you can make your own decision.