In 1935, when Babe Ruth retired, the newspapers reported that he held 76 records. Some were records that he shared with others, some were AL-only, and 56 were apparently recognized as major-league records that he held all by himself. These 76 records, cited frequently in newspapers—in 1947 when Yankee Stadium held Babe Ruth Day; in 1948, in his obituaries; in 2008, in the New York Daily News—were like a meta-record: Babe Ruth held the record for holding records.
One way of thinking about Ruth’s career is like this: It created the modern game and thus obliterated the past. It captured the world’s attention and thus dominated his present. And in a lot of ways it put a lock on the future. He had all those records—not to mention non-record distinctions and fun facts—and he’d set them by such margins that many of them were unbreakable for a very long time. Because of Bath Ruth, any fan born after 1930 knew that they’d missed out on a massive moment in, and a massive amount of, baseball history.
Let’s say that the goal of every generation is to surpass the past. We want to outdo our parents and we want to make line graphs where the trajectory is ever up. We want to make our time and place relevant. They wouldn’t put it this way, but since 1935, ballplayers have basically had modest goals: Sell a quality product, and take away all of Babe Ruth’s records.
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I never found a full list of Ruth’s Supposed 76 Records. However, portions of it were published in newspapers over the years, and stitching those together I have 64 of these records in a spreadsheet. Some are a bit frivolous: Most grand slams spanning two consecutive days, 2; most times hitting three home runs in a doubleheader, 7. Some are antiquated, like “extra bases,” which is basically isolated power but without a denominator. (A double would be one extra base; a home run would be three extra bases.) They were really into this “extra bases” stat back then, I guess, because five of his records were:
Most seasons leading the league in extra bases
Most seasons with 200 or more extra bases
Most extra bases in a career
Most extra bases in a season
Most extra bases in the World Series
But when he died, his obits listed 27 “primary” records Ruth had set, and they’re all pretty legit, except the ones where he struck out more times than anybody else. The 27 give us a good collection of the ones that really mattered to people:
Career stuff
Most career RBIs
Most career home runs
Most career walks
Most career strikeouts
Single-season stuff
Most home runs in a season
Most extra-base hits in a season
Most walks in a season
Most grand slams in a season
Highest slugging percentage in a season
Miscellaneous stuff
Most years leading the league in home runs
Highest salary
Most home runs in a five-game span
World Series stuff
Most World Series played in
Most World Series batting at least .300 in
Highest average in a single World Series
Most career runs in the World Series
Most career homers in the World Series
Most career total bases in the World Series
Most career walks in the World Series
Most career strikeouts in the World Series
Most homers in a World Series game
Most total bases in a World Series game
Most walks in a World Series game
Most walks in a single WS
Most runs scored in a four-game World Series
Most hits in a four-game World Series
Most consecutive scoreless innings pitched in the World Series
Pitched/won the longest World Series game
Dismantling this record of records was a hard-fought process for the next generations of ballplayers. Of those 27 “primary” records, I don’t believe any were broken until 1949, when Joe DiMaggio became the first player with a salary higher than Ruth’s $80,000 in 1931. But that wasn’t adjusted for inflation, and if we do adjust for inflation, nobody actually topped Ruth’s salary until the beginning of free agency in the mid-1970s.
So the first record to fall really took two decades, until Ernie Banks hit five grand slams in 1955, topping Ruth’s four grand slams in 1919. (Fun fact: Ruth’s teammates in 1919 hit four home runs, total.) Banks’ record was newsworthy, reported the next day in sports pages nationwide. However, Ruth had only been tied for the record before that, so it wasn’t as though his legacy had been wounded.
In 1960, Yogi Berra played in his 11th World Series, the first big solo Ruth record to go down, 25 years after his retirement. Over the next few years, the Yankees players alone knocked off several: In 1961, of course, Roger Maris broke the single-season home run mark. In that year’s World Series, Whitey Ford broke the consecutive scoreless innings mark. Mickey Mantle, appearing in (eventually) 12 World Series, would end up passing four of Ruth’s career postseason records during the 1960s.
Of those 27 primary records that his obituaries listed, Ruth today holds only eight. They are not what you’d call the eight coolest of the group: Extra-base hits in a season, home run titles, World Series with a batting average over .300, homers in a WS game, runs in a four-game WS, hits in a four-game WS, walks in a WS game, and most innings pitched in a WS victory. Of the eight, he’s tied for the record in three.
Little by little, the sport collectively chipped away—a Reggie Jackson here, a Shawn Green there. Of the full 64 records that I’ve got in my spreadsheet, record-holders today include: Henry Aaron, Barry Bonds, Frank Howard, Jimmie Foxx, Billy Hatcher, Albert Pujols, Mark McGwire, Ralph Kiner, Alex Rodriguez, Max Scherzer, Green, Berra, Ford, Mantle, Banks, Jackson; Travis Hafner and Don Mattingly in a tie; Hank Greenberg, Sammy Sosa and Aaron Judge in a tie; and, of course, Ruth, still tops in several. The last record to fall was, I believe, total bases in a World Series game; it took 76 years after Ruth’s retirement before Pujols (and then Pablo Sandoval) topped that one1.
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