The Babe Had It Easier? No Way.

by Paul Semendinger

October 13, 2025

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Note - This article was originally written and published by the IBWAA in late September 2025

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"They have it harder today than I did? I'm not so sure about that."

When discussion about great baseball players is held, there is a line of thought held by many that players from the past must be discounted because the game was different back then.

There is this idea that the game was simpler, the competition not as good, the game not as fast-paced — and a few use those factors to render the accomplishments of those who came before as somewhat moot.

Also mentioned is the fact that any player that played before integration (1947) must automatically be discounted because the overall competition, by definition, wasn't as good.

All of those points have merit, of course.

Yet, still, I think many discount how different and difficult baseball was all those years ago. It was a different and more challenging game.

As a Yankees fan, I take great enjoyment in watching their current superstar, Aaron Judge. He is certainly one of the greatest players in the game today and might soon even reach the status as one of the greatest players of all time. It is possible that Aaron Judge will one day (and maybe soon) be considered an inner-circle Hall of Famer along with Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, and very few others. Some today are even beginning to suggest that Aaron Judge is a greater player than Babe Ruth ever was because Judge is putting up such great numbers in today's allegedly-more-difficult game.

What is missing in all of these discussions is the fact that in Babe Ruth's day, the game presented its own challenges, many of which, as noted at the start, aren't recognized, remembered, or even considered by many. In this article, I will briefly share some of the challenges (but not all) that players faced during Ruth's day which modern players never had to contend.

In The Babe's day, batters didn't get to see a bright new baseball with almost every pitch. They used a beat-up ball that was pounded into the ground for innings on end.

The Babe hit a ball that as the game went on could barely be seen. He had to do this on fields that weren't as manicured and were without lights (especially as the games got later in the day or conditions were cloudy).

The ball itself, as the game progressed, would have been deadened from being soaked from moist grass, mud, dirt, and the like. There is a vast different between seeing and hitting a brand new baseball as opposed to trying to hit a beat-up ball.

Add to this, Babe also faced spitballers — pitchers who were allowed to doctor the ball. Even after the spitball was outlawed, those that threw it were grandfathered and permitted to remain in the league throwing doctored balls. No pitchers in the Babe's day were checked each inning for substances on their hands.

The players in Babe Ruth's day also had to try to hit that dirty baseball amid the layers of cigarette and cigar smoke that filled the stadiums. This was also before the area behind the pitcher was covered in dark paint to give batters a better background from which to hit.

The pitcher's mound, as well, was higher.

All of those factors demonstrate that hitting was more challenging a century ago than today, but there is more.

The Babe didn't have modern technology to watch before and after each at bat. In fact, one can assume that the Babe never saw frame-by-frame examples of his swing to compare and contrast and to make changes during the game or season.

He also didn't get to use technology to see each pitch, the way the pitches break, the various pitchers' tendencies, and more.

For a batter to know a pitcher, he had to remember it all in his head — what the pitcher threw, what his tendencies were, and what he did the previous times they faced each other.

Each game now, we see the players of today looking at their previous at-bats on iPads. Imagine if Babe Ruth could have had that advantage! The players of 2025 also have access to voluminous amounts of data the likes of which Babe Ruth never had.

The Babe didn't have body armor to protect his feet, ankles, or elbows. If he was hit with a ball, the pitch hit his body, nothing else. Nor did The Babe also wear a batting helmet.

That matters a great deal and cannot be overlooked. Those things matter when standing in against a major-league pitcher.

Moving down to something seemingly simple, Babe Ruth didn't even have batting gloves. When he hit the ball on a cold damp afternoon, he felt it. He also didn't have the added grip that gloves provide. The only thing that helped Babe Ruth hold a bat was his own hands.

Ruth also played in a bigger ballpark. For example, in Babe Ruth's Yankee Stadium, center field was 490 feet away. Aaron Judge's center field is a much more pedestrian 408 feet. Right center for the Babe was 429 feet, while for Judge it's 385 feet. One has to wonder how many more homers Babe Ruth would have hit in the smaller ballparks of today.

Aaron Judge's Yankee Stadium is also less intimate than Babe Ruth's. The fans are much more removed. In the old Yankee Stadium, the fans were closer to the field — the upper decks hung over the lower deck directly — they were not set-back. As such, it had to have been a more intimidating place in which to play.

We know the fans weren't always supportive of the players, that's nothing new. Babe Ruth once went into the stands to confront an angry fan. It wasn't as if the fedoras and suits worn by the patrons elicited better behavior from all.

When The Babe came off the field, he also sat on a hard bench that wasn't cooled in the summer and warmed in the spring and fall. He also never played in an indoor environment.

Babe Ruth never played on a cool night -- all his games were during the day. Ruth under the hot sun. He never played in an air-conditioned stadium.

He also never played in breathable fabrics; he played in a uniform made of wool. Before, after, and even during the game, he never relaxed in a comfortable locker room.

Babe Ruth never had the opportunity to take practice swings in a hitting cage between at bats. He didn't have a host of coaches who could break down his swing to make improvements. In fact, there were no hitting coaches in the 1920s.

Babe Ruth played in the field whenever he played. He didn't get to DH as a “rest” day. If he was going to bat, he had to play the field. The wear-and-tear of the season was very real for players in the 1920s.

To the argument that the seasons today are longer, only once has Aaron Judge played more than 129 games in the field in a season. Babe Ruth played 130 or more games in the field 13 times. Again, that matters. How much greater could Ruth have been if there were games when all he had to do was swing a bat and not play defense?

The Babe also didn't have modern nutrition. If the claim is that players are stronger and faster today, that comes because of better nutrition, better training, and the like.

The supposition has to be that the players of long ago would have also become bigger and stronger due to that. In the 1920s, they also didn't have legal supplements such as vitamins, to say nothing of surgical methods, and the like.

Yes, the modern players are stronger, but if they played today, the players of long ago would be just as strong, of course. It's not like they wouldn't take advantage of all the advances in nutrition and health. Still, the Babe and his contemporaries accomplished their successes without the benefit of all of that.

Regarding surgeries, would Aaron Judge be still playing today if not for the advances in medicine that have allowed his body to be repaired and healed? Judge had left shoulder surgery in 2017 and right elbow surgery in 2023. It can be argued that injuries like those would have been career-enders in years past. That is true for many ballplayers today.

Injuries that were career-enders in the old game are repairable today. The Babe's physique is often used as a caricature today, but the truth of the matter is he had to keep himself in playing shape in order to play and excel without the advances in modern medicine.

On the road, Aaron Judge and his teammates stay in first-class hotels that would put the places the Babe's teammates stayed in to shame.

Players today travel by airplane, which must be grueling, but imagine traveling place-to-place by rail. That had to be worse. It was certainly more time-consuming and less comfortable. The wear-and-tear of those train rides, often on cars that did not have air conditioning, is something that most never even consider when comparing today's game to the past.

In the end, it is easier to say, "Things are much more difficult today," but in fact, the game the Babe played was also a rougher, meaner, and nastier game, and not easier.

When all this is taken into consideration, all of this, and probably much more that has been lost to time and forgotten today, it is fair to claim that Babe Ruth played a much more difficult and challenging game than the players today.

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As an additional note, I wrote the following in a game summary a few weeks ago:

YES put up a graphic about home runs last night that caught my eye.

Yankees Top 5 Seasons All-Time, Home Runs:

• 2019 = 306 homers

• 2018 = 267 homers

• 2025 = 254 homers (plus last night's game)

• 2022 = 254 homers

• 2012 = 245 homers

  
  

Look at the years when all these home runs have been hit and then think about the idea that Babe Ruth (and other greats from the past) wouldn't do well in today's game, or they at least wouldn't do as well which is a common (and I believe mistaken) narrative. The seasons when the Yankees have hit the most homers have all been recently. It seems home runs are easier to hit today than in the past.

Let's go back to the Top Ten seasons:

• 2019 — 306 HR

• 2018 — 267 HR

• 2022/2025* — 254 HR

• 2012 - 245 HR

• 2009 — 244 HR

• 2004 - 242 HR

• 2017 - 241 HR

• 1961 - 240 HR

• 2024 - 237 HR

Except for 1961, an outlier season, all of the big home runs seasons are in the most recent years. It seems that home runs are easier to hit than ever before...

In 1927, the Yankees hit only 158 homers. That team had Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Tony Lazzeri, Bob Meusel, and Earle Combs and their output doesn't even compare to the amount of home runs teams hit today. Sure, the game has changed, but this idea that the pitching today is so much better seems to be false on its face. Pitchers today, it is clear, give up a lot more homers than they used to. In that way, at least, it is clear the pitching isn't better.

A common pitching narrative today is, "The players of the past never had to hit against 100 miles-per-hour relief pitchers." That sounds fair, but it's also not accurate or true. Look at the Yankees' bullpen right now. Look at the pitchers they've thrown out there this season. Would Ryan Yarbrough have made the big leagues in 1927? Would Carlos Carrasco? How about Mark Leiter, Jr.? Even last night, the Yankees' best option in the eighth inning was Devin Williams - a change-up pitcher. This idea that every team is stacked with a collection of hard-throwing arms who are all superior to the pitchers Babe Ruth faced simply isn't true.

The way the game is played today, the Babe might hit 100 homers in a season. If he did that, or even if he would blast "only" 80, his numbers would dwarf any player of today. Seeing how many home runs are hit today, it's clear that the Babe would still be blasting homers. If he was playing today, Aaron Judge, Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani, and the rest would watch the Babe and say, "Man, I'm not even in that guy's league."

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Paul Semendinger still plays baseball. He is a pitcher, but sadly, as the leaves turn from green to the wonderful colors of autumn, the baseball seasons end and the long cold lonely off-season begins. April seems so far away...