The Greatest of Their Times: Comparing Baseball's Peak Performers Across Eras

Who are baseball's greatest players? Opinions vary wildly and of the many books that have explored the topic, few delve into official performance data as thoroughly as this one. The authors analyze the peak performance records of every Hall of Fame player across different eras of baseball history. Using statistical comparisons, they select the Hall's best players at each position for era all-star teams from 1901 to 2020, including standout Black players who starred in the Negro Leagues prior to the racial integration of Major League Baseball in 1947. The book also considers controversial players excluded from Hall membership due to behavior deemed detrimental to the integrity of baseball (consorting with gamblers and use of performance enhancing drugs) but whose performance records still stand.

Enlivening the statistical comparisons are narrative overviews of different baseball eras; background stories about each era's greatest players; and discussion of the ways in which baseball reflects, and has sometimes influenced, American culture, including darker aspects of the game's history of racism, gambling, and drug use.

R. Gordon Shepherd is a distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Central Arkansas.

A. Gary Shepherd is a professor emeritus at Oakland University.

Matthew D. Moore is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Central Arkansas.