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The Most Athletically gifted MLB player I ever saw was......Who is yours??
MLBdays
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Eric Davis...he was a majestic jaguar. A Michael Jordan of baseball with his height, speed and fierceness. HE even looks like Jordan.
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Hard to imagine anyone more athletic than Vincent Edward Jackson
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
Craig Knows
I can't agree more
Mickey Mantle was 5'11" 195 LBS and could run to first base in 3.1 seconds and hit a baseball that wasn't juiced like today 565 FT
Dave Winfield drafted in 4 sports
Jim Thorpe as per the king of Finland "sir you are the greatest athlete in the world."
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
Good point on Winfield, didn't think of him.
I never saw Mantle or Thorpe play. I thought OP wanted only players you saw or I would agree Mantle was a very top tier athletic talent
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
Deion
Kirby Puckett made some fantastic catches to rob guys of home runs. That was pretty impressive.
Neon Deion & Bo Jackson
Craig
I did see Thorpe run
I should mention I am 131 years old
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
One who is underrated would be Carlos Beltran.
His speed when he broke in with KC was amazing.
He never really got the credit he deserved but he could run down balls in center field with the best of them.
Check out his stolen base percentage, probably one of the best percentages of all time.
Of course he lost most of that speed in the later stages of his career, but in his prime he was very athletically gifted.
I would vote for Bo at number 1 however.
There is a reasonable disconnect here in that there is a fine line between being gifted and athletic. In terms of gifted, I was able to see Ted Williams in a Washington Senators uniform as a manager in 1969. He without question was the most gifted. As for the most athletic...I would rather not make a choice mainly because that is a question that just cannot be answered based on stats or a subjective impression...And having written that, I suspect the candidates may easily exceed 100 and may not even be a name recognized by many .
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
Rickey Henderson gets my second vote.
Tim Raines.
IT CAN'T BE A TRUE PLAYOFF UNLESS THE BIG TEN CHAMPIONS ARE INCLUDED
I never really "got" Bo Jackson. I suppose as an athlete he was extraordinary, but his choice to be good in two sports instead of to excel in one always puzzled me. it is similar to Danny Ainge, pretty good in two sports instead of trying to be superior in one. both athletes, very gifted, only highlight to me what makes Major League Baseball so special: it has such incredible skill required in specific areas that most players who try the game cannot succeed.
look what the game did to Michael Jordan.
BTW, I know I'll catch some flack from those who like Jackson but his stats aren't really that good. he is sort of a symptom of what's being discussed in another thread, power and strike-outs. he just wasn't very disciplined. although he had power when he hit the ball, that wasn't very often: his BA was only .250 and he struck-out once every third time to the plate. why do we worship such mediocrity??? there are literally dozens of current players, probably over 100, who are better at the plate than Bo Jackson ever was.
he may have been gifted per se, but I think his ego got the better of him and he squandered his gift, eventually losing it to injury.
There is not a question that Bo would have been a better NFL RB than a Baseball player
Maybe this guy, Josh Hamilton
He's not there yet, and may never be, but Byron Buxton has unbelievable speed and is an incredible fielder. He also has good to very good power.
Keep an eye on this guy. If he can stay on the field and gets a little better at the plate, he will be a superstar!
keets, I saw a lot of Bo's at bats, and it was hard to watch.
Way too many K's.
I do think if he had just picked baseball and quit football his stats would have improved,
But as far as just pure athleticism, I think he was without peer.
If you watch the Bo Jackson "30 for 30" you'll get the gist of who he was. He probably could have been an Olympic gold decathlete had he chosen to. He already was as good a running back in the NFL as anyone....and he reported a couple years late. He didn't want to play for the team that drafted him. So he went to baseball. Simple as that. No doubt his skills eroded somewhat. He didn't squander anything. His football injury was a freak accident that disjointed his hip, cutting off the blood flow. And his own unyielding power made it worse. He popped it back into place on his own right on the field. Crazy. Check it out.
His athletic feats are absurd. Strength, speed, power, jumping ability all at 235 lbs. He high jumped 6' 8" in college. He really could have done anything in sports. His baseball skills in college were raw, but outstanding. Running sideways at full speed on the outfield wall always shocks me. The best baseball players of that era were in awe of his skills and talent. Yeah, too bad about the football injury.
Quoting my own post to expand my thought. I watched a lot of Josh on TV and some live. Insane athleticism plus talent. So many demons. Plus he was never as good or regained form, in my opinion and if I remember correctly, after he threw a fan a ball and the fan fell to his death trying to catch it.
roadrunner- nice post.
If I remember correctly, the Tampa Bay Bucs drafted Bo, but he had told them not to because he said he
would never play for them.
The reason? When he was in college at Auburn, Tampa Bay invited him to come for a visit. Bo was worried
that it might affect his eligibility for his senior season at Auburn, but Tampa Bay assured him it was within
NCAA rules. Well he made the visit and the NCAA declared him ineligible for his senior baseball season at
Auburn.
I think Bo admitted he should have checked with Auburn school officials before he made the visit, but
I guess he trusted Tampa Bay. Bo claimed by lying to him, Tampa Bay was trying to get him to give up baseball.
Bo really sounded hurt that he had to miss his senior season of baseball, he was really looking forward to it.
Edited to add: I'm actually not sure if Bo stayed all four years at Auburn or left early, but in any case if he
left early just replace 'senior season' with 'last season' in above post.
Bo had HOF talent at the RB position and had he not gotten hurt may very well have gone down as one of the best backs of all time. He had power and explosiveness and speed to burn. He was an amazing player and it's a shame he suffered that hip injury which ended his career way too prematurely.
He wasn't as refined as a baseball player, struck out too much but he had tremendous power and was an outstanding outfielder with as much athletic ability as anyone on the field.
Deion Sanders was a terrific 2-way player, too, who was also a better football player than baseball player but Bo was special and at running back, played a position that was more prominent than the one Sanders played.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
Not quite. That happened in 2011. He had a monster first half in 2012, hitting 27 homers before the All-Star break. He then quit chewing tobacco and his game went in the tank. I saw a game in Texas in late August 2012 and the fans booed him. A lot. He finished went with 43 homers that year, 5th in the MVP. The Rangers made the playoffs and there was a play where Hamilton missed a popup. After that, he was poison in Texas and signed a deal with the Angels.
Yes, thanks for clarifying. I was getting his timeline jumbled. I remember the tobacco incident now. He always had some personal drama. But he was amazing there for a stretch. The four homer game stands out. He was thisclose to being a WS hero.
Yeah, ridiculously talented guy who just couldn't get of his own way.
there's no question. Bo Jackson was just so dominating in both sports.
Bob Zupcic.
Yaz Master Set
#1 Gino Cappelletti master set
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Also collecting Andre Tippett, Patriots Greats' RCs, 1964 Venezuelan Topps, 1974 Topps Red Sox
Actually, Dave was drafted by teams in 4 different leagues, in 3 sports:
NFL - Minnesota Vikings
NBA - Atlanta Hawks
ABA - Utah Stars
MLB - San Diego Padres
Steve