The 10 Most Legendary Baseball Players Ever

America’s favorite pastime has been around for over a century and has sported numerous legendary players. From home run heroes to pitchers who just threw strikes, these ten athletes are remembered as the most iconic baseball players to ever set foot on the field.

Greg Maddux

The Braves were a force to be reckoned with the 1990s, and Greg Maddux was part of that dominance. His combination of laser-focused control and overwhelming power made for a pitcher feared by many teams, and his command of an absolutely absurd number of pitches made him all but impossible to predict. Alongside other great Braves pitchers like John Smoltz and Tom Glavine, he helped round the Braves’ terrifying pitching rotation.

Ken Griffey Jr.

With a backwards baseball cap and a swing so sweet it could give you a toothache, Ken Griffey Jr. became the iconic player of the 90s while he played with the Mariners. While his health was constantly an issue after he left for the Reds in 2000, fans will always wonder what could have been if he’d kept up the pace after leading the league in homers four times during his career.

Barry Bonds

Some people say there should be an asterisk next to Barry Bonds’ stats due to his alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs. Whatever the case, the numbers are there. He beat Hank Aaron’s home run record and put up some truly superhuman numbers between 2001 and 2004. While he might have had “help,” that’s an impressive athletic achievement in and of itself.

Mickey Mantle

Mickey Mantle was a central component to the Yankees’ domination of baseball in the 50s and 60s. He combined absurd power and unparalleled speed that made him an all-around terror on the field. If you need to know just how good he was, he hit 18 home runs in the World Series!

Lou Gehrig

Lou Gehrig is perhaps best known for his public battle with the disease that now bears his name. However, on the baseball diamond, he’s remembered for his phenomenal career with the Yankees and his absurdly reliable performance. He famously showed up to 2,130 consecutive games, a record that went unbroken for decades.

Ted Williams

Ted Williams quite literally wrote the book on hitting. His book The Science of Hitting is still a useful read for any aspiring slugger, and the man’s .400 batting average and highest on-base percentage of any player in the history of the sport both underscore how good he was at getting the ball into play.

Ty Cobb

Ty Cobb was a hitter’s hitter who played in the old-school days of the 1900s, 1910s, and 1920s. His absurd 12 batting titles, three .400 average seasons, and ending his career with the highest lifetime average of any baseball player, period. He was known for his fiery temper, too, but his performance on the field kept him on Major League teams.

Hank Aaron

Almost any baseball fan can tell you how many home runs Hank Aaron hit (755). For whatever reason, his 715^th homer on April 8, 1974, surpassing Babe Ruth’s total, just struck a chord with fans and became the stuff of legends. Ironically, the Braves slugger wasn’t even really a homerun hitter and was better known in his day for his impressive batting average, period. The man got 2,297 RBIs across his career, and no one is expected to ever even come close to that.

Willie Mays

While he’s remembered for the iconic play in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series (known only as “The Catch”) Mays was one of the finest defensive players of all time even discounting that eye-catching performance. He won an astonishing 12 Gold Gloves over his long career and also led the league in stolen bases for four years in a row!

Babe Ruth

No one did it like Babe Ruth. His absurd slugging power (.690 for his career) reshaped the game into the modern contest we know today. Without Babe Ruth, baseball would probably still be a game of small-ball fundamentals. He brought the power and rewrote all the rules.