Sports personality Chris Russo has strongly criticized Chicago Cubs player Pete Crow-Armstrong for remarks made on a podcast suggesting that baseball legend Babe Ruth "never existed" and pitched underhand. Russo expressed his outrage on ESPN's "First Take," calling Crow-Armstrong's theory "derogatory" and "disgraceful."
Russo defended Ruth's legacy, highlighting his prodigious home run numbers, including 27 home runs hit over 500 feet, a feat he claims Barry Bonds never achieved. "Nobody hit home runs like Babe Ruth," Russo stated, emphasizing Ruth's dominance by noting he "out-homered leagues." Russo questioned why, if pitchers were throwing underhand, other players of Ruth's era did not also hit a comparable number of home runs.
Crow-Armstrong shared his thoughts on Kristin Cavallari's "Let's Be Honest" podcast, where he discussed hearing the theory from a pitcher on the Mariners. He elaborated on the idea by connecting it to the evolution of baseball, suggesting that pitchers might have been throwing "underhand" to Ruth. "And he's regarded still as one of the best players ever. Might as well dive further into it and be like, well, maybe he just never existed," Crow-Armstrong said.
Russo acknowledged one potential argument for re-evaluating historical records: the segregation in baseball prior to 1945, which he suggested could have inflated some statistics. However, he dismissed the notion that players from 1927 were not as capable as today's athletes.
"Are you crazy?" Russo questioned, defending Ruth's all-around talent. "He would have been a Hall of Famer as a pitcher, forget as a hitter. There’s only one Babe Ruth. He hit anywhere, any place, any time. He’s that good."
Russo urged athletes and media figures to "do your homework" before disparaging historical figures like Ruth, whom he described as a singular talent in baseball history.```json { "category_slug": "us-politics", "selected_source_keys": "1", "title":