The Greatest Living Ballplayers

With Willie Mays's death, the title of best living ballplayer is a little more complicated.

The death of Willie Mays last week raises the question of who the greatest living ballplayer is. In Mays’s later years a consensus emerged that he was, if not the greatest player ever, than certainly the greatest living ballplayer. However, there is an interesting, and now generally forgotten, backstory around that. In 1969 baseball decided to celebrate its centennial. There is no concrete evidence that baseball or either the American or National League began in 1869, but that did not stop the festivities from going forward.