Best Baseball Players 1911-1920 and Their Cards
Collect the Top Players from 1911-1920
Mar 21, 2025
Robert Halliman
Baseball, Cards and Culture, How to Collect, MLB
The second decade of the 1900s falls squarely within baseball’s “dead-ball era” — a time defined by low-scoring games, dominant pitching, and tactical precision. Despite the scarcity of home runs, this was a decade full of unforgettable players whose influence shaped the modern game. Their names endure, not just in record books, but on some of the most cherished trading cards in The Hobby.
This list highlights the best players of the 1910s by position, alongside some of their most iconic cards ever produced.
Best Baseball Players & Their Cards: 1911-1920
Catcher: 1915 Cracker Jack #61 Ray Schalk RC
• 1917 world series champion
• hall of famer
• played and managed in the mlb
• “Schalk is unquestionably the hardest working catcher in baseball as he is doubtless also the brainiest, the nerviest, the most competent.” – john c. ward of baseball magazine
First Base: 1940 Play Ball #179 George Sisler
• Hall of famer
• 1922 AL mvp
• four-time al stolen base leader
• “”He is probably the only player other than Gehrig who can reasonably be considered the greatest first baseman ever in terms of peak value.” – Sports writer Rick Huhn
Second Base: 1909-1911 T206 American Tobacco Company Eddie Collins
• hall of famer
• six-time world series champion
• four-time al stolen base leader
• “He was the greatest infielder I ever saw.” – fellow hall of famer Frankie Frisch
Shortstop: 1909-1911 T206 American Tobacco Company Honus Wagner
• One of the five original Baseball hall of Fame inductees
• 1909 World Series Champion
• 524-Card Set
• One of the rarest and most valuable Baseball cards of all time, sold for $7.25 million in 2022
• “He is not only a marvelous mechanical player, but he has the quickest baseball brain I have ever observed.” – john mcgraw
Third Base: 1915 Cracker Jack #159 Heinie Groh
• “Heinie Groh was undoubtedly the National League’s best third baseman of the Deadball Era.” – Sean Lahman of the Society for American Baseball Research
Left Fielder: 1910 T210 Old Mill Shoeless Joe Jackson
• cleveland guardians hall of famer
• 1917 world series champion
• “I copied Jackson’s style because I thought he was the greatest hitter I had ever seen, the greatest natural hitter I ever saw. He’s the guy who made me a hitter.” – babe ruth
Center Fielder: 1933 Goudey #89 Tris Speaker
• hall of Famer
• Three-time world series champion
• 1912 al mvp
• “At the crack of the bat he’d be off with his back to the infield, and then he’d turn and glance over his shoulder at the last minute and catch the ball so easy it looked like there was nothing to it, nothing at all.” – Smoky Joe Wood
Right Fielder: 1909-1911 T206 Ty Cobb Red Portrait
• One of the five original Baseball hall of Fame inductees
• 1911 al mvp
• 12-time al batting champion
• “I never saw anyone like Ty Cobb. No one even close to him. He was the greatest all time ballplayer. That guy was superhuman, amazing.” – Casey Stengel
Starting Pitcher: 1911 T205 Walter Johnson
• hall of famer
• 1924 world series champion
• two-time al mvp
• “That young fellow is another Cy Young. I never saw a kid with more than he displayed.” – Addie Joss