Ron Kantowski explains how time helps determine the players we admire most

Thursday, Aug. 2, 2007 | 7:37 a.m.

Like most men born in America during the 1930s, my dad was a baseball guy. He cheered for the Cubs and Tigers, and as near as I can recall, his favorite player was Phil Cavarretta, the National League's Most Valuable Player the last time the Cubs made it to the World Series, in 1945.

But my dad thought Ted Williams was the greatest ballplayer who ever lived.

When Williams played his last game in 1960, I was 3 years old. So I wasn't aware that he had hit .406 or went yard on Rip Sewell's eephus pitch during the 1946 All-Star Game.

Here's what I knew about Ted Williams: A) He was the manager of the God-awful Senators and B) he and Curt Gowdy were always hunting something on "The American Sportsman."

But I also knew he must have been a pretty good ballplayer because, first and foremost, my old man said he was, and second, because there was a plastic figurine cast in his likeness on my bedroom shelf. This was before G.I. Joe and the kung-fu grip.

It was the least favorite of the baseball figurines my dad collected (although they were cleverly disguised as gifts for me and my brother). I'm not sure why I favored the Yogi Berra figurine, or Eddie Mathews, or Rocky Colavito, over the one of Williams. I can only surmise it was because I wasn't familiar with the Splendid Splinter's splendid career and, perhaps more important, because a chunk of his hat was missing.

Although I am sure my brother's butter fingers were responsible for this rather conspicuous deformity, come to think of it, we also had a Don Drysdale figurine. So who's to say that when we were sleeping, those figurines didn't magically hop down from their dusty perches and choose up sides, like in "Field of Dreams"? And who's to say that plastic Double D didn't spin plastic Teddy Ballgame's cap around with a high, hard one?

Anyway, the point is that although my dad thought Ted Williams was the greatest player who ever walked the planet, and for that matter, Venus and Mars, I would probably go with Roberto Clemente. This is because by the time I fell in love with baseball, Mickey Mantle's knees were shot and Willie Mays was on his way to becoming a Met while Clemente still was flying around the bases for triples and gunning down lead-footed Cubs who dared to go where no man had gone before - i.e., from first to third on a single to right.

So with all due respect to Bob Costas, Peter Gammons, Bill James and other experts of baseball, be they of its abstract or purest forms, this is why I don't get all worked up over how many times Barry Bonds hits the ball over the fence; how much flaxseed oil he sprinkles on his Wheaties; how many times he disses sportswriters, wives, mistresses or Jeff Kent.

I will always admire Hank Aaron more.

I admire Aaron because of the class and dignity he displayed both as a ballplayer and a human being and yes, because his head was more the size of a cantaloupe than a giant pumpkin.

But it's mostly because in 1969, when The Hammer hit .300 with 44 homers and 97 RBIs, I was 12.