Who can forget the 1962 Yankees? They had it all. Good pitching, good hitting, and good fielding all in one team.
Let’s start with the lineup. Every single player in the starting 9 was an above average hitter except for Hector Lopez who was 2% below average. Mickey Mantle drew an amazing 122 walks in 502 PA. Mantle slashed .321/.486/.605 with 30 HR and a 195 OPS+. In RF was Roger Maris who slashed .256/.356/.485 with 33 HR. other notable players in the lineup were Yogi Berra, Tom Tresh, and Elston Howard.
The pitching staff featured Ralph Terry, who went 23-12 with a 3.19 ERA, Whitey Ford (17-8 2.90 ERA), and Bill Stafford (14-9 3.67 ERA). The bullpen had closer Marshall Bridges who went 8-4 with a 3.14 ERA and 18 ssaves. The bullpen also featured Jim Bouton (7-7 3.99 ERA), Jim Coates (7-6 4.44 ERA), and Bud Daley (7-5 3.59 ERA).
The roster was obviously talented. But would they be good today? That’s a difficult question for any team of the past. It really comes down to how the pitchers were pitching.
Bob Gibson was in his first all-star year. He went 15-13 with a 2.85 ERA. His stuffy is nasty, we know that for sure. But in an age with no radar guns or pitch types, we have to depend on in person experience. That’s a pretty bad source, as people can imagine things or remember things wrong.
There is some footage, though. This footage is grainy, and inconclusive.
So we have to mainly rely on in person accounts of the games. And they say that a lot of pitchers back then were very good. So the answer to the question of whether the pitching was good is yes. The pitching was very good in 1962.
Based on this, the 1962 Yankees would still be good today.