Who's the greatest base stealer of all time?

Ricky Henderson has 500 more than the 2nd most all time.

player, SB, %

Tim Raines 808 84.7%

Eric Davis 349 84.1%

Davey Lopes 557 83.0%

Joe Morgan 689 81.0%

Vince Coleman 752 81.0%

Rickey Henderson 1406 80.8%

Lou Brock 938 75.3%

On success rate (among the big stealers, and for those olde-tymers where we don't have complete career data, like Cobb and Collins, the seasons where we do have complete data indicate they were not 80 percenters, so we leave them aside), Raines wins. And he was really, really good at it, so he deserves this acknowledgement.

But we can also look at "net steals", a simple formula -- net steals == stolen bases - 2*caught steals (on the basis that getting caught costs an out AND removes a valuable baserunner, so a double penalty is fair). And:

Henderson 736

Raines 516

Coleman 398

Morgan 365

Lopes 329

Brock 324

Davis 217

And, to no surprise, it's Rickey in a landslide.

I'm with most people and give Henderson the nod as The Greatst Basestealer Ever, and it's hard (possible but hard) to argue against him. But Raines was no slouch, and here's hoping the Hall voters notice him next January.

Jose Reyes Hanley Ramirez Juan Pierre Brian Roberts Carl Crawford Chone Figgins

Ricky Henderson

Rickey Henderson

1. Rickey Henderson

2. Ty Cobb

3. Billy Hamilton

4. Vince Coleman

5. Tim Raines

Rickey Henderson - 130 in a single season in 1982

Ricky Henderson.

Ricky Henderson

Juan Pierre, Jose Reyes, and Ricky Henderson

Consensus says Ricky Henderson.