Babe Ruth Trivia
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45 free Babe Ruth trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Babe Ruth pitched the Red Sox to three World Series titles, then went to New York and hit more home runs than most teams. This Babe Ruth trivia quiz has 45 free questions with answers covering the whole story: the boy sent to St. Mary's Industrial School at seven, the Baltimore Orioles rookie nicknamed by his teammates, the left-hander with 29 scoreless World Series innings, the sale that started the Curse of the Bambino, and the Yankee who hit 54, 59 and then 60. It also covers the parts casual fans skip: the called shot, the bellyache heard round the world, why he made more than President Hoover, why nobody would let him manage, the three-homer farewell at Forbes Field, his family, his illness and his funeral at Yankee Stadium. Questions climb from the basics to details that will test lifelong baseball readers. Every answer was checked against Ruth's Wikipedia biography, a featured article built on the standard Creamer, Montville and Stout biographies, and each question links to the page that establishes it.
30 of 45 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which city was Babe Ruth born in 1895?
Baltimore
Baltimore was certain, but the date was not. For most of his life Ruth believed he was born on February 7, 1894; a passport application then turned up a birth certificate dated February 6, 1895.
Q 02Sent at age seven to St. Mary's Industrial School, Ruth was recorded there as what?
Incorrigible
Incorrigible was the entry. St. Mary's was a reformatory as well as an orphanage, and Ruth was no orphan, yet the Xaverian Brothers kept him for most of the next 12 years.
Q 03Which St. Mary's staff member did Ruth credit with making him a hitter?
Brother Matthias
Brother Matthias ran discipline at St. Mary's, yet Ruth came to see him as a father. Ruth praised him for the rest of his life.
Q 04Why did the Orioles have to sell Ruth to the Red Sox in July 1914?
A rival league wrecked attendance
A rival league wrecked attendance: the Federal League's Terrapins played across the street and outdrew the Orioles even while Ruth's club sat in first place. Owner Jack Dunn sold his best players to stay afloat.
Q 05Which actor played Ruth in the 1992 film The Babe?
John Goodman
John Goodman took the part 44 years after The Babe Ruth Story, a 1948 biopic starring William Bendix. A dying Ruth left hospital to attend that film's premiere three weeks before his death.
Q 06In which 1993 film do neighborhood kids lose a prized Babe Ruth souvenir to a fearsome dog?
The Sandlot
The Sandlot has Ruth himself appear in a dream to tell one of the boys to go over the fence after the ball. The monstrous Beast guarding it turns out to be an ordinary dog.
Q 07Which pitcher tied Ruth's 1916 AL record of nine shutouts by a left-hander in 1978?
Ron Guidry
Ron Guidry's nine shutouts for the 1978 Yankees tied a mark Ruth had held alone for 62 years. The pitching record outlasted both of Ruth's famous home run records.
Q 08What still-standing postseason record did Ruth set in Game 2 of the 1916 World Series?
Longest complete-game win
Longest complete-game win: Ruth gave up a first-inning home run, then held the Robins scoreless for 13 innings until Boston won 2-1 in the 14th. No World Series game ran longer until 2018.
Q 09After Ruth was ejected and punched an umpire in 1917, what did reliever Ernie Shore do?
Retired all 26 batters he faced
Ernie Shore retired all 26 batters he faced, after the one runner Ruth had walked was caught stealing. It counted as a perfect game until 1991, when baseball relabelled it a combined no-hitter.
Q 10In 1999 an ESPN panel ranked Ruth the century's second-greatest North American athlete, behind which star?
Michael Jordan
Michael Jordan topped ESPN's list, but an Associated Press panel that same year reversed the order and put Ruth first. He had been dead for 51 years.
Q 11Which pitcher broke Ruth's record of 29 2/3 consecutive scoreless World Series innings in 1961?
Whitey Ford
Whitey Ford broke it 43 years after Ruth set it. Ruth claimed the streak was the baseball feat he was proudest of, ahead of anything he did at the plate.
Q 12Which Red Sox owner sold Ruth to the Yankees after the 1919 season?
Harry Frazee
Harry Frazee, a New York theater producer, also took a loan from the Yankees' owner as part of the deal. Its collateral was Fenway Park, so for years the Red Sox's rival held the mortgage on their home.
Q 13For how much did the Yankees buy Ruth's contract, then the largest sum ever paid for a player?
$100,000
Q 21What did sportswriters call Ruth's mysterious illness of 1925?
The bellyache heard 'round the world
The bellyache heard 'round the world was no mere stomach ache. Ruth collapsed on the trip north from spring training and spent weeks in hospital, and the exact cause was never confirmed.
Q 22What did Ruth become the first player to do in a World Series game in 1926?
Hit three home runs
Ruth hit three home runs in Game 4 at St. Louis. Four days later he made the last out of the Series himself, caught trying to steal second with the Yankees a run down in Game 7.
Q 23Ruth's 1926 promise of a home run for sick Johnny Sylvester was written on what?
The Yankees paid $100,000, in four yearly instalments of $25,000. It paid off at once: in 1920 they drew 1.2 million fans, the first team ever to pass a million in a season.
Q 14Which Broadway musical is often, and inaccurately, said to have been financed by the Ruth sale?
No, No, Nanette
No, No, Nanette did not open on Broadway until 1925, more than five years after the sale. It was, though, a musical remake of My Lady Friends, a play the Red Sox owner staged in 1919.
Q 15What is Boston's 86-year title drought after selling Ruth called?
Curse of the Bambino
The Curse of the Bambino got its name only in 1990, from a Boston sportswriter's book, 70 years after the sale. When Ruth left, the Red Sox had five World Series titles, more than any other club.
Q 16In 1920 Ruth's Yankees were tenants of the Giants at which ballpark?
The Polo Grounds
The Polo Grounds belonged to the Giants, and once Ruth's Yankees began outdrawing their landlords they were told to find another home. The result, in 1923, was Yankee Stadium.
Q 17Whose career home run record of 138 did Ruth break in 1921?
Roger Connor
Roger Connor retired in 1897 with 138, more than anyone had ever hit. Ruth passed him at just 26, so every one of his next 575 home runs broke his own record.
Q 18Why did Commissioner Landis suspend Ruth for the start of the 1922 season?
For a banned barnstorming tour
For a banned barnstorming tour: World Series teams were ordered to disband once the Series ended, and Ruth played exhibitions anyway. Landis took his Series pay too and kept him out until May 20.
Q 19Which honor did Ruth win only once, in 1923?
League MVP
American League MVP. The league's award then barred past winners, so Ruth could never win it again, not even for his record 60 home runs in 1927.
Q 20Ruth won 12 home run titles but which title only once?
Batting
The batting title came with a .378 average in 1924. A year earlier his career-best .393 had not been enough, because Detroit's Harry Heilmann hit .403.
A signed baseball
A signed baseball carried the promise that Ruth would knock a homer for the boy in Wednesday's game. He kept it, and newspapers were soon claiming the home runs had saved the boy's life.
Q 24What was the 1927 Yankees lineup nicknamed?
Murderers' Row
Murderers' Row won 110 games, then a league record, and swept Pittsburgh in the World Series. The last run of the sweep scored on a wild pitch.
Q 25Ruth's 60 home runs in 1927 stood as the season record until which Yankee hit 61 in 1961?
Roger Maris
Roger Maris hit his 61st on the last day of a season eight games longer than Ruth's. The commissioner had said such a record should be shown separately, and a 1991 committee confirmed Maris as the holder.
Q 26Which teammate briefly led Ruth in the 1927 home run race, 45 to 44, in early September?
Lou Gehrig
Lou Gehrig edged ahead 45-44 in early September 1927, but Ruth answered the same afternoon and never trailed again. He hit 17 that month to finish with 60; Gehrig ended on 47.
Q 27Why did Ruth wear the uniform number 3?
He batted third in the order
He batted third in the order, and the 1929 Yankees numbered players by lineup spot so fans could tell them apart. The team kept handing out his 3 after he left, and retired it only in 1948.
Q 28What did Ruth reportedly say about out-earning President Hoover in 1930?
"I had a better year than he did"
"I had a better year than he did" is the line that stuck, though it is quoted in several wordings. Ruth's $80,000 topped Hoover's $75,000 as the Depression began, which is why the quip landed.
Q 29Ruth's "called shot" came in the 1932 World Series against which team?
Chicago Cubs
The Chicago Cubs had voted Ruth's old teammate Mark Koenig only half a Series share, and Ruth attacked them for it in the press. Their bench and crowd were jeering him at Wrigley Field when he gestured and homered.
Q 30Off which pitcher did Ruth hit his 1932 'called shot'?
Charlie Root
Charlie Root always denied that Ruth had called anything. Had Ruth really pointed at the fence, he said, the next pitch would have knocked him down.