Thats all I am claiming. I am too removed from the Pele days to be able to compare. The examples I used are all players from the late 90s and 2000s like Kaka, Shevchenko, Nistelrooy, Henry, Del Piero, Zidane, Raul etc... I didn't go farther back because there probably are vast differences to the game. I am not sure but was there an offside rule in Pele's time? Its almost a different sport. Pele too (as far as I know) was a goal scoring anomaly himself. I've never heard of anyone from his era that scored that much goals. Garrincha (who I hear was one of the best players in the world during that time) doesn't have an impressive goal scoring record or ratio at all.
To see whether a player is an anomaly, compare his stats to the other players that were considered world class at the time. If you find that he is averaging more goals and assists than twice what the other world class players are doing then you've got a clear anomaly relative to his time.
You can then compare his stats with other great players in history and if you again find that he is doing almost twice as good as anyone else in history, then the earlier judgement (that the player is an anomaly) gets confirmed even further.
Now who is better, Pele or Ronaldo or Messi? He obviously has better stats with the NT while they do better at club level. But since there is a 60 year gap between them its impossible to tell who is better and whether this comparison is fair. What we do know is that all 3 are anomalies during their time and also across history. We cant say Messi is the better than Pele nor can we say that Pele is definitely better.
