How come baseball players back in the day couldn't catch, throw or field well?

When they show all the various games played like in the 1940s and earlier, why did the fielders suck so much at fielding? They never made diving catches, long running catches, climbed the walls robbing home runs, making quick hard double plays, throwing out runners at the plate from the outfield and all the other impressive highlight reels seen everyday today. You would see them frequently dropping the and kicking them and could barely get the ball back into the infield fast enough. Runners could easily steal bases. Pitchers never picked off runners. There was no gold glove or defensive player of the year award. No one back then really cares about a players fielding and it was all about the batting stats. The best catch they could find was that overrated catch by Willie Mays which didnt even look that impressive at all. But yet there were players hitting 500 and 600 foot home runs. Why did the players back then (1800s to 1940s and 50s) stink so much at fielding?