Cureveballs and Sliders 06.28.07: The Return
Posted by Jared Marcus on 06.28.2007
Finally the long awaited return of your favorite baseball column, Curveballs and Sliders. In the return edition we revisit one of our favorite subjects, the all-star selection process. This week we pick the 32 all-stars for each league. In addition we begin a very special feature on the greatest players from each U.S. State as well as thoughts on the Chris Benoit situation.
LEADING OFF
Guess who's back? Back again?????????
That's right, today is a glorious day as everyone's favorite baseball column has finally returned to 411mania.com, the greatest website for all that is sports, wrestling, music, movies etc. on the web. I apologize for the extended vacation and rather than making excuses I will just jump right into the column. You have waited long enough, just know that the column is back, better than ever, and it will be a weekly staple of 411 once agin.
However, before we jump into the baseball, with 411mania being the premier wrestling website on the internet, I do just want to quickly touch on the subject of Chris Benoit. This is clearly one of the biggest wrestling stories of all-time and to those who follow wrestling, one of the biggest sports stories of the year. I do not feel it is my place to really analyze the situation or the mindset of Chris Benoit, I will leave that to all of the experts in the Wrestling Zone. I do however just want to address the writers of the wrestling zone in a general way because the thought is at the top of my mind. I am not looking to personally attack anyone and I also, as many of them have said, do not feel it is my place to make judgments or assumptions about Benoit or his family. I do however find it completely unacceptable, disrespectful and ridiculous to read some of the articles referring to Benoit as a hero, even in a wrestling sense. It's also appalling to me that some writers are calling into question the fact that Benoit's legacy may be tarnished and that they hope it won't be. Are you kidding? I understand you may be a fan but come on!!! If the man passed away tragically, then he would get a heroes farewell much like Eddie Guerrero. If he just killed himself, maybe you could call him a coward, but it would still be a sad story that would end with his induction in the Hall of Fame next year. But the fact is that he killed two people, one of whom was a 7-year old boy nullifies any chance he has at being remembered fondly. Regardless of his reasoning, there is no justifying it. And although it may sound like I am passing judgment when I said that I wouldn't, that is not what I am trying to do. The point I am trying to make is that you can't possibly expect Vince McMahon and the WWE to not distance themselves from Benoit as much and as quickly as possible. Why would Vince ever induct a murderer into the Hall of Fame and invite all the negative press and backlash that would come with it? Why would he possibly continue to promote the man or sell anything that involves his likeness when his customers as a whole will be outraged? ITS CRAZY!!! I am a wrestling fan, have been for over 20 years and I hate when people say that wrestlers are not athletes because they are clearly some of the finest athletes in the world. However, that doesn't change the fact that wrestling isn't real. It's entertainment and it's a business. Vince has to be worried about marketing, growing his brand and making money and the way to go about that is not to associate yourself in any way with a known murderer. That is just common sense. I am sure he is angry enough already that he wasted three hours paying tribute to the man and had to put all of his storylines on hold for a man that killed his wife and child. Benoit will never be inducted into the Hall of Fame, he will never been remembered as anything other than the man that killed his wife and child and that is the way it should be. I am sorry to all of you who idolized him and built him up in your minds over the past two decades as one of the "good guys of wrestling", but having it any other way would be absolutely ludicrous. That is all, let's get to the baseball .
THE TWO HOLE
Well, now that I got that off my chest I can finally get back to the baseball. Its been a while, a long while, but I am happy to be back and can't wait to get back into writing about the greatest sport in the world. The great news is that I have over a months worth of ideas stored up and ready to go and this week we will begin with an old favorite, the all-star selection process. Beginning with the NL we are going to go through both leagues and select all 64 players that should be at this summer's All-Star game. In order to do this we are going to follow the exact procedure that MLB follows in making the teams. First we will take the fan balloting results, than choose a backup at each position, then choose 12 pitchers and round out the team with the managers choices, finally choosing the last member of the team via a five man ballot vote. And of course, we have to make sure that we have a representative for each of the 30 MLB teams by the time we are done. Now let's jump in ..
NATIONAL LEAGUE
The current NL starters based on the latest vote totals released are as follows:
C Russell Martin (Dodgers)
1B Prince Fielder (Brewers)
2B Chase Utley (Phillies)
SS Jose Reyes (Mets)
3B David Wright (Mets)
OF Carlos Beltran (Mets)
OF Ken Griffey Jr. (Reds)
OF Alfonso Soriano (Cubs)
For a change these are actually not horrible choices that were selected by the fans. Martin, Fielder, Utley and Reyes all deserve to be starters and Wright and Griffey definitely deserve to at least make the team. Only Beltran and Soriano are bad choices and having only two bad choices out of eight is about as good as you can do with fan balloting. The All-Star process will obviously never be 100% effective until the fan balloting is eliminated, but that is a topic I have spent too much time on in the past and there is little reason to go into all of it again, especially since it doesn't figure to change in the foreseeable future.
Let's pick the reserves.
C Russell Martin is clearly the best catcher in the NL this season and I am thrilled that he bypassed Paul LoDuca for the starting job, despite the fact that I am a Mets fan. As usual though, the pickings for the backup catcher are slim to none. NL catcher has been one of the weakest positions for producing all-stars in recent years and this season is no different. Because of the lack of viable candidates I am only going to select one catcher this season instead of the usual two backups. In this case I am going to give the nod to Bengie Molina of the Giants and his 38 RBI over Paul LoDuca of the Mets and Johnny Estrada of the Brewers.
1B This is always one of the hardest positions to select all-star reserves from and this year it may be even more competitive than usual. The interesting thing here is that Prince Fielder stunningly leads Albert Pujols in the balloting, putting Pujol's run of five straight starting nods in jeopardy. Fielder definitely deserves the nod, its just rare that the fans award a player like Fielder in his first all-star type season over a perennial all-star like Pujols. It does make the process much more justified, but it also makes choosing reserves much trickier. If Fielder didn't win the balloting he would be a lock to be the backup, but with him as the starter Pujols isn't a slam dunk to take the backup spot. In fact I am going to take Adrian Gonzalez of the Padres and his 51 RBI over Pujols, Derrek Lee and Todd Helton as the backup.
2B Utley is obviously a runaway choice as the starter, but choosing a backup at second this year is very difficult. Usually the choices for NL all-star second basemen are few and far between, but not this year with as many as six second basemen having career seasons. Ultimately I am going to choose Dan Uggla from the Marlins to make his second all-star appearance as the backup, but Kelly Johnson, Orlando Hudson, Jeff Kent and Brandon Phillips all also received serious consideration.
SS For decades NL shortstop was a perennially weak all-star position with managers often struggling to even find a backup. While the AL had a ton of starpower at SS over the past decade, the NL has had barely any. That has now changed in a big way and I believe that choosing all-stars for shortstop in the NL is the hardest of all positions in both leagues this year. There are five players at this position who have legitimate claims to being locks for this year's all-star game, though sadly all five cannot make the team. In past years any of the five would have probably won the balloting with the seasons they are having, but this year there just isn't room. Jose Reyes is already in through fan balloting leaving the other four to battle it out for two or maybe even three spots. The four players are J.J. Hardy, Jimmy Rollins, Edgar Renteria and Hanley Ramirez, who all have their own strengths and weaknesses. In fact its very hard to even compare them and rate them against one another because they are all strong in different categories. A month ago J.J. Hardy was a lock for the team, but he has fallen off while the other three have come on. Most notable Edgar Renteria who a month ago was clearly running fifth in this race, but today, with his .332 average and .907 OPS, he is my choice as the backup shortstop.
3B This is probably the weakest third base competition in a long time in the NL, mostly due to injuries sustained by Chipper Jones and Aramis Ramirez that cost them a few weeks each. David Wright is in as the starter and Miguel Cabrera is a no-brainer as the backup with his .331 average and 53 RBI, so this position is an easy one.
OF As I said earlier, outfield is the one weak spot in terms of the starters that were chosen by fan balloting with two of three not really deserving of an all-star slot. That is a shame too because outfield is always a very competitive position and there are always a few deserving players that have to be left home at this position. This year is no different as there are at least 10 outfielders who have to be considered for the all-star game and obviously there isn't a spot for all of them, especially with two spots already being taken away by undeserving players. For my three outfield reserves I am going to go with Eric Byrnes of the Diamondbacks with his .318 average, Carlos Lee of the Astros with his 59 RBI and Matt Holliday of the Rockies and his league leading .358 average. I chose those three over Jeff Francoeur, Aaron Rowand, Jason Bay, Brad Hawpe, Xavier Nady, Barry Bonds and Josh Willingham. For the record, Lee and Holliday should be the starters over Soriano and Beltran.
Ok, that takes care of 16 of the 32 spots, leaving 16 more to go. Of course we know that every team needs at least one representative and we have to account for that going forward. Using those 16 players we have named to the team so far, 13 of the 16 NL teams already have representatives, so we are ahead of the game. However, we still have to find representatives for the Pirates, Cardinals and Nationals, who as usual, don't have any deserving players. Let's move on the pitchers.
Starting Pitchers We will start with the automatics before we worry about teams. Jake Peavy of the Padres is 9-1 with 110 strikeouts and 1.98 ERA . He is an automatic selection and my choice to be the NL starter. Other no-brainers are Brad Penny (9-1 2.12) of the Dodgers and Chris Young (6-3 2.26) of the Padres. I am also going to take Ian Snell (6-4, 2.63) as the Pirates representative over his fellow staff member Tom Gorzellany. Rounding out my starting pitchers will be Ben Sheets (8-3 3.19) of the Brewers, John Smoltz (8-4 3.14) of the Braves, John Maine (7-4 2.90) of the Mets and Cole Hamels (9-3 3.82) of the Phillies. Those that just missed the cut include Roy Oswalt, Ted Lilly, Jason Marquis, Tim Hudson, Rich Hill, Brandon Webb, Derek Lowe, Matt Morris, Oliver Perez, Sergio Mitre, Aaron Harang, Jeff Francis and the aforementioned Tom Gorzellany. Yes, I know that is a lot but a huge number of NL starting pitchers are having all-star caliber seasons and making things even more difficult is the fact that so many of those seasons are equal and interchangeable. You could really sub any of my misses for my actual selections and you wouldn't be wrong, it really just comes down to preference at this point. Let's move on.
Relief Pitchers So we found a player for the Pirates and now only have to find representatives for the Cardinals and Nationals. The Cardinals are easy here because Jason Isringhausen is having a fantastic season, although his save total is not that impressive. That is obviously just a product of the Cardinals woes though and his 1.55 ERA is more than enough to justify his selection for this squad. Other closers I am taking are Francisco Cordero of the Brewers and his 27 saves and Takashi Saito of the Dodgers and his 1.45 ERA. That leaves only one pitching spot left and we still need a representative for the lowly Nationals. It comes down to only two choices really, either third baseman Ryan Zimmerman, or closer Chad Cordero. Cordero is not having a great season with only 12 saves, but his 2.57 ERA is respectable. In the end I would rather choose Cordero though just because the races are so tight for the final positional spots and I would hate for Zimmerman to take one of them. So Cordero makes the team as the Nats representative over more deserving closers such as Billy Wagner, Trevor Hoffman, Brian Fuentes and Jose Valverde.
We have now filled out our pitching staff and accounted for 28 of the 32 players on the team, plus we have taken care of the representatives for all 16 NL teams, meaning that we can just choose the four best players going forward.
First I am going to select Albert Pujols as a third first basemen, despite the fact that I am not fully convinced he deserves the nod over Derrek Lee. Next I am going to take Adam Dunn of the Reds and his 20 HR and .930 OPS as an outfielder. Now I am going to revisit shortstop where I mentioned before it's almost criminal that all of them cannot make the team. For my third shortstop selection I am going with Hanley Ramirez of the Marlins and his 62 runs scored and .320 average. However, we are still not done with those shortstops yet, because
There is still one spot left and that spot goes to the winner of the fans choice. The top five players that missed the roster are placed on a ballot with fans voting on the final member. The ballot is going to look like this:
J.J. Hardy (Brewers)
Jason Bay (Pirates)
Derrek Lee (Cubs)
Jimmy Rollins (Phillies)
Aaron Rowand (Phillies)
This ballot shows just how deep the NL all-star candidate pool is this year because all five of these guys really deserve a spot on the team. It is almost impossible to choose between them since they are all deserving and you can't really go wrong no matter who you choose. I however, am going to go against normal protocol and pick a fourth shortstop for the team just because I think he is the most deserving. And that fourth shortstop is not J.J. Hardy, but Jimmy Rollins and his 58 Runs and 44 RBI. My apologies to the other four players on the team, but I am sure there will be an injury or two in the coming weeks that will open up another couple of slots.
So there you have it. Let's take a look at what the NL All-Star squad looks like.
C Russell Martin, Bengie Molina
1B Prince Fielder, Adrian Gonzalez, Albert Pujols
2B Chase Utley, Dan Uggla
SS Jose Reyes, Edgar Renteria, Hanley Ramirez, Jimmy Rollins
3B David Wright, Miguel Cabrera
OF Ken Griffey Jr., Matt Holliday
OF Carlos Beltran, Eric Byrnes
OF Alfonso Soriano, Carlos Lee, Adam Dunn
SP Jake Peavy, Brad Penny, Chris Young, Ben Sheets, Ian Snell, Cole Hamels, John Maine, John Smoltz
RP Takashi Saito, Francisco Cordero, Jason Isringhausen, Chad Cordero
Alright, that will do it for the NL, now onto the AL ..
BATTING THIRD
AMERICAN LEAGUE
The AL is usually harder to decide on than the NL which you wouldn't think would be the case because there are fewer teams and fewer players, but because of the DH, there are usually many more players with big numbers in the AL than in the NL. However, this year that is not the case due to injuries and in some cases lack of production, so the AL should be a lot easier to narrow down.
The current AL starters based on the latest vote totals released are as follows:
C Pudge Rodriguez (Tigers)
1B David Ortiz (Red Sox)
2B Placido Polanco (Tigers)
SS Derek Jeter (Yankees)
3B Alex Rodriguez (Yankees)
OF Vlad Guerrero (Angels)
OF Ichiro Suzuki (Mariners)
OF Magglio Ordonez (Tigers)
These are almost the exact same starters from a year ago and they are pretty much dead on the money. Pudge doesn't deserve to start, but could easily make the team. The infield is completely accurate in my opinion and thank goodness voters came to their sense and pulled Polanco ahead of Robinson Cano, that would have been a terrible travesty. The outfield is now also dead on the money now that Magglio Ordonez has passed Manny Ramirez as a leading vote getter. Manny is still obviously a great player and always deserves consideration for an all-star slot, but this year he simply does not deserve to be a starter. So the AL voting is very good this year and all-in-all the voting results for both leagues have probably been the best results in years, contrary to what I said above. Now let's pick the reserves.
C As I said above, Pudge possible deserves to make the team, but only as the third string catcher because there are two guys ahead of him having unbelievable seasons. To give you an idea of how good these seasons are look at the fact that Kenji Johjima of the Mariners is batting .313 as a catcher but will be left out in the cold. That is because of Jorge Posada of the Yankees and Victor Martinez of the Indians. Posada is hitting .339 with 43 RBI and Martinez is hitting .319 with 59 RBI. They are both automatics so I am going to dispense with the protocol of only choosing one backup at this point and adding the other as an extra player later. Instead I am just going to put them both on the team right here and now and move on.
1B First base in the AL this year is an anomaly as the competition is not that steep. Usually it is one of the hardest positions to narrow down as it contains all the big hitting AL first basemen as well as the AL DH's that all get lumped in with them. This season, with the injuries to Mark Teixeira and Jason Giambi and the struggles of Travis Hafner and Jim Thome, the competition has really taken a hit. The plus side of this is that it made it a lot easier to select a reserve. Despite his recent lung problem, I am still selecting Justin Morneau of the Twins and his 20 HR and 57 RBI as the backup over Kevin Youkilis and Carlos Pena. Morneau should be good to go by the game and his numbers will still be more than respectable despite missing a bit of time recently.
2B As I said above, one of the best developments of the recent all-star voting totals has been the fact that Placido Polanco surpassed Robinson Cano. Polanco most definitely deserves to be an all-star this season and Cano really belongs nowhere close. Polanco probably would have made the team as a backup anyway, but the good news is that this opens up a spot for another deserving second basemen, and there are actually quite a few of them in the AL. My choice is going to be Brian Roberts of the Orioles and his. 342 average over the likes of Aaron Hill, Jose Lopez and B.J. Upton, who has missed a few weeks due to injury but still comes close to making this team.
SS Derek Jeter is the starter here, deservedly so and the competition is wide open for the backup spot with Miguel Tejada having a down year and now being out for at least a month with a fractured wrist. There are quite a few AL shortstops having great seasons but it really comes down to two choices for the backup spot here, Carlos Guillen and Orlando Cabrera. Guillen has the lead in RBI and OPS, but I am going to take Cabrera and his 100 hits and .340 average by the slimmest or margins. Others that received consideration are Jhonny Peralta and Michael Young, who may still need to be included as the Rangers representative, though Carlos Guillen deserves to make the team more if a third shortstop is included.
3B This one is easy as A-Rod is already locked in as the starter and there is really only one other third basemen in the AL that deserves an all-star slot. That player is Mike Lowell of the Red Sox with his 50 RBI. No one else even earns a look at this position.
OF AL Outfield is an interesting position this year because it is not really as loaded with star players as it has been in years past, but it is still as equally hard to choose from. Most notably because very few players are having standout seasons, instead there are a bunch of players having very good seasons making it even harder to distinguish and choose between them. We already have Vlad, Ichiro and Magglio as starters and now we need to choose three more outfielders as backups. Right away I am going to take Torii Hunter of the Twins and his 57 RBI as well as his terrific defense. I am also going to choose another Tiger in Gary Sheffield with his 49 RBI and .939 OPS. I am going to give the last backup spot to Alex Rios of the Blue Jays with his 16 HR and 52 Runs, he gets the nod over Manny Ramirez, Nick Markakis, Grady Sizemore, Carl Crawford, Curtis Granderson, Michael Cuddyer, Nick Swisher and Gary Matthews Jr.
Now we have filled out more than half of the roster, with 17 of the 32 spots accounted for. With those 17 selections we have managed to account for a representative from 9 of the 14 American League teams. We still need to find room for at least one player from each of the following teams: Devil Rays, White Sox, Royals, A's and Rangers. Now let's move on to the pitchers.
Starting Pitchers As always there are a ton of choices for starting pitchers, so before we look to fill out the missing teams we need representatives for, we will first fill in the automatics. Dan Haren of the A's is as automatic as they come with his 9-2 record and 1.78 ERA. He is my choice to start for the AL and he also fills the need for a representative for the A's, so we are off to a great start. Other automatics include Josh Beckett (10-1 3.14) of the Red Sox, Justin Verlander (8-2 2.90) of the Tigers, C.C. Sabathia (10-2 3.34) of the Indians and John Lackey (10-4 2.96) of the Angels. Next I am going to take Gil Meche (4-6 3.21) as the Royals representative because despite his record he has pitched like an all-star. Plus there is not one other player on the KC roster that could even be entered into this discussion. Next I am going to take James Shields (6-2 3.05) as the Devil Rays representative. It was a close race between he and closer Al Reyes for the D-Rays spot but ultimately I think Shields deserves it a little more. I know I am going to take at least four closers so that leaves only one more spot for a starter. In a very close race I am going to take Johan Santana (7-6 2.91) of the Twins because despite his record he has still been one of the leagues top pitchers this season. Other pitchers that were considered were Erik Bedard, Fausto Carmona, Jeremy Bonderman, Kelvim Escobar, Andy Pettitte, Chad Gaudin, Mark Buehrle and Chien-Ming Wang.
Relief Pitchers - In assembling our starting staff we were able to find representatives for the Devil Rays, A's and Royals, which leaves just two more teams that we have to find representatives for. One of those teams is the Rangers and they just have zero all-star options when it comes to pitchers, so their rep will have to come from the final position player adds. The White Sox on the other hand have a strong closer in Bobby Jenks and little else to offer from their roster, so Jenks and his 18 Saves make the team. J.J. Putz of the Mariners and his 1.11 ERA with 20 Saves is an easy choice. As is Francisco Rodriguez of the Angels and his 22 Saves. That leaves only one spot left and still a bunch of deserving relievers including Jonathan Papelbon, Hideki Okajima, Joe Nathan, Al Reyes and Pat Neshek. Instead of choosing one of these pitchers I am going to leave the last pitching slot up to the fan ballot which will be comprised of both starters and relievers.
So now we have filled out 28 members of the roster. We have 4 more spots to go and we still need a representative Rangers. Let's find one ..
As I said earlier, Michael Young is a top choice as the Rangers representative, but I just can't select him over Carlos Guillen who is having a tremendous season and really deserves to make the team, I just wouldn't respect myself in the morning. So Guillen makes the team as a third shortstop meaning that the Rangers still need a representative. With Mark Teixiera on the shelf the only other option is, yup you guessed it, Slammin' Sammy. Sosa is only hitting around .250 but his 57 RBI put him among the league leaders in the category. Plus it would make for a very interesting story. So Sosa makes the team as an extra outfielder. That leaves one more spot for a hitter and I am going to give it to Kevin Youkilis of the Red Sox and his .331 average by a narrow margin over Grady Sizemore.
That brings us to the fan choice selection for the final roster spot and the ballot for the final pitcher on the roster will look like this:
Chien-Ming Wang (Yankees)
Jonathan Papelbon (Red Sox)
Fausto Carmona (Indians)
Kelvim Escobar (Angels)
Jeremy Bonderman (Tigers)
This one is very tough but I am going to take Escobar of the Angels by the closest of margins over Bonderman and Papelbon, mostly due to the fact that the Tigers already have a ton of representatives and the Red Sox got the last positional spot with Youkilis. Plus Escobar does deserve it with a record of 8-3 and a 2.97 ERA.
Let's see what the finished AL squad looks like.
C Pudge Rodriguez, Victor Martinez, Jorge Posada
1B David Ortiz, Justin Morneau, Kevin Youkilis
2B Placido Polanco, Brian Roberts
SS Derek Jeter, Orlando Cabrera, Carlos Guillen
3B Alex Rodriguez, Mike Lowell
OF Vlad Guerrero, Alex Rios, Sammy Sosa
OF Ichiro Suzuki, Torii Hunter
OF Magglio Ordonez, Gary Sheffield
SP Dan Haren, Justin Verlander, C.C. Sabathia, Gil Meche, Josh Beckett, Johan Santana, James Shields, Kelvim Escobar, John Lackey
RP J.J. Putz, Bobby Jenks, Francisco Rodriguez
That's all for All-Star selections. I am pretty happy with the way the teams came out and breaking it down the same way that they do for the actual selection process makes it an interesting experience. I would be shocked if the teams turn out that much differently than the ones selected above but you never know. I would like to once again give props though to the fans for doing a great job of selecting the starters, a very rare occurrence in recent times but it does go a long way toward making the whole selection process much more credible and fair. Now that I have said all that the results will change drastically when the final starters are announced with Cano, Pujols, Manny, Soriano and probably a few others all sneaking into starting gigs. That will throw the whole thing into chaos and we will have to do this again in a few weeks just kidding ..or am I. Let's just move on.
CLEANING UP
I know, I know, you have missed me greatly in the past few weeks and you have also missed the column, but most of all you have missed "The Greatest", the section of the column that far and away gets the most feedback. Well, GREAT NEWS!!!, I have discontinued that section, starting this week I will debut a brand new section called, "Things I care about", this week's topic is "Tunafish sandwiches". The key to a really good tunafish sandwich is .LOLOLOL, just kidding, I would never do that to you. I am back baby and so is "The Greatest". This week we are going to begin another one of those multiple week projects. This one is going to be a break down of the greatest players from every state, much like the installment last winter when we broke down the 10 greatest players from each MLB franchise over a six week period. Starting this week and running through the next 5 weeks, we are going to rank the 10 greatest players from each of the U.S.'s 50 States plus the District of Columbia as well as Puerto Rico and Canada. The one caveat that I have is that the only way I could do this feature is by using the states that are listed as each players place of birth. I know in many cases the place of birth is not really where said player is from, for example Paul LoDuca is listed as being from New York but I know that he moved to Arizona when he was 2 and really grew up there. The thing is that I know that because I am a Mets fan and don't have that kind of information readily available for each of the thousands and thousands of players who have played professional baseball. Now I could research every single player before I make the lists and determine where their true home really is, but I am not going to do that. I love all of you who read this column and have poured countless hours into features like the "50 Greatest Icons" and "50 Worst Trades", but this is one task that even I can't undertake. Instead I will just rely on the listed places of birth and you will have to accept my apology in advance if your states "favorite son" is incorrectly listed under a different state just because he was born there. As usual, I have bored you to death with my intro and am now ready to jump into the topic. On the bright side though, for any of you who really did miss this column, at least the last paragraph was enough to remind you that you weren't really missing anything at all. LOLOL. Alright, seriously now, let's move on to the lists.
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Alabama
10) George Foster (348 HR, 1925 H, 1239 RBI, 986 R)
09) Joe Sewell (2226 H, 1055 RBI, 1141 R, Hall of Fame)
08) Don Sutton (324-256, 3.26 ERA, 3574 K, Hall of Fame)
07) Heinie Manush (2524 H, 1183 RBI, 1287 R, Hall of Fame)
06) Ozzie Smith (2460 H, 1257 R, 13 Gold Gloves, Hall of Fame)
05) Early Wynn (300-244, 3.54 ERA, 2334 K, Hall of Fame)
04) Billy Williams (426 HR, 2711 H, 1475 RBI, 1410 R, Hall of Fame)
03) Willie McCovey (521 HR, 2211 H, 1555 RBI, 1229 R, Hall of Fame)
02) Hank Aaron (755 HR, 3771 H, 2297 RBI, 2174 R, Hall of Fame)
01) Willie Mays (660 HR, 3283 H, 1903 RBI, 2062 R, 12 Gold Gloves, Hall of Fame)
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Alaska
(Note: This one was easy, only 9 players from Alaska have ever played in the Major Leagues)
10) Tie: Chris Duncan (37 HR, 83 RBI) and Andre Ethier (17 HR, 85 RBI) .yes, already, as you can see, Arizona is not much stronger than Alaska.
09) Jack Howell (108 HR, 337 RBI, 345 R)
08) J.J. Hardy (32 HR, 114 RBI, 101 R)
07) Ron Hassey (914 H, 438 RBI, 348 R)
06) Hank Leiber (101 HR, 518 RBI, 410 R)
05) Bobby Howry (33-35, 3.57 ERA, 59 SV, 491 K)
04) Tom Pagnozzi (733 H, 320 RBI, 247 R)
03) John Denny (123-108, 3.59 ERA, 1146 K)
02) Billy Hatcher (1146 H, 399 RBI, 586 R)
01) Shea Hillenbrand (107 HR, 997 H, 481 RBI, 457 R)
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Arkansas
10) Preacher Roe (127-84, 3.43 ERA, 956 K)
09) Johnny Sain (139-116, 3.49 ERA, 910 K)
08) Ellis Kinder (102-71, 3.43 ERA, 102 SV, 749 K)
07) Willie Davis (2561 H, 1053 RBI, 1217 R)
06) George Kell (2054 H, 870 RBI, 881 R, Hall of Fame)
05) Lon Warneke (192-121, 3.18 ERA, 1140 K)
04) Arky Vaughn (2103 H, 926 RBI, 1173 R, Hall of Fame)
03) Dizzy Dean (150-83, 3.02 ERA, 1163 K, Hall of Fame)
02) Lou Brock (3023 H, 900 RBI, 1610 R, 938 SB, Hall of Fame)
01) Brooks Robinson (2848 H, 268 HR, 1357 RBI, 1232 R, 16 Gold Gloves, Hall of Fame)
"The 15 Greatest" MLB Players from California
(Note: California was just too hard to narrow down to 10, actually even getting it down to 15 was next to impossible, that's what I went with)
15) Mark McGwire (583 HR, 1414 RBI, 1167 R)
14) Trevor Hoffman (2.69 ERA, 983 K, 501 SV)
13) Jeff Kent (355 HR, 1416 RBI, 1241 R)
12) Duke Snider (407 HR, 1333 RBI, 1259 R, Hall of Fame)
11) Bob Lemon (207-128, 3.23 ERA, 1277 K, Hall of Fame)
10) Dennis Eckersly (197-171, 3.50 ERA, 2401 K, 390 SV, Hall of Fame)
09) Gary Carter (324 HR, 1225 RBI, 1025 R, Hall of Fame)
08) Harry Heilmann (2660 H, 1539 RBI, 1291 R, .342 AVG., Hall of Fame)
07) Eddie Murray (3255 H, 504 HR, 1917 RBI, 1627 R, Hall of Fame)
06) Tony Gwynn (3141 H, 1138 RBI, 1383 R, .338 AVG., Hall of Fame)
05) Randy Johnson (284-149, 3.22 ERA, 4614 K)
04) Barry Bonds (2895 H, 749 HR, 1965 RBI, 2190 R, 7 MVP's)
03) Tom Seaver (311-205, 2.86 ERA, 3640 K, Hall of Fame)
02) Joe DiMaggio (2214 H, 361 HR, 1537 RBI, 1390 R, .325 AVG., Hall of Fame)
01) Ted Williams (2654 H, 521 HR, 1839 RBI, 1798 R, .344 AVG., Hall of Fame)
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Colorado
10) Scott Elarton (56-59, 5.26 ERA, 683 K)
09) Jimmy Welsh (778 H, 288 RBI, 387 R)
08) Tippy Martinez (55-42, 3.45 ERA, 632 K)
07) Johnny Frederick (954 H, 377 RBI, 498 R)
06) John Stearns (696 H, 312 RBI, 334 R)
05) Roy Hartzell (1146 H, 397 RBI, 503 R)
04) Johnny Lindell (762 H, 404 RBI, 401 R)
03) Dave LaRoche (65-58, 3.53 ERA, 819 K, 126 SV)
02) Roy Halladay (104-50, 3.66 ERA, 1502 K)
01) Rich "Goose" Gossage (124-107, 3.01 ERA, 1502 K, 310 SV)
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Connecticut
10) Rob Dibble (27-25, 2.98 ERA, 645 K, 89 SV, NLCS MVP)
09) Steve Blass (103-76, 3.63 ERA, 896 K)
08) Dick McAuliffe (1530 H, 697 RBI, 888 R)
07) Charles Nagy (129-105, 4.51 ERA, 1242 K)
06) Bill Hutchison (183-163, 3.59 ERA, 1234 K)
05) Jimmy Piersall (1604 H, 591 RBI, 811 R)
04) Tommy Corcoran (2252 H, 1135 RBI, 1184 R)
03) Mo Vaughn (328 HR, 1064 RBI, 861 R)
02) Roger Connor (2467 H, 1322 RBI, 1620 R, Hall of Fame)
01) Jim O'Rourke (2643 H, 1203 RBI, 1729 R, Hall of Fame)
"The 10 Greatest" MLB Players from Delaware
10) Chris Widger (222 RBI, 180 R)
09) Bert Cunningham (142-167, 4.22 ERA, 718 K)
08) Chris Short (135-132, 3.43 ERA, 1629 K)
07) Randy Bush (409 RBI, 388 R)
06) John Mabry (446 RBI, 382 R)
05) Kevin Mench (300 RBI, 270 R)
04) Dave May (422 RBI, 462 R)
03) Hans Lobert (1252 H, 482 RBI, 640 R, 316 SB)
02) Sadie McMahon (173-127, 3.51 ERA, 967 K)
01) Delino DeShields (1548 H, 561 RBI, 872 R, 463 SB)
Ok, that will do it for the return edition of Curveballs and Sliders. I hope you all enjoyed it and that it was worth the wait, I for one am so excited to be back. Going forward the column will once again be appearing every Thursday exclusively at 411mania.com. I have a lot of special lists and features in the works and there will be plenty of great content coming in the next few months. And of course, just in case you have forgotten, you can contact me at kidd082003@gmail.com. Until next week
