Lazer_Wright

Welcome back everyone for the final vote for the All-Time greatest team.    We have certainly put together an awesome team and now we'll pick the best skipper for team.  

Before we get to the manager, I'll announce the players chosen as the reserve outfielders.   Hank Aaron became the first player on my team to be voted unanimously to his spot on the roster as he received all 21 votes cast for reserve right fielder.  Ty Cobb edged out Mickey Mantle for the centerfield spot 12 votes to 7 with Tris Speaker receiving the other 2 votes.  Stan Musual won a more competitive vote for left field with 10 votes.   Ed Delahanty received 5 votes with Rickey Henderson and Barry Bonds each claiming 3 votes. 

You were all spot on with the Aaron selection.  The other options all pale in comparison of the achievements of one Henry Aaron.  IMO if anyone else were to have gotten a vote here, it should have been Frank Robinson.  I'm fine with Ty Cobb in centerfield, but not having Mickey Mantle on the team leaves Pete Rose and Ozzie as the only switch hitters on the team.  I probably would have voted for Cobb too, but looking at the team, a switch hitter with speed would have added an extra dimension.  I do have to disagree with the selection of Musual in left.  We're looking for a back-up to Ted Williams here and to me, Musual is Ted Williams Lite with a better glove.  I'd be looking for a right handed hitting alternative coming off the bench for Williams who would be an all around better defensive alternative.  I'd have to go with Ed Delahanty here.  Don't let his 162 game average of 9 home runs fool you.  He played in the height of the dead ball era where 9 home runs put you among the league leaders.  His average of 129 RBI and 141 runs scored were well above the rest of the field here as well as his fielding percentage +/- differential.   His speed and range weren't too shabby either.  He also played some infield as well which gives him the versatility of a Pete Rose. 

Now to the managers.  I've compiled a list of what I consider to be the 21 greatest skippers in the history of the game.  15 of them are already in the Hall of Fame as managers.  6 are either current managers or managers who I feel will one day get elected to the HOF.  There's about 5 managers who nearly made my list, but I had to make the cut-off somewhere.   My apologies go out to Lou Pineilla, Mike Scoscia, Dick Howser, Jim Leyland and Davy Johnson.   I also made my list and neglected winning percentage.   I'm sorry about that but I did list their win/loss record.   Do the math if you want to.   I'll do a blog entry in one week to annouce the winning manager with the complete roster of the All-Time team.   Here's the list....

Walter Alston.   Bkln/LAN 1954-76.  Won 2040 Lost 1613.  7 Pennants, 4 WS titles.

Sparky Anderson.   CinN 1970-78, DetAL 79-95.  Won 2194 Lost 1834.  5 Pennants, 3 WS titles.

Leo Durocher.    Bkln/NL 1939-46, 48, NYG NL 48-55, ChC NL 66-72, Hou NL 72-73.  2008 Wins 1709 Losses.  3 Pennants, 1 WS title.

Ned Hanlon.   BalNL 1889-1907, Also CinNL, Bkln NL, Pit NL.  Won 1313 Lost 1164.  5 Pennants.

Bucky Harris.   Wash AL 1924-28, 35-42, 50-54, Det AL 29-33, Bos AL 1934, Phi NL 43, NYY AL 47-48.  Won 2157 Lost 2218.  3 Pennants, 2 WS titles. 

Miller Huggins.  StL NL 1913-17, NYY AL 18-29.  Won 1413 Lost 1134.  6 Pennants, 3 WS titles.

Tommy Lasorda.   LAD NL 1976-96.  Won 1599 Lost 1439.  4 Pennants, 2 WS titles.

Al Lopez.   Cle AL 1951-56, CWS AL 57-65, 68-69,  Won 1410, Lost 1004.  2 Pennants. 

Connie Mack.   PIT NL 1894-96, Phi AL 1901-50.  3731-3948.  9 Pennants, 5 WS titles.

Joe McCarthy.   ChC NL 1926-30, NYY AL 31-46, Bos AL 48-50.  Won 2125 Lost 1333.  9 Pennants, 7 WS titles.

John McGraw.   Bal NL 1899-1902, NYG NL 02-32.  Won 2763 Lost 1948.  11 Pennants, 3 WS titles.

Bill McKechnie.  New FL 1915, Pit NL 22-26, StL NL 28-29, Bos NL 30-37, Cin NL 38-46.  Won 1896 Lost 1723.  4 Pennants, 2 WS titles.

Frank Selee.   Bos NL 1890-1901, ChC NL 02-05.   Won 1284 Lost 862.  5 Pennants. 

Casey Stengel.   Bkln NL 1934-36, Bos NL 38-43, NYY AL 49-60, NYM NL 62-65.  Won 1905 Lost 1842.  10 Pennants, 7 WS titles.

Earl Weaver.   Bal AL 1968-82, 85-86.  Won 1480 Lost 1060.  4 Pennants, 1 WS title.

Whitey Herzog.   Tex AL 1973, Cal 1974, KCR AL 75-79, StL NL 80-90.  Won 1281 Lost 1125.  3 Pennants.  1 WS title.

Bobby Cox.   Atl NL 1978-81, 90-present, TOR AL 82-85.  Won 2359 Lost 1888.  5 Pennants, 1 WS title.

Joe Torre.   NYM NL 1977-81, Atl NL 82-84. StL NL 90-95, NYY AL 96-2007, LAD NL 08-present.  Won 2196 Lost 1873.  6 Pennants, 4 WS titles.

Tony LaRussa.   CWS AL 1979-86, Oak AL 86-95, StL NL 96-present.  Won 2500 Lost 2178.  5 Pennants, 2 WS titles.

Dick Williams.   Bos AL 1967-69, Oak AL 71-73, Cal AL 74-76, Mont NL 77-81, SDP NL 82-85, SEA AL 86-88.  Won 1571 Lost 1451.  4 Pennants, 2 WS titles.

Billy Martin.   MIN AL 1969, Det AL 71-73, Tex AL 73-75, NYY AL 75-79, 83, 85, 88, Oak AL 80-82.  Won 1253 Lost 1013.  3 Pennants, 2 WS titles.  

As a footnote, I just want to remind everyone that the first World Series was played in 1903, so managers before 1903 could not earn a WS title.   Just a reminder when you judge them.    

Enjoy the blog and the vote.  You should find this as difficult to choose as any of the players!   

Hello everyone, its time to put us together the best pitching staff on the planet.  I'm going to ask you all to vote for your top 7 starting pitchers of all time.   I'm going to put 10 pitchers on my all time team.  The 5 man starting rotation will be the 5 pitchers who receive the most votes here and the 6th and 7th place finishers will be bullpen pitchers.   Next weeks vote, I'll ask you to vote in the last 3 pitchers on my all time staff out of a list of the greatest relievers of all time.  The reason for the 7/3 split in pitching is because of a much greater pool of starting pitchers than relievers.  

Before we get to the list of starters, its time to announce who the greatest right fielder of all time is according to the voters.  Thanks to CBS featuring my blog for a second straight week, once again I received a great volume of responses, so thank you CBS and thank you baseball fans.  Babe Ruth was the runaway winner by garnering 36 of the 62 votes cast.  Hammering Hank Aaron finished second with 11 votes, Roberto Clemente was third with 6 votes and Al Kaline finished 4th with 3 votes.  Frank Robinson, Reggie Jackson and Tony Gwynn all received 2 votes each.   Thank you to all who voted and extra special thanks for all the great talking points that were made to support your choices.  Had I voted, I would have to concur whole heartedly with those of you who picked Ruth.  He was a man among boys at the highest level until he was joined by teammate Lou Gehrig.   The fact that he hit more homers than every other TEAM in the AL TWICE is simply insane.  He was the pioneer of taking MLB out of the dead ball era into its golden age.  To me, he's more than the greatest right fielder of all time, he's the greatest player ever!

Several of you have asked about having a DH on my all time team.  I'm not going to do a separate DH position for this team.   After we're through picking the pitchers we'll vote for 3 reserve infielders and then 3 reserve outfielders.   Then after we're finished voting the all time team, I thought we'ld do a final vote for a manager for this all planet team.   

Now that all the position players have been determined,  here are the starting 8 position players for my all time team...

C - Johnny Bench
1B - Lou Gehrig
2B - Rogers Hornsby
3B - George Brett
SS - Honus Wagner
LF - Ted Williams
CF - Willie Mays
RF - Babe Ruth

2 bench players have already been chosen.  Josh Gibson is the reserve catcher and Pete Rose was voted as an all time bench player due to his versatility.     

Now we get to the task at hand.  I have compiled a list of the 60 greatest starting pitchers of all time.  The first 51 listed are all in the hall of fame and the final 9 listed are either still active, recently retired or deserving, but not in the hall of fame.   I am not including defensive stats on pitchers because I can't think of a single pitcher who gained his fame on his great fielding alone, they get their fame for getting batters out and winning games.   The only new stat that I threw in was the ERA+ stat which is used by some statisticians to help grade pitchers by taking in account of the eras they played in, ball park conditions, whether they pitched in a DH league or not and other factors that may affect a pitchers ERA.  The reason I'm getting this entry out a day late is that I had this just about finished, I was on the 59th pitcher of the 60th listed when I lost the whole kit and kaboodle.   Over 2 hours of typing down the drain.  So here's my second go around at this.   Without further ado, here is the list.   Please remember to vote for 7.  If you want to list them in an order, thats fine, but all votes only count for one vote.  If you can only pick out 5 or 6, that fine, but you're allowed to vote for as many as 7.  Here is the list.....

PITCHER                                 GAMES      STARTS       WINS      LOSSES     ERA      ERA+      WHIP      STRIKEOUTS      WALKS

Grover Alexander                      696          600             373        208          2.56     +135      1.121       2198                951
Chief Bender                            459          384             212        127          2.46     +112      1.113       1711                712
Mordecai Brown                         481          332             239        130          2.06     +138      1.066       1375                673
Jim Bunning                             591          519             224        184          3.27     +114      1.179       2855                1000
Steve Carlton                           741          709             329        244          3.22      +115      1.247       4136               1833
Jack Chesbro                           392           332             198        132          2.68      +110     1.150       1265                690
John Clarkson                          531           518             328        178          2.81     +134      1.209       1978               1191 
Stan Coveleski                         450           385             215        142          2.89     +127      1.251       981                  802
Dizzy Dean                               317           230            150         83           3.02     +130      1.206       1163                453
Don Drysdale                            518           465            209         166         2.95      +121      1.148       2486                855
Red Faber                                669           483            254         213          3.15     +119      1.302       1471                1213
Bob Feller                                 570           484            266         162         3.25      +122      1.316       2581                1764
Whitey Ford                              498           438            236         106          2.75      +133     1.215       1956                1086
Pud Galvin                                697           682            360         308          2.87      +107     1.191       1806                745
Bob Gibson                               528           482            251         174          2.91      +127     1.188       3117                1336
Lefty Gomez                             368            320           189         102          3.34      +125     1.352        1468               1095
Lefty Grove                               616           457            300         141          3.06      +148     1.278        2266               1187
Carl Hubbell                              535           431            253         154          2.98      +130     1.166       1677                725
Catfish Hunter                           500           476            224         166          3.26      +104     1.134       2012                954
Fergie Jenkins                           664           594            284         226          3.34      +115     1.142       3192                997
Walter Johnson                         802           666            417          279          2.17      +147     1.061       3509               1363
Addie Joss                                286           260            160          97           1.89      +142     0.968        920                 364
Tim Keefe                                 599           593            342         225          2.62      +127     1.121        2543               1234
Sandy Koufax                            397           314            165         87            2.76      +131     1.106        2396               817
Bob Lemon                               460            350            207         128          3.23      +119     1.337        1277               1251
Juan Marichal                            471            457            243         142          2.89      +123     1.101        2303               709
Rube Marquard                          536            404           201          177         3.08       +103     1.237       1593               858
Christy Mathewson                     635            551           373          188         2.13       +135     1.059        2502               844
Joe McGinnity                            465            381           246          142         2.66       +120     1.188        1068               812
Hal Newhouser                           488            374           207          150         3.06       +130     1.311        1796              1249
Kid Nichols                                620             561           361         208          2.95       +140     1.222       1868               1268
Phil Niekro                                864             716           318         274          3.35       +115     1.268       3342               1809
Jim Palmer                               558             521           268         152          2.86       +126     1.180       2212               1311
Gaylord Perry                            777             690           314         265          3.11        +117    1.181       3534               1379
Eddie Plank                              623             529           326          194         2.35        +122     1.119       2246              1072
Old Hoss Radbourne                  528             503           309          195         2.67        +119     1.149      1830                875
Eppa Rixey                               692             553            266          251         3.15        +115     1.272      1350               1082
Robin Roberts                           676             609           286          245         3.41        +113     1.170       2357               902
Amos Rusie                              462             427           245          174         3.07        +129     1.350        1934              1704
Nolan Ryan                               807             773           324          292         3.19        +111     1.247       5714              2795
Tom Seaver                              656             647           311          205         2.86        +127     1.121        3640             1390
Warren Spahn                           750             665           363          245         3.09        +118     1.195       2583              1434
Don Sutton                               774             756           324          256         3.26         +108     1.142       3574              1343
Dazzy Vance                             442             347           197          140         3.24         +125     1.230       2045              840
Rube Waddell                           407             340           193          143         2.16         +135     1.102       2316              803
Ed Walsh                                  430             315           195          126         1.82         +146     1.000       1736              617  
Mickey Welch                            564             549           307          210         2.71         +114     1.225       1850              1297
Vic Willis                                   513             471           249          205         2.63         +118     1.209       1651              1212
Early Wynn                               691             612           300           244         3.54         +107     1.329       2334              1775
Cy Young                                 906             815           511           316         2.63         +138     1.130       2803              1217
Bert Blyleven                            692             685           287           250         3.31         +118     1.198       3701              1322
Roger Clemens                         709             707          354           184         3.12         +143      1.173      4672              1580
Tom Glavine                             682             682           305          203         3.54          +118     1.314       2607             1500
Randy Johnson                         605             595           298          164         3.29          +136     1.172       4838            1485 
Greg Maddux                            744             740           355          227         3.16          +132      1.143      3371             999
Pedro Martinez                          467             400           214          99           2.91          +154     1.051      3117             752
Mike Mussina                            537             536           270          153         3.68          +123     1.192       2813           785 
Curt Schilling                            569             436           216          146          3.46          +127     1.137      3116           711
John Smoltz                             708             466           210          147          3.26          +127     1.170      3011           992

Thats the list folks, enjoy.  I'm sorry if I left off a favorite of yours.  I did leave 5 hall of famers off this list as I felt they had no chance of garnering any votes, but since they are HOFers, I'll give them mention.  They are Jesse Haines, Waite Hoyt, Ted Lyons, Herb Pennock and Red Ruffing.   I know the decisions will be hard here, but just remember, it took me many hours to put this list together and then post it here.   Your votes are very appreciated!