Okay, fellas, that seemed to go well, but now let's get down to it for real. This time around, you need an entire team:
* 8 starting position players
* 1 DH
* 5 starting pitchers
* 6 relievers (bonus credit: designate long relief, setup man, & closer)
* 5 bench players (preferred mix: backup C, utility IF, PH/corner IF, 4th OF/defensive sub, PR/5th OF)
* manager, bench coach, hitting coach, pitching coach, 1b coach, 3b coach
Offense counts, defense counts, baserunning counts -- everything counts.
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12 comments:
Ok, here we go:
Starters:
C: Fisk
1B: Yaz
2B: Doerr
3B: Boggs
SS: Nomah
LF: Williams
CF: DiMaggio
RF: Evans
DH: Rice
SP:
Clemens
Pedro
Joe Wood
Tiant
Ferriss
RP:
Papelbon
Campbell
Stanley (that's right suckas)
Kinder
El Guapo
Radatz (Closer-- he'd eat paps for breakfast)
(I don;lt think I have a lefty-- feh, I don't believe in that crap- while I'm at it, if anyone bunts on my team they're benched).
Bench:
C: Varitek
UI: Remy
PH/3B/1B: Malzone
OF: Lynn
OF: Speaker
Manager: Tito
Bench Coach: Morgan
Hitting Coach: Easler
Pitching Coach: Bill Fischer
1B Coach: Muggsy Allenson (I know he was a 3B coach, I just need him in there)
3B Coach: Zimmer (Go! No!)
My shot (pretty similar, but I'm not sure if we're talking career or best single-season):
C Fisk
1b Jimmie Foxx
2b Doerr
3b Boggs
SS Nomar (before the wrist problem)
LF Yaz
CF Freddy Lynn
RF Rice (1977-79)
DH Teddy Ballgame
SP Pedro, Clemens, Wood, Parnell, Hurst
RP Paps (closer), Radatz, Kinder, Burgmeier, Dutch Leonard, Derek Lowe (when he was a long man)
Bench: Varitek, Billy Goodman, Jackie Jensen, Speaker, Joe Cronin
Manager: Tito
Bench Coach: Brad Mills
Hitting Coach: Ron Jackson
Pitching Coach: Joe Kerrigan
1b coach: Tommy Harper
3b coach: Six, Two, and Even
My club:
1B Foxx
2B Doerr
3B Boggs
SS Petrocelli
LF Williams
CF Speaker
RF Rice
DH Ortiz
Bench
MI Nomar
CI Yaz
OF Manny
OF Damon (More of a motivator than Lynn)
C Varitek
SP
Cy Young
Clemens
Martinez
Ruth
Wood
RP
Papelbon (Closer)
Moret (long relief)
Lyle
Foulke
Eckersley (is that cheating?)
Radatz
Manager: Dick Williams
Bench: Joe Morgan
Hitting: Dave Magadan
Pitching: Farrell
1B: Johnny Pesky
3B: Wendell Kim - swing those arms
Warren -- I'll give you Eck in the pen. Did you mean to have Fisk as the starting C?
Can't believe you went there with Wendell. Dang.
Tim, yes Fisk is the catcher. Catching is probably the weakest position on the team, historically to me. I couldn't find many worthy candidates other than Fisk and Tek. I found the much maligned Wendell to be fairly amusing with his waving arms. He was pretty respected when he was with the Giants, I recall.
OK, I'm WAY late due to my travels, but I'm doing this without reading anyone else's lineups, so apologies if repetitive. My philosophy was to take the best of the best over a set period of time with the Sox for 5+ years and that those were productive years during their career. For OFs I put them where I think they could play even if not their position with the Sox. Also did this with my father on the phone and we debated present versus past a great deal.
Starting Lineup:
Ted Williams, LF
Wade Boggs, 3B
Manny Ramirez, DH (sorry Papi)
Jimmy Foxx, 1B
Carl Yastrezmski, CF (Not ideal)
Jim Rice, RF
Bobby Doerr, 2B
Nomar Garciaparra, SS
Carlton Fisk, C
Starting Rotation:
Cy Young (I mean, come on)
Roger Clemens (Throwing up in mouth)
Pedro Martinez (If we could have only had 3 more years of Pedey)
Mel Parnell (My father would not budge)
Lefty Grove (5th b/c he ended his career in Boston)
Bullpen (3 pitchers max):
Dick "The Monster" Radatz
Jonathan Pabelpon (go, look it up)
Sparky Lyle (even if he left for NYY)
Bob Stanley (you can't get around it)
*And b/c Radatz is in the bullpen we don't need any more.
Bench:
Fred Lynn, OF
Tris Speaker, OF
Mo Vaugh, IF
Jason Varitek, C
Kevin Millar, Jack Daniel's Supplier
Manager: Terry Francona
Bench Coach: Joe Morgan
Hitting Coach: Mike Easler
Pitching Coach: Radatz will do this too
1B Coach: Bill Buckner (Cause I have a sense of humor)
3B Coach: Grady Little (cause I have a sick sense of humor)
Okay Timmy boy, here we go...
C - Jason Varitek. Yes, Fisk was better offensively but 'Tek won two World Series. Post season always trumps regular season.
1B - Jimmie Foxx
2B - Dustin Pedroia. Yes ,this is controversial pick as Doerr is the odds on favorite. Trust me on this one. Pedroia's the guy.
3B - Boggs. Putz, or no putz, he was damn good offensively and defensively.
SS - Nomahhhhhh
LF - Ted Williams
RF - Dwight Evans
CF - Tris Speaker (yes, obvious pandering to Walker here)
DH - Manny Ramirez
Starting 5
Pedro
Babe Ruth
Clemens
Curt Schilling (remember, post season counts for a lot)
Cy Young
Bullpen
Radatz
Papelbon
Stanley
Foulke (in '04 in particular)
Lee Smith
Bench
Manny
Fisk
Doerr
Tommy Harper (speed)
Coco Crisp
Coach
Tito
A lot of good responses so far... I'm not sure I have a lot to add, but here goes:
C Fisk
1B Foxx
2B Doerr
3B Boggs
SS Nomar
LF Williams
CF Lynn
RF Evans
DH Manny
Comments: I tried to stay true to my picks from Tim's all-time batting order question, but the thought of having Manny as the DH and still have Williams, Lynn & Evans in the OF makes me giddy.
SPs:
Pedro
Clemens
Young
Wood
Ruth
Comments: Imagine having Ruth on the bench to pinch hit during off days... not a bad option.
RPs:
Radatz
Eck
Papelbon
Lyle
Stanley
Wakefield
Comments: I just love the thought of throwing Wake out there for an inning or two between Eck and Paps. The hitters would be twisted up like pretzels.
Bench:
Speaker
Varitek
Remy
Ellsbury
DiMaggio
Comments: I just deleted Jim Rice to make the #... can't believe he's not on there, but I'm sticking with this crew.
Manager: Francona
Bench: Mills
Pitching: Bill Lee
Hitting: Hriniak
1st & 3rd: Two of the players who aren't playing that day (little league rules).
Loving these rosters, guys -- and especially the Speaker shout from Aaron.
That said, Aaron, it would be hard for me to disagree more strongly with your explanation about Varitek over Fisk. If we're talking about starting pitchers (Schilling) or workhorse playoff relievers (Rivera), I'll at least entertain the idea that there's a special quality to postseason performance that makes a huge difference between players.
But in this case we're talking about two catchers, either of whom would be hitting well down in this lineup, both of whom handled pitchers well, both of whom were good teammates. (Right? Educate me if I've missed something about Fisk.)
Put it another way: it's not Fisk's fault that the Reds beat the Sox in that Series, and it's not *all* to Tek's credit that the Sox won in '04 and '07. Unless you're talking about Bench's role in the Big Red Machine, the catcher's spot just isn't *that* important, and Tek's two rings shouldn't be used as a trump card to select him ahead of a superior player.
In my humble opinion. ; )
Not much new ground to cover here, but here's my list:
Starters:
C: Fisk
1B: Yastrzemski
2B: Doerr
3B: Boggs
SS: Garciaparra
LF: Williams
CF: Lynn
RF: Evans
DH: Rice
SP:
Clemens
Pedro
Lonborg
Tiant
Hurst
RP:
Campbell
Papelbon
Eckersley
Lowe
SU: Radatz
CP: Gordon (of the late 90’s vintage)
Tough choice Gordon over Radatz, but I'm saying it.
Bench:
C: Varitek
UI: Remy
PH: Ortiz
OF: DiMaggio
OF: Piersall
Manager: Francona
Bench: Dick Williams
Hitting Coach: Ron Jackson
Pitching Coach: Bill Lee
Comments: As I said, not a lot of new ground covered here. I love the combo of Francona & Dick Williams. This could be the ultimate good cop, bad cop scenario. If Manny made the team, it would've been interesting. He did not, so don't need to worry about that problem.
Some of these selections (Gordon, Lonborg) were very good for shorter stretches than others, but there's some gray area in these lists always. I don't think I saw a Jimmy Piersall on anyone's list. Gotta have one guy (besides Bill Lee) who's a loose cannon, and he also happens to be one of the greatest outfielders we've ever had by all accounts.
It's tough to have Yaz at first, but you have to defer to Ted in left. I'd have loved to work Bill Mueller in here somewhere, but we'll just say he's special assistant to the GM or something. And I agree w/ Doug...Radatz would pwn Papelbon.
As far as base coaches go, I don't think I have enough of an opinion on that to say anything other than Not Sveum and Not Kim.
Agree w/ Tim about vtek vs. Fisk. Interesting also that very few players from '04 & '07 make my list. And NOBODY in the starting lineup!
[Grumpy Old Fan] "I don't like things now compared to the way they used to be...farble-dy floooo!" [/Grumpy Old Fan]
IMHO, Derek's "Grumpy Old Fan" moment makes this whole experiment worth it. I'm just feeling a lot of goodness right now.
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