Continuing with the all time team

So, it turns out that the "month long" project I figured would be a breeze was actually... well... it took a lot longer and a LOT more effort than I thought it would. As such, I'm going to admit defeat, and quickly run through the entirety of the team in a very long-winded post.

Then, hopefully I can get back to posting here more regularly.

Without further ado.. here is the full roster of my all-time favorite team:

My starting lineup

• 2b- Luis Castillo- I wrote about him here.
• C- Jason Kendall- I wrote about him here.
• 1b- Scott Hatteburg- This one hasn't been published, and may take a bit of explaining. If you read Moneyball, you know the story. He was a quality catcher who blew out his arm. He learned to play 1b, and got pretty good at it. Also, he got on base. A lot. That makes him the perfect guy to hit in front of:
• SS- Nomar Garciaparra- Who else? There is only one player who personified Redsox baseball the way Nomar did (hint, that one guy is my staff ace). No one was more electric in Fenway, and the way he treated fans was amazing (He signed a ball for my kid cousin for me, and seemed generally happy to do it). The end of his Red Sox career was always a bit of a tragedy, with him getting run out of Boston, but seeing him start a second act as an announcer has been great.
• RF- Mark Kotsay- There is a little bit of Billy Beane bias in my choices, but Kotsay makes it for another reason. His throwing arms was a freaking cannon. On the MLB games on XBOX or Playstation, I always put this guy in RF, and hoped runner would try to run against him. Cannon aside, this was a guy who was good for a .800 OPS, double digits in steals and HR, defense around the field (including CF and 1b, which was a weird, but awesome thing if you fantasy team separated OF by where they play). I'm a fan.
• CF- Mike Cameron- Take everything I said about about Kotsay (except the Billy Beane thing), make him right handed. add in a few Gold Gloves in CF and an infectious love of the game, and you have my number 6 hitter.
• Bill Mueller- Dave Roberts stole the base... but it was Mueller who drove him in.
• LF- Coco Crisp- I love watching this guy play. Sense of humor? Check. Great name? Well yeah. He is a threat to hit a HR, steal a base, and on yeah.. the defensive outfield in 2007 with he and Ellsbury was absurd.

Please note, my pitcher would hit 8th in this lineup, putting Crisp and Castillo in front of Kendall. If you've read Kendall's book, you know two things: 1- Kendall has incredible bat control and can take advantage of these guys being on base. 2- Kendall may or may not be illiterate*.

Moving to the rotation.

• SP1- Yeah, it's Pedro. The right arm of God. The guy who legitimately had the best Fastball, Change up and Curve ball in baseball... all at the same time. The Yankees were his daddy for a bit, but this guy was a warrior, and between he and Nomar, kept me a Sox fan for a long, long time.
• SP2- Mark Buehrle- This guy just goes out, and gives his team a chance to win every game. The stories about his quick pace of pitching and how much his infielders love playing behind him have been written over and over and over again. Just like Buehrle has thrown 200 IP over and over and over again. Rumors circulated that he is considering retirement after this year. I know he's unlikely to be enshrined in Cooperstown, but man, I loved watching his guy work.
• SP3- Derek Lowe- The D Lowe Face become a meme before there was such a thing, but in reality, this guy was amazing. Nevermind the heroics of 2004 (thanks for winning every clinching game... kind of a big deal)... or the perfect pitch to Terrence Long a year earlier... This was a guy who can pitch for me any time.
• SP4- Scott Kazmir- It isn't because he was traded away in a deal that literally everyone in baseball mocked. It is because his stuff, when on, was some of the filthiest I've ever seen. Add on the fact that he managed to survive an injury, reinventing himself to come back effective, and I'm a fan.
• SP5- Tim Wakefield- I wrote about him previously.

Onto the Bullpen

• Keith Foulke is my closer. He (literally) gave his right arm for the 2004 Red Sox. That's all.
• Randy Myers-Somehow, Randy Myers will always be the guy who got me interested in the machination of baseball personnel movement... perhaps because he was dominant and literally given away all at once. A member of the Nasty Boys, and a flame thrower. I loved this guy.
• Scot Shields- This guy seems like a weird fit, but from 2004-2006, this guy rolled into games, throwing 2 inning every time, and shutting down everyone he faced. I like National League ball (notice there's no DH up in my lineup?), and think having a guy that can pitch 2 quality innings at a time out of the bullpen is worth its weight in gold.
• Let's get the All-Myers LHP out of the way. Mike Myers was an amazing pitcher. Yes.. he didn't throw a ton of innings, and yeah, he was only good against LHH... but my god... he was AMAZING against LHH!
• The 5th arm in my pen should be a guy who can throw a quality inning when called on, and Todd Coffey is my guy. Watching him come out of the bullpen was one of the greatest sites in baseball, and from a fantasy baseball perspective, it seemed like there was a period when he could steal the Wins category in pitching (this isn't exactly true... but he had a few seasons where he was vulturing a half dozen wins).
• Bronson Arroyo- This is cheating, but in terms of a long reliever, I feel like it should be a guy who was claimed off waivers, expected to be a bit of a contributor, and somehow ended up being better than expected. Curt Schilling named him Saturn Nuts, and yeah.. he's a guy I've always loved watching pitch (odd motion, throws slop... He's a craft righty... and it makes no sense... and I can't get enough of it).
• My final pitcher is Micah Owings. He is the last man out of the pen, hits the ball OK, and can be an important chess piece managers can use through the game. As the 25th man on a roster (especially in the Senior Circuit)... this guy is amazing).

Finally, the bench. A brief note here... Kotsay and Hatteburg may get platoon partners, which would make sense, and I also want to have a couple of bats who can play well as pinch hitters:

• Eli Marrero- Since Jason Kendall plays more than any catcher ever, I don't need a great backup catcher, meaning Marrero is a perfect fit. A near 800 OPS vs LHP for his career, (Hattebuerg Platoon), the flexibility to play anywhere in the field (and a seemingly unhuman ability to be unaffected by the lack of routine).. this guy deserves a spot on my roster.
• Erik Hinske- Told you I wanted a professional pinch hitter.. and this guy is that. And he's an amazing good luck charm (4 years in the playoffs as a bench player... with 2 World Series Championships).
• At this point, every position is already backed up... so it is on to finding specialists. Pokey Reese is one such guy. He's a gold glove caliber defender at SS and 2b (and I do have a ground ball pitcher in my rotation), and a quality pinch runner.
• This one may have Sox fansa asking me to turn in my Red Sox Nation membership card, but you know something... Akinori Iwamura was a heck of a player. I know he was a pest, but I always felt like his attitude (spiking Pedroia included) was helpful in making the Rays into the team that went from awful to great overnight. Throw in that he's a second LH hitter on my bench, and one that can play a couple positions, and I'm sold.
• Ryan Freel- There was a time when you'd log into the Yahoo Fantasy website, and Freel could be a LF, RF, CF, 2b and 3b. As a behch player who was always in, he could single-handedly win you the SB category, and while his splits were generally neutral, he can be a platoon partner for Kotsay.

So that's it... the list I've been meaning to write about for almost a year.

It's funny, because the players on the list have sort of become my archetype for each spot in a batting order... a leadoff hitter who gets on a ton and swipes bases (Ben Revere?) or a number 4 hitter who sprays liners all over the field (as opposed to hitting 40 HR's). Tons of athleticism (is there any doubt that roster above would lead the league in SB's?).

Same on the pitching front. A dominant number 1, coupled with a set of innings eaters, a guy with the potential to be a number one any time out, and an "old reliable." A bullpen with a guy who can throw more than 1 important inning (my Jeurys Familia man-crush grows every day), a Loogy, a quality RHP and LHP, a closer and a long man.

Heck, even the 25th man on the roster being a guy who can help in a variety of ways (I can't think of a current comp to Owings... so I'd probably put Pat Venditte in there if I were building a roster from active players).

Thanks for reading this. *Just kidding... sort of.

Sean Marshall and a Broken Strat

Sometimes as baseball fans, we get to see something strange.

Take, for example, this 2009 game in which relief pitch Sean Marshall came in to face a hitter, then went to the OF for a hitter, and then came back to get the next hitter.

This past year, I tried the same maneuver in a Strat-O-Matic game, and found that... well, I think I found a glitch.

Everything started off well. My left handed pitcher came in and got the first out (against a LH hitter). I then put him into the OF, bringing up a RH/RH matchup, which got the second out. Then, bringing the lefty pitcher back to the mound something weird happened. The Strat-O-Matic game decided he was tired*.

Later in the season, my team losing by a lot, my DH was hit by a pitch, and was going to miss the rest of the game. Rather than worrying about putting in a with any talent, I decided to sub in a pitcher to run (I was planning to roll him out to start the next inning anyway). When the next inning started, the pitcher who'd just pinch run was tired.

It got me thinking.

Does Strat-O-Matic baseball baby pitchers in ways that we hadn't considered? Does a hangnail place them on the DL? Is the long run from 1st to 2nd enough to tire them out?

More likely... did I discover a glitch in the programming (and would it have been the same if my strat league played by real rules National League rules?

I thought it was an interesting finding to share, and a possible oddity in Strat-O-Matic.

*For anyone who doesn't play Strat, tired pitchers don't do well. At all.