1B - Nate Colbert or John Mayberry 3B - Eddie Matthews OF - Bobby Abreu, Tommy Davis, Tommie Agee, not sure if Rusty Staub would qualify Back up catcher, Tony Pena Utility man Ben Zobrist Add Claude Osteen and Mike Cuellar to the rotation and Mike Marshall as closer
Let’s also take a moment to cherish the only pefect game thrown in World Series history by our own Don Larsen.
Anybody else making the trek to Cooperstown this year? Our own Chipper Jones and Jim Thome just got elected.
Interesting that Realmuto was actually a good framer in the minors, then when got to the Marlins he slowly improved back to where he was migrating from -15.7 runs to -9 runs to +6 last season. He's also shown superior pop time far below the league average at 1.867 seconds (the league average was 1.975). So if we do get him we're getting a good framer and a powerful arm. Not to mention the speed and some bat to ball skills.
The proof! I've been saying the dude isn't really slow he's just so wide he looks slow. Thanks for the post I'm gonna win some free beer now.
There were a couple games last year when McCann got on and I really thought Hinch should have pinch-run Gattis for McCann given their pretty significant difference in speed, and given that Gattis could easily take over the next inning's catching duties. Another Astro who is heavy-set but runs well for his size is Tyler White. I don't think Statcast has measured him speed running the bases yet, but I bet he is pretty close to the MLB average of 27 ft/sec. He went through a spell of stealing bases pretty successfully at Fresno last year but then he started getting called out at 2nd so he eased off his "running game". Nice to see him trying though.
If the run is that important, then they would pinch run someone faster than Gattis. Their difference over 180 feet (2 bases) is about 1 second which in close plays is indeed significant. Hinch has to weigh burning his backup catcher for the possibility that a one second difference may come into play. I am absolutely 100% sure that Hinch thinks about that every time it is important and makes a truly informed decision.
I agree that usually Hinch would be better off using someone else as a pinch runner. There were only a couple of instances last season where I thought Gattis should have pinch run for McCann and those were cases where the other bench players had already been committed to the game, or were for some reason unavailable (ejected, injured...). There was one game, I'm sure many on this board will remember it, in which McCann made the final out of the game on a close call running from first to second. Had Gattis been running instead, as I seem to recall the tying or winning run would have scored and the inning would have continued. Of course one more win in the regular season wouldn't have changed the postseason picture, but my point is simply that speed is something nice to have, especially in a tight postseason game, and unusually slow runners like McCann can in some circumstances be a major handicap.
Folks, we have a 25-man roster from the names that have been submitted. Starters C our own Ivan Rodriguez 1B our own Nate Colbert 2B our own Nellie Fox SS our own Rafael Ramirez 3B our own Eddie Matthews OF our own Bobby Abreu OF our own Tommie Agee OF our own Tommy Davis Rotation SP our own Randy Johnson SP our own Dwight Gooden SP our own Robin Roberts SP our own Don Sutton SP our own Curt Schilling Bench C our own Tony Pena IF/OF our own Ben Zobrist IF our own Buddy Bell IF our own John Mayberry IF our own Vinny Castilla IF our own Miguel Tejada Bullpen P our own Mike Marshall P our own Don Larsen P our own Johan Santana P our own Claude Osteen P our own Mike Cuellar P our own Sid Fernandez Coaching Staff our own Bill Virdon our own Leo Durocher our own Yogi Berra
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/l/loftoke01.shtml 79 glorious plate appearances... the year before he finished 2nd in RoY voting and proceeded to lead the AL in steals 5 straight years.