Big weekend for fans of the obscure back and forth sports in America the World Cup begins and the Stanley Cup continues, I for one am excited, coupled with the fact that Visio ate my Information Architecture project that was due for delivery today (now pushed) I’m outta here for the weekend, in honor of my lack of time to devote to the minutiae of the week Like Jason Schmidt matching a 102 year old team strikeout record I’m going to have to go to the steamer trunk and break out some old stuff to keep the site somewhat fresh.
Therefore I’m going to post a Reds piece I wrote last year on the teams Shortstop legacy, so enjoy that and the fact that a record for team strikouts can stretch over 102 years and a whole country, that’s part of what makes baseball so damn special.
Being a Cincinnati fan you can’t be anything but aware that the Reds have had essentially 4 shortstops since 1950. From 1950-2004 sixty-seven men have played shortstop for the Reds, a total of 8680 games.
The amazing fact within this fact is that 80% of those games were played by only four men, equally amazing is 51% of them were played by only two men.
Spoiled is the Reds fan in his shortstop history, but how spoiled are we?
Here are the American League and National League games leaders for shortstops since 1950.
GAMES G AVG OBA SLG 1 Luis Aparicio 2599 .262 .311 .343 2 Cal Ripken 2381 .277 .345 .454 3 Alan Trammell 2293 .285 .352 .415 4 Bert Campaneris 2213 .258 .310 .342 5 Omar Vizquel 2138 .275 .341 .358 6 Mark Belanger 1962 .227 .300 .280 7 Ozzie Guillen 1818 .264 .285 .338 8 Ed Brinkman 1812 .224 .280 .300 9 Robin Yount 1549 .286 .331 .427 10 Greg Gagne 1524 .254 .299 .387 GAMES G AVG OBA SLG 1 Ozzie Smith 2573 .262 .337 .328 2 Dave Concepcion 2300 .267 .322 .359 3 Larry Bowa 2247 .260 .300 .320 4 Barry Larkin 2180 .295 .371 .444 5 Roy McMillan 2093 .243 .314 .321 6 Garry Templeton 2047 .272 .305 .369 7 Chris Speier 1960 .246 .326 .345 8 Dick Groat 1929 .286 .330 .366 9 Bill Russell 1911 .266 .312 .337 10 Don Kessinger 1852 .253 .315 .313
1500 appears to be the benchmark for extreme longevity at the SS position, with 2000 being the number achieved by the upper echelon.
In the AL you have 5 players with 2000 games started at shortstop, in the NL you have 6 players, the AL has 3 players who started at least 2000 of their games with one team. In the AL Ripken, Vizquel and Trammel hold that honor and in the NL Concepcion and Larkin can make claim to it as well. In modern MLB history there have been a total of 18 men who logged 2000 appearances at shortstop, 72% of them appeared after World War 2 and 3 of them were Reds. (Roy McMillan split his games amongst 3 teams, 1348 as a Red)
It was McMillan who began the string in 1951 when he appeared in 85 games for the Reds, from 1952-1958 he played in over 145 games at the shortstop position for the Reds.
In 1960 Leo Cardenas appeared in Cincinnati that season he shared the SS duties with Roy and his play must have convinced Bill DeWitt to move ahead with his first deal as the new Reds owner that winter when flipped McMillan to the Braves Jay and Pizarro in December of 1960.
1157 games later the Reds entered the 1969 season and experienced the first year in 18 seasons that McMillan or Cardenas didn’t man the shortstop position.
In the last full season at Crosley and the first full season of division play, the Reds split the position amongst 2 players with Chico Ruiz getting some time there as well. Not the most stellar group they posted below average fielding numbers and did nothing to further solidified a position that was a noted weakness prior to the start of the season.
GAMES G A E PCT 1 Woody Woodward 93 248 14 .966 2 Darrel Chaney 91 191 17 .947 3 Chico Ruiz 29 58 1 .989 4 Tommy Helms 4 3 0 1.000
The position wasn’t buoyed by the .233/.308/.277 line they produced as a group, and Chic Ruiz probably left the greatest impression that season when he “play” attacked Chief Noc-A-Homa in a mock Indian raid that found the Reds shortstop being flipped by the mascot, much to the amusement of all the Reds who revealed in his antics.
Two months later Chico was an Angel and the Reds were talking internally of counting on a youngster named Dave Concepcion. It took a couple of years for Davey to fully grab the job (a common SS occurrence is slow growth) and when he did grab it he held on tight and stayed long enough to watch both Pete and Tony leave and come back.
I’ll be where the eagles flying higher and higher.
Gonna be your man in motion
All I need is a pair of wheels.
Take me where the future’s lying; St. Elmo’s fire.
In June 1985 the world was hit in the face with The Brat Pack ensemble St Elmos Fire. In memory the whole she-bang was a monumental waste of time that I’d rather forget about.
In other news from June of 1985, the Reds used their 1st round pick on a college position player for the first time ever.
The prior year pitcher Pat Pacillo had been the first college player ever chosen by the Reds in the 1st round. The fact that this occurred in the 20th year of the drafts existence was not lost on Bill James who addressed the Reds drafting strategy in his 1984 Baseball Abstract.
The position player?
Barry Larkin, shortstop, University of Michigan.
1985 also is the last year that Dave Concepcion ever played over 100 games at shortstop in a season
Like Roy McMillan Davey was able to share his spot with his eventual successor and that alone avoided a gap in the SS legacy since the earlier one in 1969.
That’s quite the legacy
From 1970-2004 the Reds had 10 players who appeared in at least 100 games at SS
GAMES G G 1 Dave Concepcion 2178 2178 2 Barry Larkin 2085 2085 T3 Pokey Reese 222 222 T3 Darrel Chaney 222 222 5 Juan Castro 183 183 6 Woody Woodward 162 162 7 Jeff Branson 149 149 8 Tom Foley 135 135 9 Kurt Stillwell 131 131 10 Felipe Lopez 101 101
Some interesting names in that list, Chaney shared some time with Concepcion early on as did Woodward, who became better known as a GM than he was a player. Former 1st round draft choice Stillwell gave Larkin a run for the job early on, but like Pokey he was not all that and a bag of chips and soon found his way out of town.
In the same time period that the Reds had 10 players with 100 appearances the Braves can claim 18 with 100 appearances.
In the same time period that The Reds had 4 players with 200 or more appearances at SS the Braves and Mets could claim 8 players and Montreal 9.
To really touch on the spoiled nature of the Reds fan and the shortstop position let’s take a look at the Pre 1990’s expansion National League teams and see who holds their games played at SS and how they did.
1946-2004 GAMES G AVG OBA SLG Dave Concepcion 2300 .267 .322 .359 Barry Larkin 2180 .295 .371 .444 Roy McMillan 1348 .249 .326 .332 Leo Cardenas 1157 .261 .313 .377 Johnny Logan 1351 .270 .330 .384 Jeff Blauser 1024 .268 .361 .416 Padres Garry Templeton 1254 .252 .294 .340 Giants Rich Aurilia 993 .278 .331 .444 Astros Roger Metzger 1021 .229 .291 .291 Craig Reynolds 1004 .256 .288 .352 Dodgers Bill Russell 1911 .266 .312 .337 Pee Wee Reese 1676 .277 .375 .396 Maury Wills 1593 .281 .331 .332 Expos Orlando Cabrera 904 .267 .315 .405 Phillies Larry Bowa 1739 .264 .301 .324 Pirates Dick Groat 1258 .290 .329 .370 Jay Bell 1106 .269 .339 .402 Gene Alley 1096 .256 .312 .356 Mets Bud Harrelson 1322 .234 .324 .287 Cardinals Ozzie Smith 1990 .272 .350 .344 Dal Maxvill 1100 .222 .299 .265 Cubs Don Kessinger 1648 .255 .315 .314 Shawon Dunston 1254 .267 .295 .407 Ernie Banks 1216 .290 .353 .552
The Reds are the only team a player with 2000 starts and they have 2 they also are the only team with 4 players with 1000 starts. An amazing sign of stability at a position that is very volatile.
Little surprises around every corner, but nothing dangerous!
Since 1950 the Reds can also claim to have were the best hitting shortstops , plating a ½ a run better per 27 outs than all other NL shortstops.
RUNS CREATED/GAME DIFF PLAYER LEAGUE G 1 Reds 0.51 4.22 3.71 10455 2 Cubs 0.37 4.06 3.69 9958 3 Cardinals 0.30 4.00 3.70 10931 4 Rockies 0.27 4.46 4.19 2087 5 Diamondbacks 0.20 4.38 4.18 1394 6 Pilots/Brewers 0.11 4.31 4.20 1335 7 Dodgers 0.01 3.71 3.70 10441 8 Expos 0.01 3.64 3.64 6844 9 Braves -.07 3.63 3.70 10836 10 Pirates -.08 3.63 3.71 10270 11 Giants -.14 3.59 3.73 10817 12 Astros -.19 3.38 3.57 9015 13 Marlins -.20 4.00 4.19 2356 14 Phillies -.22 3.45 3.67 10254 15 Padres -.36 3.27 3.63 7017 16 Mets -.45 3.09 3.54 8207
The Reds might have the heir apparent to the linage in Lopez…. if his fielding and contract keep him around… the Boros factor will weigh heavily in the upcoming off-season’s as the Reds enter the weekend with the most errors on the left side of the infield in MLB. It’s a wait and see moment for the fans of a team that has had the pleasure essentially watching 4 guys play the same position for 55 years.
That’s something special and that’s what makes baseball so different than the back and forths.