The AL East With Alex Belth

Our first installment of "Baseball Preview With The Stars" features writer, painter, blogger, movie mogul, music mixer and all-round great guy Alex Belth. (By the way, shouldn't it be "all-around great guy?" I would think so, but the copy editors at the paper insist it's "all-round." And as anyone who has read this blog knows, I NEED copy editors. They're much smarter than I am. By the way when you see an asterisk next to a word*, that means it was corrected by one of you. So thank you. OK, back to your regularly scheduled blog entry).

You will know Alex from Bronx Banter, his writing with SportsIllustrated.com and the good work he did with the movie Swimfan. Now for those of you who would even suggest that the only reason I'm making Alex my first Preview Star is because of the hard work he's doing pumping my book ("The Soul of Baseball") well, you know, whatever.

Alex is a twin, he's been doing the Bronx Banter blog since 2002, he worked with Ken Burns on the "Baseball" documentary, he's worked with the Coen Brothers, he wrote a wonderful book on Curt Flood, and he's such a good guy that I like him even though he's an unabashed Yankees fan.

I ask the questions. He offers the answers. It's easier this way.

First, 1-5, predict the AL East.

1. Yankees
2. Red Sox
3. Blue Jays
4. Devil Rays
5. Orioles

Who do you think is the best everyday player in the division?

Alex Rodriguez. David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez might be better hitters, but they can't run the bases like Rodriguez. And even though he had an awful year with the glove, Rodriguez is a better fielder than both of them. Carl Crawford, and Vernon Wells and Derek Jeter deserve an honorable mention, too.

True or False: Derek Jeter is a lousy defensive shortstop.

False. I don't think he is a Gold Glover, but I don't think he's garbage either. He's competent. It's interesting that he's improved his fielding during the past few seasons.

Is Bruce Springsteen a true Yankees fan? A true baseball fan? Man, I love Bruce, but how could he use the word "Speedball" in "Glory Days?"

I saw the Boss at the Stadium last year with what looked like his daughter and a friend of hers. He was mad low-key and very accommodating to the fans. Yeah, I think he's a genuine fan. Gregory Hines used to come to the games all the time. The celebrity Yankees fan I'd most like to watch a Yankee game with is Jack Nicholson. John Madden would be pretty good too, and so would Larry David. Speedball? Ah, memories of Steve Howe...

Who is the best starting pitcher in the division?

Doc Halladay.

Who is the best closer in the division?

I've got to go with my man, Mo, but you could make a case for B.J. Ryan.

You've done quite a bit of film work. You worked with Ken Burns. Does he always use words like the narrator in "Civil War" or "Baseball?" Or did he ever say, "Dammit, Alex, get your ass in gear already?"

No, but after working for Ken in New York for about a month he turned to me one day and said, "When are we going to get your ass up to Walpole?" That's the town up in New England where he and his crew lived and cut their movies. In person, Ken doesn't come across as the effete intellectual that he does on TV. He doesn't speak in that kind of prosaic manner. Actually, he's a charismatic guy, extremely bright and very confident. I took a ride with him from NYC to Walpole, and he was a pretty loose dude. We listened to the Stones. I tried to turn him on to some hip hop and while he didn't really take to it--the lack of melody really got in his way of appreciating rap records--but he was open enough to give it a shot.

Which is the cooler Coen brother?

The funny-looking one.

Are you happy the Yankees got Andy Pettitte back? Do you think they could rebuild that entire 1998 team again? What's Hideki Irabu doing these days?

Yeah, I am happy to see Pettitte back, which is funny because I wasn't sad to see him go three years ago. I always liked him -- his performance in Game Five of the 1996 World Serious is one that Yankees fans will be hard-pressed to forget -- but he was never a favorite. Oddly enough, his closeness with Clemens didn't endear me to him much, though it made me like Clemens more. Go figure.

I don't think teams like '98 can be built, really. So much has to go right in order for a team to enjoy the kind of stupid success that the Yanks did that year -- or that the Mariners did a few seasons later. Dag, Boo Boo Irabu. I haven't heard that name in a minute. But I really liked him. He was one of the few screwjobs on those clean-cut Yankee teams. He reminded me of a combination of Jackie Gleason and a bad Elvis impersonator. I remember he'd get so rattled if the umps weren't calling strikes early in the game. He'd get so upset that it was like he would purposely throw borderline pitches and dare them to keep calling balls. Perhaps his greatest moment in pinstripes, I think it was in '98, came in a game against the Blue Jays. Clemens had drilled Jeter I believe, and Irabu retaliated by plunking a Toronto player. When the batter didn't respond, Boo Boo charged the plate. It was early in the game. I remember relief pitcher Mike Stanton running out of the dugout and holding Irabu back, barely able to conceal a smile.

True or false: The Red Sox will rue the day they signed J.D. Drew.

False. He's the antithesis of a Dirt Dog, but I think he's a very good player.

The Reggie Bar -- good chocolate bar or not?

Oh, I remember it as being awful. But I don't really like many American chocolate bars. My mother is from Belgium, and so I was spoiled from a young age with good chocolate. I'm basically a chocolate snob. What was it that Catfish Hunter said about the Reggie bar? "I opened one up, and it told me how good it was." I did love the bright orange wrapping with the picture of Reggie in his classic swing.

What is your favorite Yankees-Red Sox moment? Least favorite?

God, there have been so many good Yankees moments against the Red Sox. One that stands out in my mind is a catch that Ken Griffey, Sr. made at Yankee Stadium in the mid-80s. It was the middle of the summer. He climbed the wall in left field and scooped a ball right out of the stands. Alex Rodriguez had a couple of awful moments against the Sox in 2004 but that was worse for him than it was for me. And as upsetting as the 2004 ALCS was, there wasn't one moment that stuck out in my mind as being the worst, though there were a couple of pivotal plays. Brice Florie getting hit by a line drive is a terrible memory, but I think Carl Everett breaking up Mike Mussina's bid for a perfecto with two outs in the ninth is my least favorite memory.

Just how many runs will that Baltimore pitching staff give up this year? Is it even any fun when the Yankees go into Camden to play what will undoubtedly be a 12-11 game?

A kabagillion. Fun isn't exactly the right word. No, those Yankee-Orioles games down in Camden are trying even for a Yankee fan. But ultimately, I root for the wins. If it's gotta be unsightly sometimes, so be it.

You have some very cool artwork on your website. Talk about art and writing.

Well, I had a facility for drawing and painting as a kid. I always thought I was going to grow up to be a fine artist. Writing was in my family -- my grandfather wrote for the Brooklyn Eagle and was later an editor for the Herald Trib before he was as a publicist at the ADL for years -- but I never thought I'd be a writer. My dad cared about me and my brother and sister becoming competent writers. He used to make us write little essays for him when we were kids. But writing was always very difficult for me. Drawing came naturally, so it was easier to work hard at it. As I mentioned, my mom is from Belgium and she had some artistic ability. Comic books -- Tintin, Asterix -- was also an avenue for me to communicate with my French relatives so pictures, whether they were drawings, photographs or movies, were always more important to me than words. I'm a far more visual person than a literary one.

I think I was fortunate to go from fine arts to writing instead of the other way around. For instance, I learned that when you are working on a painting, you may get to a point where you fall in love with a section of the picture. And you just adore it, but if you are honest with yourself you realize that it is taking away from the whole, from what you are trying to do. So you need to have the courage to paint over that section you love in order to serve the whole. Otherwise you are just being precious. You have to be willing to screw up the entire picture in order to learn something, you have to be disciplined. So I spoiled some decent pictures in the process. (The beauty part is that the next time out, you could make something incredibly beautiful with little to no effort.) With writing, you have to be disciplined too, of course. But if you cut a line, you don't have to destroy it. You can use it later for something else entirely. There were several good anecdotes or quotes that I cut out of my book on Curt Flood simply because they distracted from the narrative. But I used them when I was doing press for the book, and in subsequent articles I wrote about him.

Tampa Bay. What's the point?

Yeah, they are just facing a ridiculous uphill battle. But at least they have some young players who are exciting to watch. I like them more than the O's, that's for sure (Is there any bigger disgrace in baseball than what's happened to the once-proud Baltimore organization?). The Trop is just a terrible-looking Stadium on TV, which doesn't help matters. But Jake Luft of SI.com was telling me recently that he actually enjoys the park. Jake is from Florida and says being indoors during the middle of summer down there is the way to go, no matter how bad it looks on TV. Plus he says there is an Outback Steakhouse there so you can bring a bloomin' onion back to your seat. Who knew?

Carl Crawford is absolutely one of my favorite players, and I think one of the best in baseball. How much will the Yankees pay him?

Speaking of Jake, I was out with him, my Bronx Banter partner Cliff Corcoran and Jay Jaffe of Baseball Prospectus a few weeks ago and Crawford's name was mentioned. I said that I thought it would be great if he really broke out this year and became a legitimate star. Jake looked at me like I was nuts and said, "He already is a star!" And looking at his numbers again, I'd say he's right. It would be great if keeps it up, even manages to improve on his '06 performance. How much would the Yanks pay him? Um, buckets of duckets, dude, buckets of duckets.

We all know George Steinbrenner is aging. What will his legacy be for you as a lifelong Yankees fan?

It's funny how even the biggest ogres can become virtual saints as the age, or after they die. I've found that I've gotten soft on George over the past few years, which may have as much to do with the fact that I've never known any other Yankee owner during my lifetime (I was two when he purchased the team) and I'm simply overcome with nostalgia. I'll remember him as a bully, a jerk, a crook, and sometimes a clown. I'll definitely remember him as a guy from Cleveland and NOT New York. During the late eighties, I thought that the Yanks would never be competitive again until he stopped owning them. But really, his legacy will be that he made the Yankees matter again. In Richard Lally's oral history of the Yankees, "Bombers," pitcher Steve Hamilton talks about the losing years in the late 1960s when the team was owned by CBS, about how opposing fans would feel sorry for the Yankees. That was a sign on how far they had fallen, a team who people had loved to hate for so long. Well, no matter what you think of George, he made people love and hate the Bombers again. And he made them winners too, in spite of his tirades and immaturity. He's got to get some credit for that. He put his money back into his team. They've won the World Series six times since he's owned them. No other team during that time span can say that.

Matsuzaka. You buying the hype?
Sure, why not?

You have teamed up with a friend to create a very cool music mix. Has there ever been a good baseball song?

Baseball tunes. That's a very short mix tape, man. Baseball songs are even worse than baseball movies. (There are some baseball movies that I find watchable like "Eight Men Out," and "Long Gone," but only two that I would say that I genuinely love--"The Bad News Bears," and "Bull Durham.") Ultramagnetic Mcs had a tribute to the Negro Leagues years ago called "Saga of Dandy, the Devil and Day." This rapper from the Bay Area named Rasco had a pretty decent posse cut called "Major League" in the late nineties. On the remix, he rapped, "Sport the pinstripes, break throug like Jackie Rob' /You Mark Port-u-gal, I'm swingin like Ty Cobb." That's a pretty funny diss. But rappers never took to baseball like they did to hoops.

"Centerfield" cracks me up in a real cornball kind of way, but I don't know that I'd ever go out of my way to listen to it. I think "Joltin' Joe DiMaggio" by Les Brown is probably the best baseball song that I can think of. As far as 1940s novelty records go, that's a good one. I'd put it on a mix. I like it better than the Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson records.

That thing they do in the Yankee Stadium bleachers, where they call out each player's name until acknowledged: Incredibly cool or obnoxious beyond words?

I don't know that I'd call it cool, but I do like it. Some Yankee fans think it's tired, but I get a kick out of it. It's not fresh, but it's so rare that you can find that kind of connection between the fans and the players these days, especially in a big market (and one without a mascot). Plus, it's a very New York kind of thing, the fans insisting on being noticed and all.

Which version of New York, New York is better: Frank's or Liza's?

Frankie, baby. Liza's sung the original, which is something that people sometimes forget. But then again, people tend to forget the movie "New York, New York," period. It was a failure, but it had some interesting moments. Scorsese was still in his prime, so even his flops had moments.

Is this Joe Torre's last year?

Could very well be, but I wouldn't bet on it. Hey, I think that Torre's run as Yankee manager under Steinbrenner is as unlikely as Joe D's 56-game hitting streak. So I'll believe it's over when it's over.

My 10 favorite bad trades ...

This year marks the 30th anniversary of one of my favorite bad trades in baseball history, the Midnight Massacre deal where the New York Mets traded Tom Seaver to Cincinnati for Pat Zachary, Doug Flynn, Steve Henderson and Dan Norman. The reason I love that trade so much is that every single person in America realized it was a horrendous trade right when it was made. And then, as time went on, it got worse.

That kind of magical bad deal doesn’t happen all that often. Best I can tell, most bad deals fall into one of three categories:

1. The bad deal a team feels forced to make because they are about to lose the player anyway (example: Oakland trades Mark McGwire for Blake Stein, T.J. Matthews and a third guy who was even worse than Blake Stein and T.J. Matthews).

2. The bad deal a team makes because they feel like they are one piece away from being a pennant contender (example: Detroit trades a good young arm named John Smoltz for Doyle Alexander, who does indeed go 9-0 down the stretch and carry the Tigers into the postseason. Bonus info: In his career, Doyle Alexander was traded for Smoltz, Frank Robinson and Pepe Frias).

3. The bad deal a team makes because they badly misjudged their own player’s abilities (example: Boston trades a young Jeff Bagwell for an old Larry Andersen; this is also a Category 2 ... the Sox thought Larry Andersen was important for the stretch run).

In addition, there’s the rare fourth deal: the “Oh my God, does anyone there even understand the rules of baseball” deal. These are very rare. Even some of the worst deals in baseball history – Brock for Broglio, Colavito for Kuenn, Pedro for Delino DeShields, Michael Young for Esteban Loaiza (ugh) – were made with some sort of logic behind them. It was flawed logic. But with those deals it’s a bit like reconstructing a failed crime scene. You could say, “Okay, at least I know what they were TRYING to do.”

I’m fascinated by the trades that never made any sense at all, trades that were obvious flops when they were made and then became catastrophes later. Twenty seven years after the Seaver deal, the Mets traded Scott Kazmir (considered by most people at the time to be one of the top pitching prospects in baseball) for Victor Zambrano (considered by most people at the time to be Victor Zambrano). The deal was universally panned but over time it has gotten much worse. And it still figures to get worse. It’s too early to put the Kazmir deal in my Ten Favorite Bad Trades Ever. But it has a chance down the road.

Here, then, are my ten favorite bad trades (Since I mentioned Seaver, I’m leaving him out):

10. The White Sox trade Sammy Sosa to the Cubs for George Bell (1992).

First of all, the White Sox and Cubs should not make trades with each other. Nothing good can come from that. When you look at the history of these two organizations, you know one of them is going to get ripped off very badly, and Chicago really doesn’t need that kind of tension.

This was the second time Sosa was traded, and it’s true that at this point he was a 23-year-old kid who seemed to have absolutely no idea how to swing a bat so that it actually connected with the ball. Still, everyone understood that the kid had already shown some power and speed, he had not been playing baseball that long, he had a chance.

OK, but that’s just a misjudgment. Here’s why I love this deal: It was made just before the start of the 1992 season – literally just days before, on March 30 – which means there was a high-level meeting among White Sox officials who said: “We just have to get George Bell.” Bell was 32 when the deal was made. He was slow, couldn’t field, didn’t want to field, would rather eat paint than walk and had not been worth a damn offensively in two years. He was not exactly known for those intangibles he could bring to a team either. The White Sox had to have him.

They got him. Bell led the Sox with 25 home runs and battled teammate Steve Sax for the honored statistic of “lowest on-base percentage by a player who used to be considered good” (Sax won .290 to .294). And then Bell fell off a cliff. Sosa, well, you know.

9. Philadelphia trades Fergie Jenkins to Chicago for Bob Buhl and Larry Jackson (1966).

In a way, this deal really falls under Category 3 – the “team misjudged its own player” deal. Jenkins was still a relative unknown when the Phillies dealt him – he had not thrown 15 innings in the big leagues. That said, though, this deal qualifies because there’s really no explanation why Philadelphia wanted Larry Jackson and Bob Buhl. They were both ancient, they were both coming off fairly dismal seasons. And it wasn’t like Jenkins developed years later. He won 20 games each of the next six years.

8. Philadelphia trades Ryne Sandberg and Larry Bowa for Ivan DeJesus (1982).

Maybe it was the .194 batting average in 1981. Maybe it was the 13 RBIs in 403 at bats. Maybe it was the 140 errors he had made at shortstop the previous five seasons. Whatever it was, the Phillies just had to have Ivan DeJesus for the 1982 season. They coveted Ivan DeJesus. They swooned over Ivan DeJesus. So, they traded an over-the-hill Larry Bowa for him, which was fine, but the Baseball Gods (capital letters) will get you when you pine for Ivan DeJesus. The throw-in, Ryne Sandberg, had a fairly decent career.

Bonus: Cleveland trades Harry Chiti to the New York Mets for Harry Chiti (1962).

I always felt the Mets got the better of this deal. Or maybe Cleveland did. Harry Chiti was, apparently, a pretty decent defensive catcher (he could really handle the knuckleball according to his various Internet bios) but I’ve often wondered what it was like being known for only one thing in baseball -- getting traded for yourself. I'll bet the jokes at the bar got old.

7. Texas trades Ron Darling and Walt Terrell to the Mets for Lee Mazzilli (1982).

This is a Category 2 trade – a bad deal a team makes when they feel they are just one piece away from contention – but it still gets on this list because: a.) Texas was nowhere near contention, and b.) There is no possible way they could have seen Lee Mazzilli as that final piece. Mazzilli had hit .228 with no power for the Mets the year before and to prove it was no fluke, he promptly went to Texas and hit .241 with no power. When the season ended, the Rangers looked to trade Maz for the one guy they felt confident could hit worse. And they got Bucky Dent.

Meanwhile Darling won 86 games the next six years and picked up a Gold Glove. Terrell won 58 games the next four years, though he did most of that good work with Detroit. The Mets traded Terrell to the Tigers for Howard Johnson in a classic example of doubling up with house money. Johnson had three 30-homer, 30-steal seasons with the Mets. The best part of this Lee Mazzilli trade is the often repeated story about Texas farm director Joe Klein, who was holding a meeting when he heard about it. He supposedly stood up and said, “Gentlemen, this meeting is over. We’re going to the bar.”

6. Kansas City trades David Cone to the New York Mets for Ed Hearn, Rick Anderson and Mauro Gozzo (Round one, 1987); Kansas City trades David Cone to Toronto for Chris Stynes, David Sinnes and Tony Medrano (Round 2, 1995).

You know, David Cone grew up in Kansas City. Yep, born and raised in the City of Fountains and Boulevards. His hometown team traded him away TWICE – in two of the worst trades in memory. I can’t imagine there is any equivalent in sports.

5. St. Louis trades Steve Carlton to Philadelphia for Rick Wise (1972).

I love this deal for a whole other reason. When it was made, Carlton was certainly the better pitcher. He was a three-time All-Star, he had just won 20 games, he was a strikeout lefty, he was only 26. But Wise was no slouch; he was 25, he had come off a good season for a terrible team (17-14, 2.88 ERA). You might see how St. Louis officials went into the 1972 season optimistic that they might have pulled off a good deal for themselves.

And then, BLAMMO, right away Carlton has one of the 10 greatest pitching seasons in baseball history. His first year in Philadelphia, he goes 27-10, 1.97 ERA, strikes out 310, joins Koufax as the only National Leaguers to win the pitching triple crown since World War II, and he does all this for an absurdly dismal Philadelphia team that only wins 59 games. Now, seriously, how do you go back to your owner after that and say, “Um, I still think that trade might work out for us?”

4. Cincinnati trades Christy Mathewson to New York Giants* for Amos Rusie (1900).

I absolutely love this trade. Obviously, it’s a beauty of a deal because Mathewson (who was 19 when they dealt him) became one of the five greatest pitchers in baseball history while Amos Rusie – who is in the Hall of Fame – pitched exactly three awful games with the Reds.

But here’s what makes this an absolutely classic: Amos Rusie had not played professional baseball in TWO YEARS when Cincinnati made this deal. Rusie had been an incredible pitcher in the early 1890s. He was called the Hoosier Thunderbolt (he changed the game; his fastball almost killed Hughie Jennings and helped prompt the baseball gods to move the mound back to 60 feet, 6 inches). But then Rusie held out for a year in a contract dispute, then he got hit in the head with a line drive and lost his hearing, He also had some arm problems. And he stopped pitching. Two years later, the Reds traded Christy Mathewson for him.

So, essentially this deal would be like, I don’t know, Detroit deciding tomorrow to trade Justin Verlander to the Mets for David Cone.

3. Cincinnati trades Frank Robinson to Baltimore for Milt Pappas, Dick Simpson and Jack Baldschun (1965)

This is actually the classic version of the trade I’m talking about – the trade that makes absolutely no sense when it was made and then makes less sense as time goes on. Robinson had been typically great for the Reds in 1965 and then they traded him, which set off a pretty good outcry in Cincinnati. Then, much like Steve Carlton, Robinson promptly went out and won the Triple Crown. After that, this deal became a part of a line in "Bull Durham:” “Who can forget Frank Robinson for Milt Pappas, for gosh sake?”

2. San Francisco trades Joe Nathan, Francisco Liriano and Boof Bonser to Minnesota to A.J. Pierzynski (2003)

It depends on what happens with Liriano’s health, but I think it’s fair to say: This has a chance to be the worst trade in baseball history. It has all the credentials. Minnesota was dying to get Pierzynski and his attitude off the team – and everybody around baseball except the people in San Francisco seemed to know it.

Meanwhile, Nathan was a 28-year-old reliever coming off a dominant season. Liriano was a 20-year-old lefty who could throw 98 m.p.h. Bonser was a big 21-year-old righty who was a first-round pick, had pitched dominant ball in the low minors and was also named “Boof.” This was one of those deals where scouting directors all over baseball stopped meetings and went to the bar.

The trade turned out even worse than expected. The Giants, who apparently had done absolutely no scouting before this trade, found out that Pierzynski was not always a pleasant fellow, so they released him at the end of the year. Nathan has been one of the more dominant closers ever in his three years in Minnesota, Liriano pitched like Koufax before he got hurt, and Bonser is still called Boof.

1. Kansas City trades Jermaine Dye to Oakland (in a three-way deal) in exchange for Neifi Perez (2001).

This isn’t the worst deal ever. It’s just my favorite bad deal. I remember when the Royals made this trade, I called up general manager Allard Baird and said, “It appears you just traded Jermaine Dye for Neifi Perez. Why would you do that?” He explained to me the Royals really couldn’t afford Dye and that they desperately needed a shortstop – talks with Rey Sanchez had broken down – and Perez was a good defensive shortstop who would hit a little bit.

And I said: “It appears you just traded Jermaine Dye for Neifi Perez. Why would you do that?”

I’ve never seen an everyday player as bad as Neifi Perez in 2002. It wasn’t just his .260 on-base percentage and .303 slugging percentage though that’s a pretty good start (his OPS+ that year was 40. Forty. FORTY!). It wasn’t just his unbelievable lack of speed and terrible base running instincts (he was successful on eight of 17 stolen base attempts). It wasn’t just his surprisingly dreadful defense or his terrible attitude (he once refused to go into a game, then later said he was “joking”). No, it was the idea that he was in Kansas City at all. The Royals had traded Jermaine Dye to get him. All because talks broke down with Rey Sanchez.

Sometime, the pain is too much to bear.

Coming up: The first installment of "Baseball Preview With The Stars."

Fastest Man In Baseball

Look at this: We're including charts on this blog now. You have to offer some applause for my wife, Margo, who put that together. Pretty nice looking, no? I'm talking about the chart. What kind of wise guy are you anyway?

We’re going to try to rank the 10 fastest players in baseball here, but first let’s talk a little bit about the decline of the stolen base. You know, I kind of miss the old running game. Yes, I understand that it does not necessarily make strategic sense to run like mad, the way teams ran from about 1974 to 1992. I also understand it does not make a whole lot of sense for quarterbacks to simply throw bombs into coverage the way so many NFL teams did in the 1960s and 1970s.

But that doesn't mean I have to like it. I have this theory that people will adjust to the times, but they will always love the game most the way they watched it played as children. So, even though I understand why it had to change, I miss the bombing quarterbacks – the Joe Namaths and Bert Joneses and Daryle Lamonicas and Dan Pastorinis and John Hadls – who threw tons of incompletions and interceptions but would sometimes hit the big play. It was exciting and dangerous -- like going to Vegas. I also miss stolen bases.

That nice-looking chart above shows how teams have used the stolen base since the late 1950s. The chart includes total stolen bases and caught stealing numbers, the number of attempts you would see in a game (both teams) and stolen base percentage.

I have no doubt that you as a reader can do a much better job of breaking down those numbers than I can – hey, I failed out of accounting – but I think it’s clear what has happened this decade. People in baseball read and were influenced by statistical breakdowns and Moneyball (Well, 98.3% of the people were influenced ... this does not include Joe Morgan). They became acutely aware of the dangers of running haphazardly. Most people in baseball put the stolen base break-even point at about 70 percent – that means it doesn’t make sense in most situations to try and steal a base unless you expect to be successful about 70 percent of the time.

Last year, teams were successful 71.4% of the time, the highest percentage since 1950 (and Bill James says that pre-1951, the caught-stealing numbers are spotty). Teams are also running less (over the last four years) than at any point since the 1960s. So it makes sense. Managers and general managers and players have accomplished their purpose – to maximize stolen bases without giving up as many outs. Teams are running smarter now than ever before.

Still, I kind of miss the stolen base, the tension of the moment, the little game between catcher and pitcher and runner. I guess this happens in every sport -- sound strategies take away excitement. Remember when hockey teams started playing that neutral zone trap that certainly was effective but made games unbelievably boring? In fact, do you remember hockey? Oh well.

Let’s move on. There are still some burners in baseball today. Here, I’m going to list the fastest runners in baseball using my own very special invention -- the "Super Speed Score." I will not reveal my SSS method here because it's a secret and also it's ridiculous and also I know that if I did reveal it, people would find enough holes in it to build several golf resorts. So, I certainly understand if you don't want to put too much stock in these numbers. In fact, I would recommend that. I will tell you the Super Speed Score takes into account such things as stolen bases, stolen base percentages, triples, grounded into double plays and also base running numbers taken from The Bill James Handbook.

In addition, I will add a quote about each player from a friend of mine who has been scouting in the Major Leagues for a long time. He has asked to remain anonymous because he doesn't want anyone to know that he knows me. Also I told him how the Super Speed Score works and he doesn't want to be associated with it.

10. Kenny Lofton, Texas Rangers
Super Speed Score: 85.1

Scout: "He has lost a lot of his speed, in my opinion, but he makes up for it with his savvy. He knows what to do on the bases."

Lofton will turn 40 in May – and since I turned 40 this year too, I had to jump him over potentially better speed candidates such as Felipe Lopez, Eric Byrnes (Sorry, it’s that hair) and Ryan Freel. But Lofton did hold his own anyway, even at 39. He stole 32 out of 37 bases, and he hit 12 triples in 469 at-bats. He did ground into a bunch of double plays and he wasn’t all that stellar on the bases, but heck, he’s old enough to be Hanley Ramirez’s father.

9. Hanley Ramirez, Florida Marlins.
Super Speed Score: 86.5

Scout: He’s definitely one of the fastest players I saw last year. He thinks double out of the box, and he’s a fearless base stealer. He’s extremely aggressive on the bases.

It will be interesting to see where Ramirez goes from here. He’s obviously blazing fast – he stole 51 bases last year, hit 11 triples and so on. But he also hit 46 doubles (most ever for a National League* shortstop under than age off 22 according to Wikipedia – where do they come up with this stuff?) and 17 home runs. So he obviously has power. And if there’s one thing you know about baseball and life – power corrupts. I suspect that if Rickey Henderson had come up in 1999, he would have been a very different player (especially if he came up with the A’s). He still would have been a GREAT player (high on-base percentage, power) but not the all-time stolen base champ.

You know, it would be interesting to know: Would Rickey have been a better player had he come up with Oakland in 1999 instead of 1979? Maybe another entry.

Anyway, I suspect that with a few more home runs, Ramirez will run less so enjoy his speed while you can. I think the same is also true for Cleveland's Grady Sizemore, who can really run but will soon be a No. 3 hitter.

8. Jimmy Rollins, Philadelphia Phillies
Super Speed Score: 86.8

Scout: He's fast, but I’m not sure he takes advantage of his speed like he could. I don’t think he views himself as a speed guy.

Rollins is beginning to hit with more power too (25 homers last year), which will undoubtedly change him. He still has speed – he stole 36 out of 40 bases last year and cracked nine triples. The base running statistic that stands out for him is that he only advanced first to third 8 out of 36 times, which is really low. That may be caused by playing in a small ballpark.

7. Willy Taveras, Colorado Rockies
Super Speed Score: 87.2

Scout: He can really fly, but I’m not sure he hits enough to be in the lineup everyday. He needs to take pitches. It will be fun to watch him run around in that big Colorado outfield.

When Buck O’Neil first saw Willy Taveras, he said: “This guy looks like a young Willie Mays.” The funny thing is: He meant it literally. Buck thought Taveras resembled Mays in the face. He didn’t think Taveras bore any resemblance at all to Mays as a player, with the possible exception that they both tended to wear caps on the field. Even there, Mays' cap flew off.

Taveras scored really well as a base runner last year – he was 24 of 30 scoring from second on a single and an amazing six for six scoring from first on a double. It will be interesting to see how he does in Colorado. On the one hand, that light air might encourage Taveras to continue his disturbing pattern of hitting fly balls. On the other hand, some those fly balls might find gaps in Colorado. Anyway, he’s fast.

6. Ichiro Suzuki, Seattle Mariners
Super Speed Score: 89.0

Scout: I keep hearing how he's lost a step, but I haven't seen it. Home to first, he’s still the fastest in the game. I would probably have him higher than sixth.

Well, OK Mr. Anonymous Scout, go start your own blog then. It seems to me that Suzuki’s base running numbers were down. He only went first to third 10 out of 36 times, and he only scored from first on a double four out of 14 times. In previous years, Ichiro’s base-running numbers were much better. He is still a masterful base stealer (45 out of 47) and he only hit into two double plays in more than 700 plate appearances. But I do think he’s showing just a little age.

5. Juan Pierre, Los Angeles Dodgers
Super Speed Score: 89.3

Scout: It’s funny, I was thinking about pure speed guys and Pierre has been doing it for so long I almost forgot about him. Still has tremendous speed; he and Furcal should run like crazy for that team. Pierre’s a terrific bunter too.

Remember how I was talking about what Rickey Henderson would be like in today’s game. Well, here's the converse: I wonder what Juan Pierre would have been like in, say, 1977.

Look: He had 200 hits last year (third time in his career), he played every game for the fourth straight year, he hardly ever strikes out. He had 58 steals last year (2nd in the league) but you know that if this was 1977, he probably would have stolen 90 or 100 bases. These days, Juan Pierre is probably not appreciated much – he’s on his fourth different team, people complain about his inability to walk or hit for power. But in 1977, he would have been considered one of the best players in baseball. Kids all over America would have had posters of him on their walls.

4. Chone Figgins
Super Speed Score: 89.7

Scout: He’s just a terrific base runner. He’s obviously very fast, but I think he’s also just one of those guys who knows how to use his speed. I would bet in a straight race, Joey Gathright would outrun him. But on the bases, there is no comparison.

I remember a game last year between Kansas City and Anaheim. It was late, and it was close, and Chone Figgins got on base somehow – I think he singled. The Royals brought in a reliever. Figgins promptly stole second, stole third and scored a groundout. I’m not too big on momentum and intangibles and all that stuff you can’t see. But I do think that kind of speed display can do an awful lot. It tears the heart out of fans, I know that. Figgins stole 52 bases and was a demon on the bases – he scored from first on a double 10 out of 12 chances. Bill James’ numbers ranked him as the best base runner in baseball in 2006.

3. Dave Roberts, San Francisco Giants
Super Speed Score: 91.1

Scout: You know, I really like him. As he’s gotten older, he’s done a better job of getting on base. He’s still one of the best base stealers in the business. He runs down everything in the outfield. I think he’s underrated.

Roberts was 34 years old last year, but he still stole 49 out of 56 bases, hit 13 triples in only 499 at-bats and was one of the toughest in the game to double up. Bill James’ Speed Score ranked Roberts as the fastest player in baseball in 2004 and 2005.

2. Carl Crawford, Tampa Bay Devil Rays
Super Speed Score: 93.8

Scout: Think about this … for a while they had Crawford, (Rocco) Baldelli and (Joey) Gathright. Would that have been the fastest outfield in baseball history? … If I was starting a team, Carl Crawford would be awfully high on my draft board.

Crawford is one of my favorite players in baseball. And his speed numbers are spectacular. He stole 58 of 67 bases. He hit 16 triples. He was tough to double up, and he was awfully good on the bases, except going first to third – he was only 3 of 19 in that category. I wonder if it was because he was constantly surprised whenever Tomas Perez or Jonny Gomes or Toby Hall or Jorge Cantu or whoever it was batting behind him got a hit.

Anyway, Crawford is also the best defensive left fielder in the game, he’s hitting for more power, he’s blazing fast, I figure someday soon he will be on one of the big market teams and everyone in America will “discover” just how breathtakingly good he is … and then Tampa fans will know how Kansas City fans felt when Carlos Beltran was discovered after he left Kansas City.

1. Jose Reyes, New York Mets
Super Speed Score: 94.2

Scout: Yeah, you got this right. He’s the fastest player in the game today. He’s a threat to beat out any ground ball. He could probably steal 100 bases if they would give him the green light every time.

Well, the numbers speak. He stole 64 bases last year and became the first player to steal 60-or-more bases in back-to-back years since … well, guess. No, it was not Toby Harrah. How did you come up with that name? It was Lofton in 1993 and ’94. Reyes also hit 17 triples for the second straight year – nobody in the NL has put up 34 triples in back-to-back years since Stan Musial during World War II.

And remember: Reyes has only had two full seasons.

There’s more: Reyes only hit into six double plays all year. He was an excellent base runner. And with Reyes, you have a whole lot of anecdotal evidence – everyone who has seen him play seems to have some story about how he outran this throw or beat out that hit. In that way, he’s an awful lot like Willie Wilson. And because he’s doing it in New York, the stories will surely get larger and larger. He's the fastest guy in the game today.

Next 10:
11. Felipe Lopez
12. Eric Byrnes
13. Ryan Freel
14. Grady Sizemore
15. Josh Barfield
16. Rafael Furcal
17. Orlando Cabrera
18. Omar Vizquel (!)
19. Mike Cameron
20. Scott Podsednik

Players who are faster than you might think: Vizquel (SF), David Wright (NYM), Mark Teahen (KC).

Players who are slower than you might think: Derek Jeter (NYY), Torii Hunter (Min), Podsednik (White Sox, stole 41 bases, yes, but was caught 19 times. Yuck).

Willie Wilson: Fastest ever?

So, here’s what I’m wondering: Who is the fastest player in baseball? Well, actually I’m wondering two things – who is the fastest player now and who was the fastest player over the last 50 years. These questions occurred to me the other day when I had a few moments to speak with Willie Wilson. I’m pretty sure that Willie Wilson was the fastest player I ever saw. I didn’t see him often. I lived in Cleveland then, and my idea of speed was Miguel Dilone.

(Hey, Miguel Dilone was fast. In 1980 he hit .348 despite never hitting a ball more than 100 feet in the air, and he stole 61 bases. In 1982, though, he hit a solo home run off of La Marr Hoyt, his first home run in two seasons, and at that point he started swinging harder than Sinatra in Vegas. He hit about .109 the rest of his career. But I'm getting away from the point. He really was fast).

Anyway, I distinctly remember (or at least I’ve convinced myself that I distinctly remember) a routine ground ball Willie Wilson hit to shortstop at old Municipal Stadium, one of those ground balls that was so traditional and everyday that the instinct was to look down and mark the “6-3” on your scorecard before the ball even reached the shortstop. Frank Duffy (or maybe it was Jerry Dybzinski or Tom Veryzer) scooped the ball cleanly, made a strong throw to first – and Willie Wilson was already PAST the bag. He was halfway into the outfield. The umpire called him out. Willie was used to getting jobbed on bang-bang calls at first base (and this one wasn’t really bang-bang, it was more like "bang ... have some coffee ... read a book ... do your taxes ... bang"). He went back to the dugout without (noticeably) complaining. But everyone was duly awed. This man was fast.

The problem is: You can’t really have a rational discussion about Willie Wilson’s speed in Kansas City. This is a town without many conceits, but when you start talking to people here about how fast Willie was, the conversations rapidly deteriorate into one of those old Saturday Night Live “Who would win a round of golf between God and Ditka” things. There have been many fast players to come through Kansas City. Bert Campaneris was fast, Amos Otis was fast, Fred Patek was fast, even the aging Vince Coleman was fast. Johnny Damon could run, Carlos Beltran could run and, man oh man, the young Tom Goodwin could run. But Willie has been set apart in the same way people set apart their wedding china. Willie Wilson is the speed-burner Kansas City brings out for special occasions. The best any Kansas City Royals player can ever hope for is to be considered almost as fast as Willie Wilson.

OK, so question No. 1: Was Willie Wilson the fastest player in the last, say, 50 years? For this, I (of course) turned to Bill James, who (of course) had his own unique way to look at the question. You Bill James disciples already know that Bill has a value he invented called the “speed score.” I guess that the good folks at Baseball Prospectus have tinkered with speed scores too. It is an attempt to pull a players speed out of the statistics. Bill is very quick to point out his speed score is just an estimate; it’s not meant to be a precise measurement of a player’s speed. But, I must say, it’s awfully good. It takes into account five categories:

1. Stolen bases.
2. Stolen base percentage.
3. Grounding into double plays.
4. Runs scored.
5. Triples.

Now, all of these statistics – all of them – involve more than just pure speed. But they are certainly the statistics that reflect speed (I’ve always had this bizarre hunch that really fast players reach on errors more than other players – this is my “speed forces defenders to rush their throws” theory – but I don’t believe the stats back it up).

Remember: We are talking about baseball speed. When the Royals traded for Joey Gathright last season, the reports were that he was the fastest player in the game. He might be – perhaps he has the best 40-yard dash time in the game, I don’t know. But these aren’t the combines. Joey Gathright on the field did not look particularly fast in 2006. He got poor jumps in the outfield. He got thrown out on the bases quite often. He just never seemed comfortable using his natural speed. The numbers bear this out. According to The Bill James Handbook, Gathright went from first to third on a single only three out of 12 times and scored from first on a double only one out of three times. In Kansas City, he was only successful on 10 out of 16 stolen base attempts. Gathright may be fast. But he wasn't baseball fast.

Bill being Bill, he saw what I was after and he sent me a speed score list of the fastest players in baseball each of the last 50-plus years (min. 20 stolen bases). I wasn’t going to type them all in, but hey, he sent them along, and it’s a good list, and maybe you will be so appreciative that you will buy a book. I’m not going to include their actual speed scores except in a couple of cases because frankly I don’t think it would add much and also I have to finish this and go to the Kansas State-Oklahoma basketball game for my real job. Just know that Bill used a 10-point system in the five categories, so the perfect speed score would be 10.0. I throw in a few comments throughout:

1955: Bill Bruton
1956: Jim Rivera
1957: Luis Aparicio.
1958: Aparicio
1959: Vada Pinson.
The "Vada Pinson for the Hall of Fame" people seem to have quieted down for whatever reason. It seems like years ago -- before I was a Hall voter -- I would get five letters a year from people who ran down Pinson's many achievements. I know the argument well: He led the league in doubles twice, triples twice, hits twice, he won a Gold Glove, he had five 20-homer-and-20-stolen-base seasons, he had 2,757 hits and so on. Anyway, I don't hear from those folks much now.

1960: Bill Bruton
Bruton was a true speedster who led the league in stolen bases three times and in triples twice. He hit three triples in a game – two of them with the bases loaded.
1961: Maury Wills.
1962: Wills
Wills scored a 9.1 speed score this year, the highest until Willie Wilson in the late 1970s. This is the year Wills stole 104 bases and was caught just 13 times. Consider this: Nobody had stolen more than 56 bases since World War II. Dom DiMaggio once led the league with 15 stolen bases. It really is understandable why so many people who were around Los Angeles that year are convinced Wills should be in the Hall of Fame. This season must have seemed revolutionary. Heck, imagine someone coming along NOW who stole 104 bases. Nobody has come within 25 of that since before the FIRST George Bush was in office.
1963: Wills
1964: Lou Brock.
1965: Zoilo Versailles
Brock was second.
1966: Bert Campenaris
Brock was second again.
1967: Brock
1968: Brock
1969: Brock
Do you sense a pattern here?

1970: Bobby Bonds
1971: Freddie Patek.
Freddie the Flea was second in the league in stolen bases – to his teammate Amos Otis – and led the league in triples.
1972: Dave Nelson.
1973: Brock is back.
1974: Herb Washington.
I have no idea how Bill’s system could have picked out Washington, the Great Speed Experiment who did not have a single at-bat that year. He only stole 29 bases in 45 attempts, which isn't great. Maybe it’s because he scored 29 runs in 0 at-bats – nice ratio. And he certainly did not ground into a double play. I don’t get the number in this case, but I have no doubt Washington was indeed the fastest MAN in the game that year, since he was one of the fastest men in the world. But the fastest PLAYER was again Brock. He tied with the unfairly forgotten Larry Lintz, who could fly but couldn’t hit and would soon take his place as Oakland’s new Herb Washington.
1975: Wilbur Howard.
Often forgotten – well, hey, I forgot him anyway. Stole 32 bases and hit eight triples in his one season with more than 200 at-bats. Mickey Rivers was second. Do you remember the time when Mickey Rivers started calling himself "Miguel Rivera?" Did I dream that?
1976: Davey Lopes.
1977: Omar Moreno.
1978: Moreno.
1979: Willie Wilson.
Here we go, the greatest speed score of the last 50 years – and perhaps the greatest in baseball history. Willie scored a 9.8. Look at this year: He led the league with 83 stolen bases and was caught 12 times. He was third with 13 triples, sixth with 113 runs. And get this: He hit into one double play in more than 600 plate appearances. I’m not sure if Bill’s data considers this, but Willie also hit FIVE inside the park homers this year. There are no reliable speed scores for Cool Papa Bell or Ty Cobb or Billy Hamilton or Jackie Robinson as a young man. But it’s hard to imagine anyone was ever faster than Willie Wilson in 1979.

1980: Willie Wilson.
Same year more or less – 79 stolen bases, only caught 10 times, led league with 15 triples. But this year he grounded into four double plays, dropping his speed score to 9.6. Wilson was so fast that the burner Ron Leflore, who was undoubtedly one of the fastest men in baseball history, who stole 97 bases and hit 11 triples, finished second.
1981: Lee Lacy.
1982: Lacy.
Lacy was fast. More than that, though, he inspired Topps to make more baseball cards of him in 1981 than any other player in baseball history – at least that’s how I remember him.
1983: Rudy Law.
It’s easy to forget. Rudy Law had 77 stolen bases this year. I'd forgotten it. By the way, Rickey Henderson, who stole 108 bases, did not finish in the Top 3 in speed score. In fact, he NEVER finished in the Top 3, which seems amazing but is actually pretty easily explained. Rickey never hit a lot of triples (he finished ninth in the league this year -- one of only two times he placed in the Top 10), he banged into a surpring number of double plays, he was caught stealing more than any player since they started keeping the stat. Rickey was an amazing player, a fearless base stealer and undoubtedly very fast. But I don't doubt that, pure baseball speed, Rudy Law, Willie Wilson and Vince Coleman were faster. Lee Lacy too.
1984: Juan Samuel.
1985: Vince Coleman
Another speed dynasty is about to begin. Gary Redus was awfully fast this year and for the next few years, but he never could top Coleman.
1986: Coleman
1987: Coleman
1988: Cecil Espy
Seems like a blip in the system here. Coleman was second.
1989: Coleman.

1990: Alex Cole.
Wow. Remember him? What a good-looking young player. Hit .300 his rookie year, took a walk now and then, stole 41 bases in only 63 games, It never quite worked out for him. And after he retired he was pled guilty to a drug charge. Sad deal.
1991: Lenny Dykstra.
1992: Tim Raines.
Yes, I think he’s a Hall of Famer. I say that for my friend Keith Law.
1993: Coleman.
1994: Coleman.
It is remarkable how long Coleman maintained his speed. This year he was already 32, he couldn’t hit a lick, he couldn’t get on base, but he still stole 50 bases and legged out 12 triples – second in the league in both categories. He grounded into just two double plays.
1995: Coleman.
1996: Lance Johnson
1997: Delino DeShields
1998: Randy Winn
1999: Tony Womack

2000: Womack.
2001: Tom Goodwin.
2002: Dave Roberts
Isn’t it strange how during a certain era – let’s say beginning around 1996 or so – the “fastest man in baseball” tag sort of started to lose cache. It’s like something happened around that time, something that fundamentally changed the game, but I can't put my finger on what that might have been.
2003: Rafael Furcal
2004: Dave Roberts
2005: Dave Roberts

Well, that was fun. So, for the record, Willie Wilson had the two best speed scores over the last 50 years. Believe it or not, Dave Roberts in 2004 had the third-highest score. He stole 38 bases and was caught only three times. He hit seven triples and scored quite a few runs for only 319 at-bats. He also did something somewhat memorable in the playoffs, although I could be getting that wrong. I need to ask Bill.

Anyway, Bill wants me to remind everyone again that this statistic is not there to end arguments but to start them. So, why not? Using Bill James speed scores and various other considerations such as my own ridiculous opinions, I believe the 10 fastest players over the last 50 or so years were -- I'm talking the fastest players at their peak:

1. Willie Wilson.
2. Vince Coleman
3. Maury Wills
4. Lou Brock
5. Omar Moreno
6. Luis Aparcio
7. Ron LeFlore
8. Dave Roberts
9. Lee Lacy
10. Bill Bruton

Honorable mention: Juan Samuel, Rudy Law, Mookie Wilson and Pearl Jam (Note: Yes as an alert reader has already pointed out, it was Mookie Blaylock that was the original name of Pearl Jam. But I say anytime you run across a Mookie of any kind you mention Pearl Jam), Kenny Lofton.

As always, I’ve gone way over my time limit. So next entry we’ll discuss the second question: Who is the fastest player in today’s game? (Hint: It is not Frank Thomas).

Program alert for those in the Kansas City area: I will be giving a presentation about “The Soul of Baseball” and signing books Monday night at the Jewish Community Center, 5801 W. 115th Street in Overland Park. Admission is free, though there will be armed guards there to make sure everyone buys a book afterward. I’m kidding. They won’t be armed. I mean, not with live ammunition. The JCC is asking people to please RSVP here just so they can get a count for the dessert afterward. But even if you forget to do that, you’re welcome to come.

A New Way To Look at Hall of Famers

Well, this month the Hall of Fame should make an announcement about how they plan to honor Buck O’Neil. You already know about the wild events of last year, when a special Negro Leagues committee put 17 new members into the Hall of Fame but did not include Buck. I think it’s fair to say that the people at the Hall of Fame itself felt terrible about it, and on the day before Buck’s funeral in October, Hall President Jane Forbes Clark released a statement, which read (in part):

“Buck was perhaps the greatest ambassador baseball has ever known. He was a giant of a man whose wisdom, kindness and generosity of spirit will live on forever in those whom he touched and those who touched him.
"The National Baseball Hall of Fame's Board of Directors has a very strong commitment to keeping Buck O'Neil's legacy alive forever, and at our last meeting in July, we began to look at ways to recognize his lasting contributions to our game."

There hasn’t been anything more said publicly, but I’ve been told a couple of things by people who seem to be in the know:

1. The Hall of Fame board of directors will meet this month, and the question of how to honor Buck O’Neil and fulfill Jane’s promise will be on the agenda.
2. They will not induct Buck O’Neil into the Hall of Fame.

This entry is not so much about Buck, but I want to say that – odd as it may seem considering how much I loved Buck – I agree with the Hall of Fame. I don’t think it would seem like anything more than pandering to put Buck in the Hall now using some sort of presidential pardon. For me, the point was for Buck to be elected honestly into the Hall of Fame while he was still alive, while he could enjoy it, while everyone could enjoy him. If they ever have another Negro Leagues vote or put Buck on the veteran’s ballot – and I doubt they will – I hope Buck is considered properly. But for now, I think, the Hall’s task should be, as Jane said, to keep Buck O’Neil’s legacy alive forever.

And that brings us to “The Buck O’Neil Award.”

As you know, there’s already a Ford Frick Award for announcers (Frick was a sportswriter and Baseball Commissioner who helped start the Hall of Fame) and J.G. Taylor Spink Award for sportswriters (Spink was a writer and editor, and he turned The Sporting News into The Bible of Baseball).

But there is no award – and also no direct route to the Hall of Fame – for those people who have had giant effects on baseball through their lifetime achievement. There is no easy way for the Hall of Fame to honor great scouts, for instance, or legendary coaches or The Famous Chicken or Hal Richman (who invented Strat-o-Matic) or Sy Berger (the driving force behind baseball cards) or Marvin Miller or even guy like Gil Hodges, who was both a terrific player and manager for perhaps the most beloved team in baseball history, the Miracle Mets. This a huge gap, in my opinion. And it seems like an award to honor these people is long overdue.

I think that this award should be named for Buck O’Neil, who made his mark as a player, manager, coach, scout, museum builder, spokesman and ambassador for the game. He is the prime example, in my mind, of the tunnel vision of the Baseball Hall of Fame process. The Negro Leagues committee members (some of them anyway) could not help but view Buck as one thing – a player – and as a player he was good but not great, memorable but not Hall of Fame worthy. It was (in my opinion) his baseball life that was Hall of Fame worthy -- more than worthy -- and it apparently is hard for some to get their minds around that.

In the book – and, I admit, in a burst of exaggeration to prove a point – I wrote that keeping Buck out of the Baseball Hall of Fame because he was not a good enough player was like keeping Leonardo da Vinci out of the Renaissance Hall of Fame because he was not a good enough inventor.

ANYWAY to the point of this thing: I’m going to list off a few of my candidates for The Buck O’Neil Award here. But, I'm only listing a few for a reason: I have really appreciated reading your comments. And I would love to hear some of your nominations for this award.

Gil Hodges: He was a borderline candidate as a player, having achieved 63 percent of the writer’s vote in his final year on the ballot (he needed 41 more votes). He was a fine defensive first baseman, he drove in 100 RBIs seven straight seasons, an All-Star seven straight seasons, he finished in the Top 10 in OPS six times. He hit 370 home runs (at the time a record for right handed hitters in the NL (in fact, when he retired, the only right-handed hitter who had hit more home runs was Jimmie Foxx). And he was an absolutely beloved player. Now, throw in his role as manager of the 1969 Mets – he’s an ideal choice for this award.

Billy Martin: How about his baseball life? He was a World Series hero as a player, particularly for his performance in the 1953 World Series (.500 batting average, .958 slugging percentage), he managed two World Series champs with the Yankees in 1977 and '78 (though that was quite a whirlwind in 1978), he led five teams to the playoffs and he was – for better and worse – perhaps the most famous person in the game. He was rough and hardnosed and not always likeable, but that’s baseball too.

Tom Greenwade: There actually is a precedent now for scouts getting into the Hall of Fame. One of the 17 Negro Leaguers inducted last year was Alex Pompez, an owner and promoter. His Negro Leagues career would be almost entirely forgettable if it were not for his indictment for racketeering. His great contributions to baseball (as his bio on the Hall of Fame website confirms) came after the Negro Leagues, as the scout who signed Orlando Cepeda and Juan Marichal among others. Well, Tom Greenwade was the scout signed Mickey Mantle for the New York Yankees and recommended Jackie Robinson to the Brooklyn Dodgers, He did much, much more in his legendary scouting life – he was a scout for more than 50 years – but just those two things make his case, don't they?

Howie Haak: I’m not going to list all the scouts who are deserving of consideration here, in large part because I don’t know many of them. But when you go to the Dominican Republic and to Puerto Rico, the one name you hear all the time is Howie Haak. He was a pioneer in finding those players and bringing them to America. His greatest signing was Roberto Clemente, but for almost 40 years he worked to find players on the dust fields in the poorest cities, and he undoubtedly made baseball a better game to watch.

Marvin Miller: I’m not exactly sure what anyone is waiting for. If Jackie Robinson changed the game more than any single person in the first half of the 20th Century (along with Branch Rickey, of course), then Marvin Miller changed the game more than anyone in the second half. Maybe there are those who don’t like what the game has become, with the high-priced contracts for players. Well, it was a lot worse before, with the low-priced contracts for player and owners getting filthy rich. It is absolutely unfathomable to me that the Hall of Fame players, who should know better, did not vote him in.

Bill James: He’s my friend, so I don’t want to put too fine a point on this. But he changed the way we watch baseball. And, in his own way, he changed the way people PLAY baseball. I’m not sure any writer since Henry Chadwick (who invented the box score) has done more. Chadwick is in the Hall of Fame.

Lefty O’Doul: Now here’s a baseball life. He began as a pitcher and hurt his arm. So he became an outfielder and hit .349 in more than 3,000 at bats. He twice led the league in hitting, and his 1929 season (.398, 32 homers, 122 RBIs, 152 runs, 254 hits) is an all-timer. He became manager of the San Francisco Seals and won more games than any manager in Pacific Coast League history. He also helped develop Joe DiMaggio. And finally he was a tremendous goodwill ambassador for baseball, and was one of the key people in bringing the game to Japan.

Minnie Minoso: He is caught in the middle. Before he was 28 years old, he was one of the great players in the Negro Leagues, a two-time East West All-Star, a key player on the New York Cubans that won the 1946 Negro Leagues World Series. After he was 28, he was a star with the Chicago White Sox, a player who put up offensive numbers in his 30s that are equal or superior to most of the players in the Hall of Fame. Later, of course, he became the oldest player to have an at-bat in the Major Leagues (though I believe Julio Franco is now 238). Nobody has put it all together yet, but Minoso has lived a Hall of Fame life.

There are many others who deserve consideration for this sort of award, but I’ll stop here and say I would love to hear some thoughts. I also want to take a second to thank everyone who has bought the book and everyone who came to the debut book party at the Negro Leagues Museum on Wednesday and book signing event at the Plaza on Thursday. It means the world to me.