Infield: Harry Steinfeldt (1898-1911) arrives in the consciousness of most baseball fans as the answer to a trivia question: Who was the third baseman in the “Tinker to Evers to Chance” infield? He was a decent enough hitter and fielder, a starter on the great Chicago Cubs teams that were the first dynasty of the 20th century. After eight years in Cincinnati, Steinfeldt arrived in Chicago in 1906, led the NL in hits and RBI, and played in four World Series between 1906-10. He batted .471 in the 1907 Series, leading the Cubs to their first championship (though the pitching staff also played a role, allowing just six runs in five games). First baseman Howie Schultz (1943-48) was a 6-foot-6 guy who was nicknamed “Stretch” and “Steeple.” After an undistinguished baseball career, he played for a few years in the NBA as a teammate of George Mikan in Minneapolis. Second baseman Heine Smith (1897-1903) was a pretty ordinary player, but he does have the distinction of being John McGraw’s predecessor as manager of the New York Giants. Shortstop Heine Sand (1923-28) gives us two Heines in the infield, neither one of whom could hit. (For the record, there have been almost two dozen men named Heine who have played in the majors, but none since the retirement of Heine Manush in 1939. Many people confuse Heine Peitz with Heine Reitz, though they are in fact two different guys. In St. Louis, a youth ballfield is named in honor of Heine Meine. Now let’s wrap up the “Beavis & Butt-Head” snickering and move on.)
Outfield: Left fielder Hank Sauer (1941-59) was a tremendous slugger who didn’t stick in the majors until he was 31 years old because of (a.) military service, (b.) concerns about his egregious defense, and (c.) the pigheadedness of team management in Cincinnati that was convinced, despite all evidence to the contrary, that Sauer’s prowess as a minor-league power hitter would not translate to the majors so they would rather use guys who they already knew couldn’t hit. Finally Sauer hit 50 home runs and slugged .668 in Triple-A at age 30 and the Reds said “OK, OK … “ He hit 286 of his 288 career home runs after the age of 31, and he won the NL MVP in 1951 when he led the league in home runs and RBI while playing for the Cubs. He was a bad defensive player, but the man could hit. Center fielder Harry Stovey (1880-93) was a great hitter, too. In fact, when he retired he was baseball’s career home run leader (with 122) until Roger Connor took that title from him a couple of years later. Playing his best years in Philadelphia, he regularly lead the American Association in homers, triples, runs, slugging percentage and other stats. Right fielder Homer Summa (1920-30) was a .300 hitter in a time when everyone hit .300. In fact, Hardball Times reports that Summa held, lost, and recently regained a career record – among all players with a .300 career average in 3,000 or more plate appearances, Summa had the lowest career OPS+ figure (92), which measures overall offensive effectiveness. Juan Pierre has supplanted him in this regard for a while, with an OPS+ below 90, but now that his career record dropped below .300, he no longer qualifies. It's Summa's record again.
Catcher: Hank Severeid (1911-26) started for a decade for the St. Louis Browns. He apparently loved to play catcher, and he was legendarily tough. This explains why he was able to play almost 1,400 games in the majors – and another 1,300 in the minors, pretty much all of them behind the plate. Decent enough hitter, nothing special, but the man was durable.
Rotation: Hilton Smith was one of the great pitchers in the history of the Negro Leagues, one of the guys in contention for the title of Best Negro League Pitcher Who Wasn’t Satchel Paige. In fact, he and Paige were teammates on the Kansas City Monarchs, though Smith’s quiet demeanor was a stark contrast to Paige’s outgoing nature. Smith won 20 games regularly, including a 25-1 record in 1941, and hit .300 in several different seasons. Hal Schumacher (1931-46) was a good, and very consistent, starter for the New York Giants. He won 61 games between 1933-35, and then he went seven consecutive seasons with between 11-13 victories. He was a good hitter (15 career home runs) and had some memorable starts in his three World Series – in Game 5 of the 1936 Series, he pitched a 10-inning complete game for the victory, highlighted by the third inning when, with the bases loaded and nobody out, he struck out DiMaggio and Gehrig, then got Dickey to fly out. You already know the story of Cleveland lefty Herb Score (1955-62). He won 16 games at age 22, then won 20 at age 23, leading the American League in strikeouts both seasons. In his first five starts of the 1957 season, he was pitching great – until he took a line drive in the face. He was never the same. He was 38-20 with a 2.63 ERA before the line drive in the face, 17-26 with a 4.43 ERA after – as such, he remains a legend for what could have been. Harry Staley (1888-95) won 136 games in the 19th century. He had a couple of 20-win seasons, but then again, at the time he pitched you pretty much had to win 30 to lead the league. Harry Salisbury (1879-82) won 20 games in 1882, but then again … see the previous sentence.
Bullpen: Closer Huston Street (2005- ) won the AL Rookie of the Year Award at age 21 and now has more than career saves an an average of more than a strikeout per inning. He has made the transition from Oakland to Colorado and is still pitching well. Heathcliff Slocumb (1991-2000) also did some closing while bouncing around eight teams in 10 years. Not a bad pitcher, but it is probably his fate to be remembered as the guy who the Red Sox traded to Seattle in order to get Derek Lowe and Jason Varitek, thus helping to set the stage for the Removal of the Curse of the Bambino. Harry Smythe (1929-34) pitched 4,300 innings in the minors and won 301 games. In the majors, he had a career ERA of 6.40 and a career winning percentage of .294, which is not good at all. (Now, if he had .640 winning percentage and a 2.94 ERA, he’d be onto something.) Hal Smith (1932-35) pitched a few years for the Pirates and wasn’t too bad. Herm Starrette (1963-65) pitched well in the minors, and during his brief tenure with the Orioles he pitched well, too. He was out of baseball by age 28, presumably because of injuries, but he had a long career as a pitching coach (won a World Series ring with the 1980 Phillies) and as a front office assistant to Dan Duquette. Harry “ Pop” Shriver (1922-23) was another guy who was effective in a short major-league career. Harry Shuman (1942-44) was a pretty decent minor-league pitcher who logged a few big-league innings during World War II.
Bench: Outfielder Harry Simpson (1951-59) wasn’t a bad player. He led the league in triples twice, drove in 100 runs, played in an all-star game. But he is fixed in our collective memory as “Suitcase” Simpson, the guy who got traded so often that, as the saying goes, he lived out of his suitcase. Harry Spilman (1978-89) was a utility infielder who was a backup on some good teams. Heine Schuble (1927-36) is another utility infielder, and we’ve already made enough Heine jokes. Howie Shanks (1912-25) started in the Washington Senators’ outfield for more than a decade, despite a lack of any kind of consistent production. The backup catcher is Hal Smith, who played from the mid-1950s until the mid-1960s. Actually, there were two of them. It’s probably Hal Smith (1955-64), who bounced around five teams, won a World Series title with the 1960 Pirates, and three times hit double-digits in home runs. But maybe it’s Hal Smith (1956-65), who w as a weaker hitter and had a much shorter career with the Cardinals but did manage to play in two all-star games.
Manager: Haywood Sullivan was a weak-hitting catcher and had an unsuccessful stint managing the Kansas City A’s in 1965, but he made his mark in the front office of the Red Sox, serving as general manager and part owner from 1978-83. He took over a very good team, which then went downhill, though how much of it was Sullivan’s fault is open to discussion. He did trade guys like Fred Lynn and Rick Burleson, and he did let Carlton Fisk walk via free agency, and he did bring in a lot of older players who had been stars several years earlier. Most notoriously, he convinced the Red Sox to take his son, Marc, in the second round of the 1979 draft and then promoted him through the minors despite the fact that the kid couldn’t hit, finally giving him a lengthy trial in the majors in which he batted .186 with no power and a 5-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Because Marc Sullivan does not have the initials “HS,” we are assuming he won’t unexpectedly turn up on this team while our backs are turned.
Outfield: Left fielder Hank Sauer (1941-59) was a tremendous slugger who didn’t stick in the majors until he was 31 years old because of (a.) military service, (b.) concerns about his egregious defense, and (c.) the pigheadedness of team management in Cincinnati that was convinced, despite all evidence to the contrary, that Sauer’s prowess as a minor-league power hitter would not translate to the majors so they would rather use guys who they already knew couldn’t hit. Finally Sauer hit 50 home runs and slugged .668 in Triple-A at age 30 and the Reds said “OK, OK … “ He hit 286 of his 288 career home runs after the age of 31, and he won the NL MVP in 1951 when he led the league in home runs and RBI while playing for the Cubs. He was a bad defensive player, but the man could hit. Center fielder Harry Stovey (1880-93) was a great hitter, too. In fact, when he retired he was baseball’s career home run leader (with 122) until Roger Connor took that title from him a couple of years later. Playing his best years in Philadelphia, he regularly lead the American Association in homers, triples, runs, slugging percentage and other stats. Right fielder Homer Summa (1920-30) was a .300 hitter in a time when everyone hit .300. In fact, Hardball Times reports that Summa held, lost, and recently regained a career record – among all players with a .300 career average in 3,000 or more plate appearances, Summa had the lowest career OPS+ figure (92), which measures overall offensive effectiveness. Juan Pierre has supplanted him in this regard for a while, with an OPS+ below 90, but now that his career record dropped below .300, he no longer qualifies. It's Summa's record again.
Catcher: Hank Severeid (1911-26) started for a decade for the St. Louis Browns. He apparently loved to play catcher, and he was legendarily tough. This explains why he was able to play almost 1,400 games in the majors – and another 1,300 in the minors, pretty much all of them behind the plate. Decent enough hitter, nothing special, but the man was durable.
Rotation: Hilton Smith was one of the great pitchers in the history of the Negro Leagues, one of the guys in contention for the title of Best Negro League Pitcher Who Wasn’t Satchel Paige. In fact, he and Paige were teammates on the Kansas City Monarchs, though Smith’s quiet demeanor was a stark contrast to Paige’s outgoing nature. Smith won 20 games regularly, including a 25-1 record in 1941, and hit .300 in several different seasons. Hal Schumacher (1931-46) was a good, and very consistent, starter for the New York Giants. He won 61 games between 1933-35, and then he went seven consecutive seasons with between 11-13 victories. He was a good hitter (15 career home runs) and had some memorable starts in his three World Series – in Game 5 of the 1936 Series, he pitched a 10-inning complete game for the victory, highlighted by the third inning when, with the bases loaded and nobody out, he struck out DiMaggio and Gehrig, then got Dickey to fly out. You already know the story of Cleveland lefty Herb Score (1955-62). He won 16 games at age 22, then won 20 at age 23, leading the American League in strikeouts both seasons. In his first five starts of the 1957 season, he was pitching great – until he took a line drive in the face. He was never the same. He was 38-20 with a 2.63 ERA before the line drive in the face, 17-26 with a 4.43 ERA after – as such, he remains a legend for what could have been. Harry Staley (1888-95) won 136 games in the 19th century. He had a couple of 20-win seasons, but then again, at the time he pitched you pretty much had to win 30 to lead the league. Harry Salisbury (1879-82) won 20 games in 1882, but then again … see the previous sentence.
Bullpen: Closer Huston Street (2005- ) won the AL Rookie of the Year Award at age 21 and now has more than career saves an an average of more than a strikeout per inning. He has made the transition from Oakland to Colorado and is still pitching well. Heathcliff Slocumb (1991-2000) also did some closing while bouncing around eight teams in 10 years. Not a bad pitcher, but it is probably his fate to be remembered as the guy who the Red Sox traded to Seattle in order to get Derek Lowe and Jason Varitek, thus helping to set the stage for the Removal of the Curse of the Bambino. Harry Smythe (1929-34) pitched 4,300 innings in the minors and won 301 games. In the majors, he had a career ERA of 6.40 and a career winning percentage of .294, which is not good at all. (Now, if he had .640 winning percentage and a 2.94 ERA, he’d be onto something.) Hal Smith (1932-35) pitched a few years for the Pirates and wasn’t too bad. Herm Starrette (1963-65) pitched well in the minors, and during his brief tenure with the Orioles he pitched well, too. He was out of baseball by age 28, presumably because of injuries, but he had a long career as a pitching coach (won a World Series ring with the 1980 Phillies) and as a front office assistant to Dan Duquette. Harry “ Pop” Shriver (1922-23) was another guy who was effective in a short major-league career. Harry Shuman (1942-44) was a pretty decent minor-league pitcher who logged a few big-league innings during World War II.
Bench: Outfielder Harry Simpson (1951-59) wasn’t a bad player. He led the league in triples twice, drove in 100 runs, played in an all-star game. But he is fixed in our collective memory as “Suitcase” Simpson, the guy who got traded so often that, as the saying goes, he lived out of his suitcase. Harry Spilman (1978-89) was a utility infielder who was a backup on some good teams. Heine Schuble (1927-36) is another utility infielder, and we’ve already made enough Heine jokes. Howie Shanks (1912-25) started in the Washington Senators’ outfield for more than a decade, despite a lack of any kind of consistent production. The backup catcher is Hal Smith, who played from the mid-1950s until the mid-1960s. Actually, there were two of them. It’s probably Hal Smith (1955-64), who bounced around five teams, won a World Series title with the 1960 Pirates, and three times hit double-digits in home runs. But maybe it’s Hal Smith (1956-65), who w as a weaker hitter and had a much shorter career with the Cardinals but did manage to play in two all-star games.
Manager: Haywood Sullivan was a weak-hitting catcher and had an unsuccessful stint managing the Kansas City A’s in 1965, but he made his mark in the front office of the Red Sox, serving as general manager and part owner from 1978-83. He took over a very good team, which then went downhill, though how much of it was Sullivan’s fault is open to discussion. He did trade guys like Fred Lynn and Rick Burleson, and he did let Carlton Fisk walk via free agency, and he did bring in a lot of older players who had been stars several years earlier. Most notoriously, he convinced the Red Sox to take his son, Marc, in the second round of the 1979 draft and then promoted him through the minors despite the fact that the kid couldn’t hit, finally giving him a lengthy trial in the majors in which he batted .186 with no power and a 5-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Because Marc Sullivan does not have the initials “HS,” we are assuming he won’t unexpectedly turn up on this team while our backs are turned.
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