13 replies to this topic

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Well, it's all done. What started almost six months ago to combat the mid-season malaise has finally ended a week before Christmas.

Here are the Top 100 as voted by you, the SoSH members:

1. Ted Williams
2. Pedro Martinez
3. Carl Yastrzemski
4. Cy Young
5. Roger Clemens
6. Manny Ramirez
7. Tris Speaker
8. Wade Boggs
9. Jimmie Foxx
10. Babe Ruth
11. Jim Rice
12. Carlton Fisk
13. Dwight Evans
14. Bobby Doerr
15. David Ortiz
16. Lefty Grove
17. Smokey Joe Wood
18. Nomar Garciaparra
19. Joe Cronin
20. Dom DiMaggio
21. Luis Tiant
22. Mo Vaughn
23. Tim Wakefield
24. Fred Lynn
25. Tony Conigliaro
26. Johnny Pesky
27. Jason Varitek
28. Harry Hooper
29. Curt Schilling
30. Mel Parnell
31. Jimmy Collins
32. Dick Radatz
33. Rico Petrocelli
34. Jonathan Papelbon
35. Mike Greenwell
36. Bob Stanley
37. Bill Lee
38. Vern Stephens
39. Jackie Jensen
40. Dennis Eckersley
41. Derek Lowe
42. Dutch Leonard
43. Reggie Smith
44. Bruce Hurst
45. Pete Runnels
46. Kevin Youkilis
47. Buck Freeman
48. Dustin Pedroia
49. Larry Gardner
50. Ellis Burks
51. Josh Beckett
52. Frank Malzone
53. John Valentin
54. Tex Hughson
55. George Scott
56. Ellis Kinder
57. Duffy Lewis
58. Johnny Damon
59. Billy Goodman
60. Rick Burleson
61. Trot Nixon
62. Jim Lonborg
63. Bill Monbouquette
64. Marty Barrett
65. Jimmy Piersall
66. Mike Timlin
67. Rick Ferrell
68. Carl Mays
69. Joe Dobson
70. Rich Gedman
71. Mike Lowell
72. Bill Mueller
73. Frank Sullivan
74. Troy O'Leary
75. Wes Ferrell
76. Bill Dinneen
77. Chick Stahl
78. Jody Reed
79. Brian Daubach
80. Tom Burgmeier
81. Jon Lester
82. Sparky Lyle
83. JD Drew
84. Bernie Carbo
85. Bill Carrigan
86. Boo Ferriss
87. Mike Andrews
88. Dave Henderson
89. Ernie Shore
90. Everett Scott
91. Keith Foulke
92. Tom Gordon
93. Tommy Harper
94. Lee Smith
95. Butch Hobson
96. Jacoby Ellsbury
97. Bill Campbell
98. Ray Culp
99. Jake Stahl
100. Rich Garces

As far as lists go, this is a pretty good one. Towards the end it got a little weird, but the instructions were purposefully subjective and while I'm a big admirer of Mr. Dave Henderson, even I think that he's probably ranked ten spots too high. Not a big deal though, I felt that this was a fun exercise and a lot of great message boarding was the by product of it. Also, I learned a lot about some old Sox players from the turn of (last) century and was able to look at guys I thought that I had known.

Thanks to everyone who participated in the voting and nomination process, but a very special thanks goes to NiteVizhun UV. The dude really stepped up when I was in a bind and every week ran the polls and tallied the votes. This wouldn't have happened with out him. Again, thanks.

Perhaps in another five years we can do this again. Maybe John Lackey or Clay Buchholz or Adrian Gonazlez will make the list?

[pokey_reese]

Thanks a lot for doing this, I loved having the chance to be completely, deliberately subjective and not backing up my statements with data. I won't lie, my heart skipped a beat when I saw Troy O'Leary ranked ahead of J.D. Drew, because in my heart, there is no such thing as OPS.

[The Boomer]

This is awesome. You can debate whether any one particular player could move up or down the list a few slots. However, with nothing but HOF players ahead of him and a few directly behind him, doesn't this suggest that Dewey Evans belongs in the Hall of Fame too? His defense arguably puts him over the top but, realistically, he will need to wait until he is eligible for the Veteran's Committee.

[SeanBerry]

Awesome job JMOH and Nite.

That's a pretty fucking solid list.

[Foulkey Reese]

This has been great to follow. Nice job JMOH.

Mike Lowell being 20 spots ahead of Keith Foulke definitely jumped out at me.

[Nite Vizhun UV]

Well, it's all done. What started almost six months ago to combat the mid-season malaise has finally ended a week before Christmas.

[list]

Here are the Top 100 as voted by you, the SoSH members:
As far as lists go, this is a pretty good one. Towards the end it got a little weird, but the instructions were purposefully subjective and while I'm a big admirer of Mr. Dave Henderson, even I think that he's probably ranked ten spots too high. Not a big deal though, I felt that this was a fun exercise and a lot of great message boarding was the by product of it. Also, I learned a lot about some old Sox players from the turn of (last) century and was able to look at guys I thought that I had known.

Thanks to everyone who participated in the voting and nomination process, but a very special thanks goes to NiteVizhun UV. The dude really stepped up when I was in a bind and every week ran the polls and tallied the votes. This wouldn't have happened with out him. Again, thanks.

Perhaps in another five years we can do this again. Maybe John Lackey or Clay Buchholz or Adrian Gonazlez will make the list?

Thanks JMOH, it was fun. What's our next polling project and when does it start?!

[Mike Greenwall]

You know, looking at the final results, I think SOSH did a great job with this. I have no problem with the placements, let alone the names.

Well done.

[Cuzittt]

As I said before, I appreciate the effort made by all the people who participated. I think it was a great exercise.

I think we mostly got the right people. I think we mostly got them near where they should be. If there is any major complaining to do... we tended to rate more recent players more highly than the older players (Schilling is at least 10-20 places too high). That, and Dave Henderson... but I am not going to belabor that point.

It will be interesting to see what happens if we do this again in 5 years. I think some of our current infatuations will be tempered (while new ones flair up).

And... yes, Dwight Evans belongs in the Hall of Fame. He was a better player than Jim Rice.

[Al Zarilla]

I think we mostly got the right people. I think we mostly got them near where they should be. If there is any major complaining to do... we tended to rate more recent players more highly than the older players (Schilling is at least 10-20 places too high). That, and Dave Henderson... but I am not going to belabor that point.

I don't know about rating recent players too high. Those guys in the decades of the heavy flannel, baggy uniforms just don't look that athletic in the old black and white films I see, compared with today's players. OK, there are some out of shape guys that still make it today because of a unique ability to hit or pitch, but there are also a lot of pretty good athletes in today's game, whose athleticism can make them better fielders and baserunners to go with their hitting skills. An old film example, MLB Network was showing old world series clips a few weeks ago, half hour segment per series. Of course, I watched the 1946 one, and a few others in that timeframe. I was surprised how much action was crammed into the half hour. One thing stuck out: most of the players looked like they were playing a Sunday softball game. The speed of the game just wasn't there. Shockingly, Ted Williams looked really fast going from home to second on a double he hit, faster than most of the other guys shown running out hits, or in the field. If Ted looked fast, how slow were the other guys? Dom DiMaggio looked fast too. Enos Slaughter, on the famous "Pesky held the ball" play, just stuck his head down and busted it all the way from first to home, but he didn't look like a fast runner.

Bigger, stronger, faster, you usually hear it WRT football back when vs. now, but I think it applies to all sports. Just throwing it out there, and maybe it's too tangential here, but the integration of baseball with Jackie Robinson, Larry Doby, et al may have been the catalyst to speeding up and making baseball much more athletic.

[Soxfan in Fla]

As I said before, I appreciate the effort made by all the people who participated. I think it was a great exercise.

I think we mostly got the right people. I think we mostly got them near where they should be. If there is any major complaining to do... we tended to rate more recent players more highly than the older players (Schilling is at least 10-20 places too high). That, and Dave Henderson... but I am not going to belabor that point.

It will be interesting to see what happens if we do this again in 5 years. I think some of our current infatuations will be tempered (while new ones flair up).

And... yes, Dwight Evans belongs in the Hall of Fame. He was a better player than Jim Rice.

Agreed. Evans was a better overall player (excellent defensively), whose hitting numbers were similar. Evans was never the feared hitter that Rice was for a stretch but overall was consistently solid for a very long time. Evans should be in the HOF before Rice.

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

After the holidays, I was hoping to do a few more of these:

-- Top 20 Managers
-- Top 10 Front Office Types (including GMs, owners)
-- Bottom 20 Least Favorite Red Sox (may break that out into player, managers, front office types or expand to a Bottom 50)
-- Top 50 Greatest Sox Moments

We'll see what happens.

[jacklamabe65]

Great job, my friend.

Love it that number 25 is Tony C.

May I add that Ned Martin would be the lead announcer for this team....

[brs3]

I posted the final list(and linked some of the related threads) at the Red Sox page on Baseball Digest's website. Thanks for letting me share it! The whole process was awesome to participate in and watch unfold.

[bigyazbread]

Great job, my friend.

Love it that number 25 is Tony C.

May I add that Ned Martin would be the lead announcer for this team....

With Jim "Possum" Woods as his partner.