He has played 1,761 games and has amassed 1,826 career hits which includes a shortened 2019 (injury) and 2020 (COVID) seasons.
Before Cutch's 1st regular season game with the Brewers, I thought it would be fun to look at the best team I can put together using only players from the Pirates, Giants, Yankees, and Phillies.
This will be a fun exercise, but to avoid putting a roster full of mostly just Yankees All Time Greats though I am making some rules.
I can only select 1 player from that team equal to the number of seasons (even if they weren't full seasons) for each team that Cutch played for. This means that Cutch's 25 games with the Yankees during the 2018 season limits me to select only 1 Yankee to be on my roster because he only played for that team in one season.
My 13 player roster must include one player for each position (1B, 2B, SS, 3B, RF, CF, LF, C), SP, and relief pitcher. That takes up 10 spots on my roster. I'm also going to include a DH so I don't have to worry about taking out my starting pitcher late in games and the DH is now a universal rule in both leagues.
Now for the real fun, if a player played for same teams that Cutch played for, all teams count. This means that if I want to use Barry Bonds for Left Field because he played for the Pirates, I can't use any other players who played for the Giants, so Willie Mays and Willie Mccovey are both out because Bonds played for the Giants and Pirates. I will have to be diligent about my selections.
The player I select can not have played less games than Andrew did for that team. This means that if I wanted to use one of the greatest second baseman of all time, Ryne Sandberg, and claim him as a Phillie, I can't. Cutch played 260 games for the Phillies and Sandberg appeared in only 13 games for the Phillies.
So here's how the maximum number of players per team will breakdown equal to the number of seasons Cutch played with them.
9 Pirates
1 Giants
1 Yankees
3 Phillies
With a team having to consist of so many Pirates, I wanted to look at the All Time Greats, especially those that played their entire careers with the Pirates.
Let's look at the guys who have statues outside PNC Park first
RF Roberto Clemente
SS Honus Wagner
1B/LF Willie Stargell
2B Bill Mazeroski
That's a good start to the team. It takes care of my basic infield and a key spot in the lineup with Clemente being a middle of order guy and a perennial gold glove winner. I will circle back to the Pirates after I knock out some more obvious choices
For the Giants there is only one player I want
The greatest player of All Time
CF Willie Mays
If you wish to argue against Mays being the greatest player of all time, I welcome your challenge in the comments below.
The Yankees have such a deep and rich history I could pick anyone from Yogi Berra to Mariano Rivera to Babe Ruth to Lou Gehrig and everyone in between. So instead I will skip forward to the Phillies.
Let's fill out our infield with the best 3rd Baseman of All Time, Mike Schmidt.
Schmidt won 3 MVPs over his career along with ten Gold Glove Awards. He is the most beloved player in Phillies franchise history ahead of notable HOF alumni, Steve Carlton.
Now as far as pitchers go, Steve Carlton would be an obvious choice. He started nearly 500 games for the Phillies and won 4 Cy Young Awards. There is one problem though, he played 6 games for the Giants. This eliminates Carlton from being used as he played for both the Giants and Phillies and played in less games for the Giants than Cutch did. Sorry Lefty!
Roy Halladay recently had his number retired by the Phillies and won a Cy Young with the club and pitched a no hitter with them in his first post season appearance. Unfortunately, Doc doesn't qualify because he pitched in less games than Cutch played for the Phillies.
If I want to use a pitcher it will likely have to be someone with the Yankees (only 25 games played by Cutch in pinstripes) or be a Pirate or Phillies starter who made A LOT of starts.
It really is a shame that Carlton played those 6 games with San Francisco disqualifying him from this team I am making.
There is one lefty in the Phillies though had a lot of success with the Phillies, more so than Hall of Famer, Robin Roberts.
I am talking about Cole Hamels
294 games started
3.30 ERA
World Series MVP
Nearly 1,900 strikeouts with Phillies
In addition to those stats he had a better ERA+ and a better WHIP than the HOF pitcher Robin Roberts.
Cole's teammates Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, and Ryan Howard could all have a place on my team. I will have to see how the rest of my roster plays out. I do have one more Phillies spot left on my roster.
Catchers are thin in the history of the Pirates, I may have to look at other teams.
Buster Posey, Yogi Berra, and Thurman Munson all come to mind. I can't use Buster if I want to use Mays. Do I really want to use my only Yankees selection on Yogi Berra?
The answer is no. I am using my ONLY Yankees selection on the ONLY PLAYER TO BE UNANIMOUSLY elected into the Hall of Fame.
Enter Sandman!
Mariano Rivera is my closer and my only Yankees selection. This may be viewed as an odd selection since I only get one player to represent the Yankees. No one dominated as a reliever quite like Mo. Sure there are guys like Roy Face that won 18 games out of the bullpen for the Pirates, but if I want to ensure the game is won late in the game, give me Mo.
So here's what I have left to use
1 Phillies
5 Pirates
And here is my lineup thus far
1B Willie Stargell (can also play LF)
2B Bill Mazeroski
SS Honus Wagner
3B Mike Schmidt
RF Roberto Clemente
CF Willie Mays
SP Cole Hamels
RP Mariano Rivera
I still need a LF, C, and DH
For catcher, I'm going with one of my favorite players of the late 90s and early 2000s, Jason Kendall. Kendall is one of a handful of catchers with 2,000 career hits at the position and because he played his best years on a terrible Pirates team, he is often very under rated. He was a 3 time All Star and finished his career with more walks (721) than strikeouts (686). He had a .366 OBP which is a very high OBP for a catcher, higher than Carter, Fisk, and Bench.
As for LF, I'm going to put Ralph Kiner out there. Kiner hit 301 HR over 8 seasons with the Pirates and is the only player to lead the league in HR for 7 straight seasons. Kiner also provides another option at 1B.
As for my DH, I'm going with another slugger, Ryan Howard. Prior to his 2011 postseason injury, Howard put the league on watch and became the fastest player in MLB history to get to 300 HR. Dick Allen would be a fallback option with his .902 OPS in Philadelphia.
So how would I put this lineup together?
SS Honus Wagner
RF Roberto Clemente
CF Willie Mays
1B Willie Stargell
LF Ralph Kiner
3B Mike Schmidt
DH Ryan Howard
2B Bill Mazeroski
C Jason Kendall
SP Cole Hamels
RP Mariano Rivera
At first glance I was going to move Schmidt higher in the lineup but wanted to split up all the right handed bats (Wagner, Clemente, Mays, Kiner) so I threw Stargell into the cleanup spot. The amount of HR power the 3-7 spots have without a single Yankee is mind blowing.
Kendall can restart the lineup from the 9 hole and act as another leadoff option if needed.
Do you agree with my selections?
How would you put together a roster using a max of 9 Pirates, 3 Phillies, 1 Yankees, 1 Giants?
This is a fun, creative idea. Cole Hamels feels like the weak link, which speaks to the strength of the team. I like this post a lot!
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting set of rules. I feel like maybe you just didn't want Barry Bonds on the team, which I can totally understand.
ReplyDeleteI think I'd take Berra as my catcher and use Elroy Face or Kent Tekulve as my closer. Obviously Mo is better, but I think the difference at catcher is more important. You could consider Paul Waner or Chuck Klein for that DH spot.
I do think Ruth was a better player than Mays, much as I love Mays, because his numbers were so amazing in their time (there were seasons when he had more home runs than any other TEAM in the league) and because he was also an excellent pitcher. But it's close and there's no denying how great Willie was.
I considered both Tekulve and Waner, but the multiple team rule prohibits me from using them. Tekulve pitched for the Phillies and Waner played his final 2 seasons in New York.
DeleteAs for Face, he was a better than average pitcher, but not elite.
I chose Kendall because I personally think he was very underrated and has a really high OBP from the catcher position, which will help "reset" the lineup for the boppers.
It was hard for me to leave Ruth out but I would much rather have Roberto patrolling RF.
Very cool idea. It's been a long week and my mind is a little bit fried, so I'll just agree with your picks... except swap out Hamels and replace him with Lefty. And instead of Kendall... I'd go with Tony Pena.
ReplyDeleteMy buddy has been picking up different Rickey Henderson cards from Dynasty. I think he has four different teams. I'm jealous of his project.
Based on my rules I couldn't use Lefty because he played fewer games for the Giants than Cutch did. Otherwise, 100% agree!
DeleteFun post and exercise! The 4 Dynasty cards next to each other look great. I had no idea that was a thing, but very cool set together.
ReplyDeleteI wish Cutch was on the Yankees longer and got on some dual relics. A Cutch/Cole dual Yankees relic would be cool!
Also, you should have gone with Tino at 1B! Come on!
Fascinating post. I think I would make a couple of pitching changes though. I would go with Whitey Ford over Cole Hamels. That would mean losing Rivera (although I consider him to be one of the most overrated players of all time). In the place of the closer, I would go old school Phillies and use Tug McGraw. He didn't have the gaudy save numbers of modern relievers, but that is because he actually pitched more than one inning a game. That means he also pitched 900 more career innings than Rivera.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how a game like this would work for a more traveled legend like Rickey Henderson or even, dare I say, Edwin Jackson.
This was a fun post! I think your team looks good based on the criteria. It would be tempting to pick Berra as the catcher, but there's no other quality closer you can use since Teke is ineligible. Gotta go to Mo, lol.
ReplyDeleteKendall is very underrated. Nice choice there.
Mays is my pick as the greatest CF ever, and probably the best all-around player ever. I am a bit surprised you didn't go with Bonds and Cutch though :D
Fun post with the interesting rules!
ReplyDelete