Today's Birthday Team has a player who was known for having a remarkably large head.

And Barry Bonds.

C: Joe Oliver
1B: Preston Ward
2B: Dick Higham
3B: Joe Schultz Sr.
SS: Ed Montague Sr.
LF: Barry Bonds
CF/Manager: Jack Clements
RF: Tommy McCarthy

SP: Duane Pillette
SP: Alex Carrasquel
SP: Jerry Augustine
SP: Jesse Stovall
SP: Nate Bump
RP: Ryan Speier

General Manager: Mike Port
Less-talented family members of star ballplayers: Stephen Larkin, Scott Van Slyke

Clements was a catcher (the famously lefty throwing one!) and solid bat ... but not a cf (41 career g in of, 7 in cf, 1076 behind the plate).
117 career ops+, 7 yr peak of 141, single season peak of 170.

Granted, you could just be trying to fill a spot in the lineup, like w higham at 2b and Schultz at 3b

Yeah, there weren't really any legitimate center fielders. Reminds me of a old quote by a star NFL quarterback (I can't remember who) when someone asked him why he was the holder for kicks. He said something like "If I don't, nobody will be there to catch the snap."

On a real team, you'd probably end up with Clements playing LF and Bonds in CF, but I figured Bonds had earned the right to play wherever he wants.

Clint Conatser is the top "real" center fielder born today. Played two cromulent partial seasons for the Dodgers in the late 1940s.

I'd think that, as manager and easily the 2nd best player on the team, Clements might have some say... :)
I either play bonds in cf (who had the most games played there) or slide McCarthy over. If Oliver's gonna play anyway, I guess he catches - but having him catch v lefties, while Clements rests or plays first or... might be a better use of resources. Granted, Oliver has to play in this framework, that many games played and all...

Ryan Zimmerman's stat line so far in the month of July: .400/.464/.853, 9 HR, 22 RBI. Cortisone: the greatest medical invention of all time.

when someone does a post mortem on doug melvin's tenure with the brewers it's going to be pretty easy to sort out what went right and wrong.

when doug managed to patch together enough defense and pitching to go along with the steady offense the team won

but when he didn't hoo baby was it ugly

and the manager thing, that's a tricky one. ron r has a fair number of pluses. but for the life of me i don't understand sticking with a pitcher who lets 7 straight guys reach base in the ninth inning. most managers wouldn't do that in the fourth inning of any old game during the season. that there is a closer fetish to beat all closer fetishes

I think Kevin Mench had the largest hat size in MLB history.

New article up at THT: The Great 28, part 2 of 2. Part I introduced the 28 teams going into SG's sim machine. Now for the results. Who will turn out to be the best team ever? Click and see the results.

Also, today there's a new historical up at THT noting that today is the 65th anniversary of the last time the Dodger all-time cumulative franchise record was at .500. After 38 years under .500, they finally crawled their way back to even. They've since gone well above .500, of course.

Ryan Zimmerman's stat line so far in the month of July: .400/.464/.853, 9 HR, 22 RBI. Cortisone: the greatest medical invention of all time.

Why am I reminded of this "Brass Eye" segment?

I love Chris Morris.

Today is also the birthday of one of the sadder stories in Japanese baseball history, Shinichi Ishimaru. Ishimaru was a star pitcher for Nagoya (now the Chunichi Dragons) in the early 1940s. In 1943 he went 20-12 with a 1.16 ERA, and threw a no-hitter. He was subsequently drafted into the Navy, became a pilot, and eventually volunteered for a kamikaze squadron. He was killed on May 11, 1945 when his aircraft was shot down by American fighters while on route to its target. Ishimaru was the subject of a recent film in Japan.

Why am I reminded of this "Brass Eye" segment?

So did Zimmerman have the "good" shoulder tendinitis or the "bad" shoulder tendinitis? Because if he had the "bad" one, he should be run out of the league!

Game of the day (yesterday): Nats 8, Mets 2 (10). Steve Lombardozzi led off the top of the first with an infield single. Bryce Harper followed that with a two-run homer. Washington followed that with a walk and a single, but Chris Young and the Mets bullpen would make sure they didn't score again for quite some time.

Jordan Zimmermann traded goose eggs with Young until the fourth, when David Wright produced New York's first run of the game with a two-out solo homer. Zimmermann was lifted for a pinch hitter in the top of the seventh, and in the bottom of the inning, Mike Gonzalez served up a game-tying homer to Ike Davis. Both teams put singles runners on in the ninth, but didn't score, sending the game to extras.

Roger Bernadina led off the top of the tenth with a single against Tim Byrdak. Sandy Leon then hit a short grounder that the Mets threw to second, where Ruben Tejada dropped it, putting runners on first and second with none out. Pedro Beato replaced Byrdak; Mark DeRosa put down an attempted sacrifice, but Bernadina was forced at third on the play. Lombardozzi singled to load the bases, and Harper followed with a hit of his own to bring in the go-ahead run. Ryan Zimmerman tacked on a three-run double, and Mike Morse added a two-run homer. Beato went on to walk pitcher Tom Gorzelanny before being mercifully removed from the game, his ERA having increased from 2.25 to 10.38 (to be fair, he's pitched in 7 games this year). Gorzelanny worked around a walk in the bottom of the tenth to preserve the six-run victory.

This is a perfectly fine game - very good starting pitching (13 innings, 7 hits, 3 runs, 3 walks, 13 K's and 2 HR between them), a late tying run, and extras. It's also just about as bad as you can do in an extra inning game - it's the fourth-worst outing of 10 or more innings this year. And yet, it still grades out in the 79th percentile, and beats perfectly decent Royals-Angels and Phillies-Brewers games. As usual, extra innings are a virtue in themselves.

Mets lose huge in extra innings seems to be a developing theme.

New article up at THT: The Great 28, part 2 of 2. Part I introduced the 28 teams going into SG's sim machine. Now for the results. Who will turn out to be the best team ever? Click and see the results.

Cool. Any problems like the ones we had a few years ago when we tried this? Like guys with impressive rate stats in trivial number of PAs dominating the game?

Mets lose huge in extra innings seems to be a developing theme.

Indeed. I wonder what the last team was to lose extra-inning games by 5 or more runs on consecutive days?

Game of the day (last year): Royals 5, Rays 4 (10). Facing Jeff Francis, Desmond Jennings laced the fifth pitch of the game into the left-center field gap for a leadoff triple.

It was his first major league plate appearance of the year. So that's nice.

Jennings came in on Ben Zobrist's one-out single; Evan Longoria added a single of his own, and Sean Rodriguez drew a base-loading walk, but Francis stranded all three runners. After Jeff Niemann worked a perfect first inning for Tampa, Elliot Johnson tripled with one out in the second, and Jennings doubled him home, giving him the middle half of the cycle within his first two innings. Niemann kept up the good work, giving up two-out singles in the second and third but nothing further. In the fourth, Casey Kotchman and Kelly Shoppach started the inning with singles; Johnson hit into a double play, putting a runner at third with two out and bringing Jennings back to the plate.

In his third major league plate appearance of the year, and the twenty-seventh of his career, the Royals intentionally walked him. This practically forces me to ask the question: what's the fewest plate appearances any player has ever had before being intentionally walked? Without the pitcher being due up next?

It worked out all right for them; Jennings stole second, but Johnny Damon grounded out to end the inning. And their offense finally woke up in the bottom of the inning, as Billy Butler reached on an error by Longoria, moved to second on a wild pitch and third on a single by Eric Hosmer. After Jeff Francoeur fouled out to first, Mike Moustakas tied the game with a double to right-center.

The tie was short lived, as Zobrist and Longoria started the fifth with doubles of their own to put Tampa back in the lead. The Rays added another run against reliever Greg Holland with two out in the sixth when Jennings walked (unintentionally this time) and Damon doubled to bring him home. Kansas City drew closer in the bottom of the sixth when Hosmer singled, Francoeur doubled him to third, and Moustakas drove him in with a sac fly. Holland and Joel Peralta combined to retire the next ten hitters - six for Holland, four for Peralta, who was pulled for JP Howell with one out in the eighth. After striking out Hosmer, Howell hit Francoueur with a pitch and balked him to second, but Moustakas grounded to second to end the inning.

Aaron Crow set Tampa's hitters down in order in the ninth (including Jennings's first out of the year), giving his teammates one more shot at a one-run deficit. Kyle Farnsworth started the bottom of the inning by striking out Mitch Maier; he then walked Chris Getz, and induced Alcides Escobar to force Getz at second. That brought Alex Gordon to the plate, and on an 0-1 count, Gordon doubled to right-center, scoring Escobar and tying the game at 4.

In the tenth, Crow walked Longoria and BJ Upton before being pulled in favor of Joakim Soria. Matt Joyce greeted Soria with a single that loaded the bases. Kotchman then grounded back to the mound, with Soria throwing home for the force; the inning then ended with back-to-back strikeouts of Sam Fuld and Johnson.

Brandon Gomes came on for the Rays in the home portion. Billy Butler hit his first pitch into right field for a single, and was replaced by pinch runner Mike Aviles. Eric Hosmer then drove his second pitch into the left-center field gap for a walkoff RBI double.

This one grades out rather better than this year's game, thanks to the extra rallies, both successful and unsuccessful. Of particular note in this affair was the following: The teams combined for 10 extra-base hits, 8 doubles and 2 triples. All of the extra-base hits were involved in scoring rallies, and all of the scoring rallies involed extra-base hits.

Also, Desmond Jennings was intentionally walked in his third plate appearance up from the minors! I may not stop laughing (intermittently) about that for the rest of the evening.