Teixeira #78, Prince Fielder #294, Justin Morneau unranked.

I thought Prince Fielder was a fun player to root for. The injury that ended his career prematurely was unfortunate.

Mark Teixeira would rank 5th at 1B without David Ortiz, 6th without him. Justin Morneau would be ca. 60th at the position and Prince Fielder about 75th. None are in any danger of making my ballot in the foreseeable future.

Teixeira is the only one of the trio to make my consideration set, and even then he's down in the 200s. He's about half way between John Olerud and Mark Grace in the 'modern first baseman with a notably good glove' archtype. My system ranks him around Carlos Delgado and Ed Konetchy for first basemen.

The Angels getting him at the deadline in 2008 might be the best deadline acquisition in history if you put all the pieces together. They gave up Casey Kotchman and Stephen Marek, Teixeira absolutely crushed it, and the comp picks they got when he went to the Yankees turned into Mike Trout and Tyler Skaggs, the latter of whom turned into Dan Haren. The Angels decision making since that trade has been substantially less impressive...

Teixeira is basically tied around the 100th spot, with the likes of Matt Williams, Luis Aparicio, Dennis Martinez, Jamie Moyer, Gil Hodges, Mickey Lolich, Frank Viola, Herb Pennock, Claude Passeau, and Cliff Lee. Morneau and Fielder aren't even in my consideration pool.

Favorite Prince Fielder moment. Drifts back toward the stands on a foul ball. Play ends with him leaning in front of a fan with a tray of nachos. Fielder takes a nacho chip for a between-pitch snack. True story.

#5: I think Rosie O'Donnell made a similar play, but it was a hot dog.

Who was the more valuable Fielder, Prince or Cecil? (Insert joke here).

At a superficial glance it looks like Prince, but Cecil should get an adjustment for "blocked by Fred McGriff and Pat Gillick, went to Japan". Prince had 2800 MLB PA before age 26, Cecil 550 though deserving of more.

The Angels getting him at the deadline in 2008 might be the best deadline acquisition in history if you put all the pieces together.

The Rangers got Elvis Andrus, Jarrod Saltalamaccia, Matt Harrison and Neftali Feliz for two months of him, which is one of the best 21st century prospect hauls.

It was a year and two months of Teixeira that the Rangers gave up. The Braves traded away the big prospects to get him, missed the 2007 playoffs, and dealt him in mid-2008 when they realized that they were going nowhere that year, too.

It was a year and two months of Teixeira that the Rangers gave up.

Ah, good point. Still a nice haul.

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Justin was crushed by injuries. Very depressing how many players have their careers cut short. He is a good announcer, but that doesn't really figure into it.

And no, he ain't sniffing the HOM.