June 10- Anaheim Angels

I realize a lot of people, especially Anaheim Angles fans aren’t particularly fond of this cap, but honestly, I kind of dig it. It was first introduced in 1997, the same time the California was dropped from the name and the Anaheim was added. For five grueling years they wore this cap under managers Terry Collins, Joe Maddon and Mike Scioscia just as he was starting out. It served as their game cap, unlike its counterpart with the light blue bill which I wrote about on April 8^th. While the Angels themselves didn’t fair out too well under this cap, there is one moment that occurred while they were wearing this bad boy that I can’t shake for my mind.

As an Oakland Athletics fan it’s hard for me to tip my cap to an accomplishment by a rival player; however, there are just some moments that occur in sports that one needs to cast differences aside and realize that what they just witnessed is truly spectacular. Even more impressive is when someone I’ve had a history with and I agree upon the same thing. This story takes place on a random day in April while the other eight Cave Dwellers and I were watching “Top 50 Countdown- Greatest Defensive Plays” edition on MLB Network while we were sitting around waiting for our production assignments for the day in the MLB Fan Cave.

I’m having a little bit of difficulty remembering which day in particular it was, but I think it might have been on April 27^th as we were waiting for Detroit Tigers players Collin Balester and Miguel Cabrera. The two were running just a little bit late and all eight of us had gotten there especially early for prep-work on the Miggy Poco sketch that we would be filming that day. With time to kill until they arrived we turned a few of the televisions on the Cave Monster on and tuned into MLB Network since all we were really allowed to watch was baseball no matter what hour of the day it was. Due to it being so early in the morning, 8:45 AM EST, there wasn’t anything live on air quite yet, so we were regaled with “Top-50 Countdown.” The funniest part of this moment is that St. Louis Cardinals fan Kyle Thompson, Atlanta Braves fan Ricky Mast, New York Yankees fan Eddie Mata and I really knew all of the plays that they were going to show. So of course, to make things interesting, we all started predicting the order of the Top-10 plays. The only problem with this is that this particular activity, much like the crew who assembled the stories and highlights, based everything around lore and personal opinion. There really isn’t an accurate way to rank any of these moments, especially when it comes to something like robbing a home run. At the end of the day, as long as the ball was caught, the job was done. I suppose a degree of difficulty could be added onto it, but a lot of that is arbitrary too because the ground covered by the defender is really based on how well they read the person at the plate and where they’re stuck when it comes to defensive positioning. Yes, I take a lot of these things into consideration when making important judgment calls.

By the time we started out little game the show had all ready cracked the Top-20. Not having any idea of what the previous 30 plays were made it a little more challenging. Eddie, being the homer that he is, of course said the Derek Jeter flip play was going to be number one. My response to that has simply giving Eddie the finger. I don’t really remember what Ricky said, but both Kyle and I ended up with the same answer. It was probably the only time he and I ever really agreed on anything.

This is another befuddling moment for me because I don’t remember exactly where the moment landed on the list. I’m pretty sure it was Top-five, possibly even at number 3, but to this day I still stick to my guns as it is not only the greatest play I have ever seen as it occurred, but quite possibly the best play in history. Once again, this is merely a matter of my opinion and should be taken as such. No sense in starting a Holy War over something so trivial.

6/10/97- One of the really cool things about living in Bakersfield, California during baseball season was that I got a seemingly endless fill of Major League Baseball games on TV even without the assistance of MLB.tv or MLB Network, both of which didn’t exist at the time. Now, the only drawback to this is that I was stuck watching Los Angeles Dodgers and Anaheim Angels games. Sadly I was too far away from the cusp of where we had a signal to the Bay Area sports stations so I could only watch Athletics games if they ever played on ESPN or against the Angels.

On one particular summer day on June 10, 1997 I found myself especially bored out of my mind I was watching the Angels on the road against the Kansas City Royals. Just to let you know how bad things were back in those days, Angels’ skipper Terry Collins had the team sitting is second place in the American League West with a 32-28 record while Bob Boone was on the verge of getting canned as the manager of the Royals as they were in third place in the AL Central at 28-31. The Angels struck first in the top of the second inning with a 1-0 lead after Tim Salmon crossed the plate from second thanks to a Garrett Anderson single. The Royals would make a charge in the bottom of the fifth inning, tying the game a one apiece after a Jeff King double followed up by an RBI single by Chili Davis. Johnny Damon then followed that up with a single while the next two batters, Mike MacFarlane and Scott Cooper lined out to Anderson in left field. With two outs, a runner on first in the bottom of the fifth inning, Royals’ right fielder David Howard came to the plate.

The look of a true baller.

Howard had broken into the Major Leagues in 1991 and was 59 games into his final season with the Royals at the time when he stepped into the batters box. The best season he had ever put together was in 1996, the only season in which he played in over 94 games (143). In ’96 he hit .219 with four home runs and 48 RBI. He got cot caught stealing more often than he was successful, which goes to show that he wasn’t that quick for as fit as he was. His four home runs in ’96, 11 for his career show that he didn’t have a lot of power. And despite how mediocre his career may have been, stats wise, he will always be remembered for this at-bat.

 The eyes say, "I'm stone cold," but the sideburns say, "I came to party."

 Jason Dickson was pitching for the Angels that day. Dickson had been called up the previous season, 1996, and made seven starts for the Angels, going 1-4 with a 4.57 ERA. 1997 was proving to be a much better year for the 24-year-old right-hander who would go on to make his one and only All-Star Game appearance that year and finish in third place for the AL Rookie of the Year award with a 13-9 record, a 4.29 ERA and 115 strikeouts. Unfortunately for Dickson, some “flash in the pan” (sarcasm) named Nomar Garciaparra made short work of every rookie in the league.

Dickson threw a hanging curveball to Howard which he immediately turned on. For a guy hitting in the nine-hole it’s not exactly expected the he’d make contact, but for the lack of power he usually put behind the ball, Howard sent this was screaming to centerfield. Angles centerfielder Jim Edmonds then had to get on his horsey and haul ass to even come close to making a play. Wait… did I say Jim Edmonds? Did I say come close to making a play?

"Thanks for the stupid jersey Disney."

Edmonds made his MLB debut on September 9, 1993 as a late-season call up for the 40-man expansion roster. In 1994 he played in 94 games (94 in ’94, funny) and hit .273 with five home runs and 37 RBI which was good enough for an eighth place finish for AL Rookie of the Year. In 1995 he made his first of only four All-Star Game appearances as well as a 14^th place finish for AL MVP after going .290/33/107. It was a really stupid year for on the voter’s behalf. Edmonds produced another solid year in 1996, but it would be on this day in 1997 that Edmonds became a household name.

As the ball sailed into centerfield Edmonds could tell that he was playing way too shallow to make a play. However, while most people would make the play off the wall after realizing they’re doomed, Jim “F---ing” Edmonds will do everything in his power to make that out. Rather than me blab about it anymore, take a look at the play here.

Now, there are plays that a truly worth of note, and then there are some like this that are beyond words like “boner-inducing,” as I would use. “The Catch,” as it’s known throughout the baseball community, pretty much cemented the first of eight Gold Glove awards that Edmonds would win throughout his career. Now, I realize that there are some purists out there who still hold Willie Mays’s over the shoulder basket catch during Game one of the 1954 World Series as the greatest play of all-time; however, all I can really say to those people is, “Shut your mouth. Shut it.” While the importance of Mays’s catch is what makes his so amazing, the pure athleticism and sacrifice of the body is why I hold what Edmonds accomplished in such high regards, even if it is an early June game against a team that hadn’t been to the playoffs since they won the World Series in 1985. It’s a level of play that very few will ever display in their careers, and Edmonds did it on a regular basis.

The Angels, energized by what they had witnessed, went on a scoring tear and beat the Royals by the final score of 6-2. But even with the win all anyone wanted to talk about that night on ESPN’s Sportscenter was that amazing play which we still talk about to this day.

Like I said, “boner-inducing.”

June 9- Boston Red Sox

I have to admit, and I’ll give you the same answer no matter how many times I’m asked this question: What is the best Major League Baseball stadium you’ve ever been to? As much as my heart belongs to the Coliseum and the Oakland Athletics, I have never been in such a state of child-like wonder more than the three days I got to spend at Fenway Park in Boston. While I realize that New York Yankees fans will more than likely disagree with me on this answer, the fact of the matter is that if you name any other stadium, you’re just wrong. Granted, as a Yankee fan, or a fan of a rival team I can totally understand you having a bad experience at Fenway, but I’m merely talking about the park itself. As far as atmosphere is concerned, Fenway is definitely Top-five.

Prior to campaign for the MLB Fan Cave at the start of 2012 I was set to be completely finished with my education at the University of Oregon right around St. Patrick’s Day. As a personal reward for my accomplishment I had been saving money in order to finance a continent-wide tour of all the stadiums in MLB, including Olympic Stadium in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Of all 31 stadiums (including Olympic) available, I was going to make sure that I hit the five that I had always wanted to visit since my childhood: Wrigley Field, Tiger Stadium (Comerica Park), PNC Park, Olympic and Fenway. Needless to say, when I got accepted for the Fan Cave gig everything got put on hold. Well, everything except baseball that is.

When I was let go from my services as a Cave Dweller I found myself in a peculiar situation, one that I had never been in since I was two-years-old; I didn’t have a job and I wasn’t in school. Due to the fact that I was let go the day after Memorial Day in 2012 I wouldn’t be able to enroll back into classes until fall term. The main reason for that is because the one Spanish class that I needed was over capacity during summer term and I couldn’t take it again until winter of 2013. In short, the Fan Cave really screwed me and didn’t bother feeling the slightest bit sorry for my situation. No matter, I stood strong and got it done this last winter. With about $14,000 left of the initial $18,000 I got for my three months of work in New York City, I plotted out, made calls and set up reservations for my North American Baseball tour.

Obviously I’ve been talking a lot about my trip throughout these posts so I’ll spare the details of everything leading up to getting to Fenway. I stayed in Boston off-and-on for a little over a week. During my time I caught two Red Sox games and a concert. I’m also not going to go into too much detail on either of the games or the concert as they will be talked about at length when I get to the particular hats I was wearing those nights. The main things I want to focus on here are all the little nuances about Fenway Park that make it a baseball paradise. Things like…

The old bullpen car

Bullpen cars something that has been long forgotten, used between 1951 and 1996, but according to lore it was just as much of an in between inning thrill as zambonies are at hockey games. They used to take the pitchers from the bullpen to the mound and were occasionally used to bring special guests to the field before the games. It sounds crazy, but it was part of the game.

The Ted Williams statue (featuring a drunkard)

An 8-foot, 6-inch-tall statue of Williams mounted on a four-foot granite base was unveiled Friday afternoon outside Gate B of Fenway, located behind the right-field line. The structure, which weighs 3,380 pounds, depicts Williams holding a bat over his left shoulder while he places his cap on the bald head of a cancer-stricken child. Williams made a tradition of visiting children at the Jimmy Fund Clinic of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Pesky Pole (featuring The Shark)

Pesky's Pole is the name for the pole on the right field foul line, which stands 302 feet from home plate, the shortest outfield distance (left or right field) in Major League Baseball. Despite the short wall, home runs in this area are relatively rare, as the fence curves away from the foul pole sharply. The pole was named after Johnny Pesky, a light-hitting shortstop and long-time coach for the Red Sox, who hit some of his six home runs at Fenway Park around the pole but never off the pole. Pesky and the Red Sox give credit to pitcher Mel Parnell for coining the name. The most notable for Pesky is a two-run homer in the eighth inning of the 1946 Opening Day game to win the game (in his career, Pesky hit 17 home runs). On September 27, 2006, on Pesky's 87th birthday, the Red Sox organization officially dedicated the right field foul pole as Pesky's Pole with a commemorative plaque placed at its base.

And of course, the Green Monster

The Green Monster is the nickname of the 37.167 feet left field wall in the park. It is located 310 to 315 feet from home plate; this short distance often benefits right-handed hitters.

Part of the original ballpark construction of 1912, the wall is made of wood, but was covered in tin and concrete in 1934 when the scoreboard was added. The wall was covered in hard plastic in 1976. The scoreboard is manually updated throughout the game. Despite the name, the Green Monster was not painted green until 1947; before that it was covered with advertisements. The Monster designation is relatively new; for most of its history it was simply called the wall. In recent years, terrace-style seating has been added on top of the wall.

For those of you who are Red Sox enthusiasts you’re probably thinking, “Dude, you’re missing something.” And yes, you would be correct. I am missing the one thing that I had three opportunities to have a photo taken with or of and somehow managed to blow it. But, I’ll get to that in a minute. First, that hat.

This cap was introduced at the start of the 1946 season as a replacement for basically the exact same hat; however, the key difference between this cap and the one used in 1945 is that this one features a white outline around the “B.” The ones prior to this did not, and will be featured in a post down the road. Even though I have touched upon this detail in several of my prior posts, the addition of the outline proved to be one of the more successful uniform alterations made in MLB history. That season the Red Sox finished with the second-best record in their team’s history (104-50), only one less win than what the 1912 team posted. Besides the one win difference, the other unfortunate difference between the 1912 team and the 1946 team is that the 1912 team won the World Series that year 4-3 over the New York Giants. In 1946 the Red Sox lost the World Series 4-3 to the St. Louis Cardinals. The other notable moment of the 1946 season is that it was the first season since 1942 that the full team was back together and on the field as the previous three years saw several players including Bobby Doerr, Pesky and Williams all shipping off for war as I wrote about on May 26^th. The last appearance this cap made was the final game of the 1951 season as in 1952 the “B” was changed to the more traditional looking style of today.

Now, as I mentioned a little bit ago there is another important feature of Fenway that I didn’t list, which I did on purpose. For some strange reason I didn’t take a trip to see “the lone red seat” which sits out in centerfield beyond the Red Sox bullpen (Williamsburg). Actually, I take that back. I did end up out there for the second game I attended; however, whomever’s seat it was all ready had their keester in it. What does this mean in the long run? Basically, I have to get back to Fenway to make a photo happen; which I’m totally cool with. Which brings me to the marks.

42/37/21- No, it’s not a date or jersey numbers or stats. It’s the section (42), row (37) and seat (21) of the longest home run “hit on record.”  The Ted Williams hit on June 9, 1946, was officially measured at 502 feet, well beyond "Williamsburg". According to Hit Tracker Online, the ball, if unobstructed, would have flown 520 to 535 feet.

The ball landed on Joseph A. Boucher, penetrating his large straw hat and hitting him in the head. A confounded Boucher was later quoted as saying, “How far away must one sit to be safe in this park? I didn't even get the ball. They say it bounced a dozen rows higher, but after it hit my head, I was no longer interested. I couldn't see the ball. Nobody could. The sun was right in our eyes. All we could do was duck. I'm glad I did not stand up.”

Manny Ramirez is the only other player at Fenway Park who has ever hit the ball over the seat, on June 23, 2001; Ramirez hit two home runs; one estimated at 463 feet and another one with an official estimate of 501 feet. The latter blast struck a light tower above the Green Monster, denying it a true landing point, to which the official estimate deferred to Williams' record placing Ramirez's home run exactly one foot short.

As noted in the 2007 book The Year Babe Ruth Hit 104 Home Runs, researcher Bill Jenkinson found evidence that on May 25, 1926, Babe Ruth hit one in the pre-1934 bleacher configuration which landed five rows from the top in right field, an estimated 545 feet from home plate. Ruth also hit several other "Ruthian" blasts at Fenway that landed across the street behind straightaway center field, estimated at 500 feet.

By the way, in case you didn’t know, the name “Williamsburg” is the proper name for the Red Sox bullpen as it was aptly named for all the home runs Williams knocked into it.

4/20/46- I pretty much shot my wad early with this one, so to speak, as this was the date of opening day at Fenway in 1946. The significance I all ready stated above with Pesky’s home run in the eighth inning against the Philadelphia Athletics.

June 8- Houston Astros

There are a lot of stupid moments that have taken place in Major League Baseball history, but very few of them were able to make me cock my eyebrow as much as what took place on November 17, 2011. It’s one of those moments where I remember exactly where I was when “the news” broke. In fact, I was lying on my right side as my tattoo artist Felix the Tat was putting in the finishing touches on the National League side of my MLB tattoos as I was wishing my brother Adam a happy birthday via text message. The entire irony of what I was doing came to full fruition the second I got a text message from my friend Scott Landis (@ScottCLandis) who broke the word on the story that I had been dreading they’d make official since it was first announced earlier that year. “The Houston Astros will be playing their final season in the National league in 2012.”

In the months to follow, especially when my stock took off in my MLB Fan Cave campaign, I received a flurry of questions from fans and journalists in regard to the Astros tattoo that I have on my left hip, “so now that the Astros are in the American League, what does that mean for the tattoo you have? Are you going to have it grafted over?”

The first time I heard these questions I laughed. Upon the 10^th time I couldn’t help but tell people how stupid they are for asking that question. It wasn’t my intention to be insulting when I said it. It was all just a matter of a lack of research on their part. You see, one thing that everyone seemed to forget in the whole League switch melee is that I had designed my tattoos in the format that 1996 never ended. By this I mean I had the Milwaukee Brewers on the AL side to begin with as they never should have been moved in the first place.

And just like the Brewers, even if it was announced before I got the ink done, I still would have put the Astros on the side in which they were first brought into the league. After all, it’s MLB’s fault by screwing everything up in the first place by adding two NL teams (Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins) in 1993 as opposed to an AL and NL. What’s most interesting about the Astros move is that MLB could have fixed the ever-growing problem easily by moving the Brewers to the AL Central, where they belong, and the Kansas City Royals to the AL West and still have the three divisions with five teams each format that they were trying to assemble. Why the Royals you might ask? Well, since their inaugural season in 1969 the Royals had always been members of the AL West. From then until 1994 the Royals won six western division titles and a World Series in 1985. Since the divisional realignment in 1994 they haven’t won a thing. Even more interesting is that the Royals were the first team approached to switch to the NL at the end of the 1997 season, but they declined.

While my plan to correct everything back to the way things originally were may seem incredibly selfish, the reality is that in the long-run it would actually be financially beneficial to all parties involved. For starters, the Brewers would be able to go back to putting out new product and once again cash in on their 1982 AL Championship run without it looking awkward as current members of the NL. The Royals can once again take heed of the fact that their still, statistically, the second best team in the AL West, and probably improve up their seasonal fortune on the field by not having to face Justin Verlander and the Detroit Tigers so often throughout the season. But the biggest reason comes in with less money spent in regard to travel for the teams. I realize that’s kind of a frivolous thing to bring up, but with teams like the Oakland Athletics and the Royals who love to stretch every penny. Granted, in the case of the Athletics and Angels we’re literally talking about a 100-200 mile difference. But still!

There is a reason why I brought all of this up and it has to do with the date and the numbers I marked on my cap. MLB first started interleague on June 12, 1997 as the Texas Rangers squared off against the San Francisco Giants at The Ballpark in Arlington. With interleague one of the for sure matchups that occur every season is for every team to play their “rival” as assessed by MLB, not necessarily the fan bases. This is why you get such classic “storied” matchups of the San Diego Padres taking on the Mariners every season. When it came to the Astros, one would think that the Rangers, their in-state counterpart, would have met this standard. Nope! The Astros and Rangers wouldn’t face one another until four seasons after interleague first started. On June 8, 2001 the Rangers hosted the Astros for the first ever Lone Star Series (Lone Star Showdown sounds better) which ended with a 5-4 victory for the Astros.

The Astros first introduced these caps at the start of the 2000 season as one of the accoutrements for their first season at their new stadium, The Ballpark at Union Station. This of course was its first name before becoming Enron Field (2000-2002), which then became Astros Field (2002) until they sold the naming rights to Coca-Cola in July of 2002 in which it has been Minute Maid Park ever since. The really weird thing about this cap is that the Astros used at both home and only the road, it mostly depended on which uniform they were wearing. From 2000-2012 they definitely wore it on the road with their grey jerseys which said Houston written across the chest; however, whenever they wore their black pinstriped uniforms at home, they also donned this cap. In these cases it relied mostly upon who was pitching that day.

2001 was the beginning of what should have been the Astros domination of the NL Central for well over a decade. They came close at times, but alas, things have sadly gotten back to the way it used to be back when they were the Houston .45s. As much as people want to say that the 2000s Astros relied heavily upon the Killer B’s and some solid pitching from Roger Clemens and Roy Oswalt, there are two guys who played a major impact in the team’s success. Two guys who rarely get the credit they deserve… until now.

#14- Back in 1994 the Mariners selected a third baseman with a lot of promise out of Redondo Beach High School in the 61^st round of the amateur draft. Being chosen that late he had a flurry of options, and elected to take the smarter route by enrolling at USC to play for the Trojans. In 1998, his senior year, he and the Trojans won the NCAA National Championship over then-PAC-10 rival Arizona State. This particular player is still the only Trojan to hit 20 home runs and steal 20 bases in a season. With the championship and a few stellar seasons under his belt he re-entered the draft in 1998 and was selected in the ninth round by the Astros. On September 20, 2000 during 40-man roster call-ups, Morgan Ensberg made his Major League debut wearing #2 as a pinch hitter for Chris Truby. Ensberg would only play in four games that season and spend all of 2001 and half of 2002 in AAA with the New Orleans Zephyrs of the Pacific Coast League.

With a new outlook and a new number (#14), Ensberg played in 49 games in 2002 and batted .242 with three home runs and 19 RBI. In 2003 Ensberg and regular third baseman Geoff Blum were alternated at the hot corner, with Ensberg having the better offensive season. That year he hit .291 with 25 home runs and 60 RBI in 127 games, a fine breakout year. In 2004 Ensberg’s numbers dipped a little bit, merely from the power output perspective, but by 2005 he was back on his game.

As I mentioned above with the Killer B's (Craig Biggio, Jeff Bagwell and Lance Berkman), it’s pretty easy to see how a guy like Ensberg wouldn’t get much attention for his accomplishments, All three of the other guys had all ready had established careers and had been in the running for, or won (Bagwell in 1994) a NL MVP award. In 2005, the only year the Astros had ever made it to the World Series, Ensberg was the man. That season Ensberg played in 150 games and hit a solid .283 on the year. He paired that with career highs, and team high in home runs (36) and RBI (101). Seriously, the next closest in home runs was 26 by Biggio and Jason Lane, and the closest in RBI was Bagwell with 82. Bagwell missed the majority of the regular season and Ensberg did what he could to fill in. Besides a trip to the World Series, Ensberg was rewarded with his one and only Silver Slugger award, his only trip to the All-Star Game and a respectable fourth place finish for the NL MVP award.

Ensberg would only play for three more seasons: one-and-a-half more years with the Astros, a half season with the Padres after being traded and a short tint with the New York Yankees. These days he works for the Astros as a developmental specialist with the Lancaster Jethawks, the team’s advanced-A affiliate in the California League.

#15- Despite being signed as a free agent by the Astros in 1991 at the age of 16, it wouldn’t be until September 1, 1997 that Venezuelan-born outfielder Richard Hidalgo would make his MLB debut. Hidalgo was a powerful hitter, with good instincts in the outfield and a strong throwing arm. He was supposed to be an all around player in all areas, but a congenital knee defect changed those plans. After hitting .306 and .303 in his first two seasons, Hidalgo had a disappointing 1999 campaign with a .227 average, although he showed some power with 15 home runs in 383 at-bats. He required season-ending kneecap surgery.

Hidalgo blossomed in 2000, when he hit .314 with 44 home runs and 122 RBI. Despite the solid numbers Hidalgo only finished 20^th for the NL MVP that season. His numbers dipped a bit in 2001 (.275, 19, 80) and 2002 (.235, 15, 48), but in 2003 he returned to good form both at the plate and in the field. He posted numbers of .309/28/88, collected three homers in a game, and led the Majors in outfield assists with 22, while committing only four errors. Once again he got the short end of the stick by only finishing 18^th for the NL MVP that season, not even a Gold Glove award.

Hidalgo split the 2004 season between the Astros and the Mets, hitting .239 with 25 homers and 82 RBI. A highlight of the 2004 season was a Met record of home runs in 5 consecutive games, 3 of them in interleague games against the Yankees. In 2006, he signed a minor league contract with the Baltimore Orioles, but left the team before the season started, when his wife became ill. Hidalgo requested to be released from his contract, allowing to him to go to Japan where he would have a starting role. In the 2006 off-season, the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs reportedly showed interest in signing Hidalgo. In January 2007, the Astros signed him again, this time to a minor league contract. This second tenure was short-lived, as Hidalgo was released by the Astros on March 25, 2007, after refusing a minor league assignment. Despite being drafted so young, Hidalgo’s last game came at 30 years of age. Wild.

June 7- Tampa Bay Devil Rays

Well, tonight’s post will certainly be interesting on account of the fact that the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s uniform database currently isn’t working. Or, in lieu of my post from last night, perhaps their upset with me for mentioning the fact that some of their listing are incorrect and I’m only receiving an error message on my end. If this is the case, this would indeed be a disturbance. But really, what are the odds of that?

I picked this cap up back in the summer of 2010 off of the Lids Web site as really more of an impulse buy. I ran into a similar problem with a nearly identical Tampa Bay Devil Rays cap which I wrote about on January 8th. By this I mean I bought the cap because it looks cool, more important I thought it was a cap the Devil Rays wore within the first few years they were playing ball circa 1998. Well, I was wrong, just like the post from January. I of course haven’t let it get me down, I still dig it. This cap is actually a hybrid of the 2000 and the 2001 caps. How do I know?

From 1998 through the end of the 2000 season all of the Devil Rays caps had black panels and only in two cases, 1998 and 1999-2000, was the bill of the anything but black. The bills for these other caps were purple and only used for their road caps. In 1998 it featured only the Devil Ray as shown here in post from February 28^th, and for the road cap used from 1999-2000 featuring the logo shown on this cap. The Devil Rays didn’t start using all green caps until the 2001 season, which I’ll get to some time down the road.

Because this is a custom cap there unfortunately isn’t much of a history behind it. However, a cap like this gives me free reign to talk about a few unsung heroes of the first few years of Devil Rays baseball. While a lot of names and faces certainly came and went over the first few years, it still gave a couple of guys more than enough time to make a noticeable impact in the league which aided in them getting picked up by other franchises. Or, as in one of the cases below, Tampa gave him a place to go out on a high note.

#2- In the third round of the 1995 amateur draft the Florida Marlins selected Randy Winn out of Santa Clara University and immediately sent him to the minors to play for the Elmira Pioneers, and intermediate-A squad in the New York-Pennsylvania League. For the next two seasons Winn bounced around between advanced-A with the Brevard County Manatees and the Kane County Cougars before moving on to AA with the Portland Sea Dogs through the end of the 1997 season. With two expansion teams ready to roll for the upcoming 1998 season all that was left for them to do was draft a team. Winn was one of the few players in the Marlins system to find his name on the expansion draft eligibility list. With the 58h overall pick the Devil Rays picked up Winn to fill in one of their outfield spots.

On May 11, 1998 Winn made his major League debut with the Devil Rays as a pinch runner for Paul Sorrento in the Devil Rays’ 4-2 victory over the Cleveland Indians. That season Winn played in 109 games, batting .278 with one home run, 17 RBI and 26 stolen bases. In 1999 and 2000 Winn spent only half of his time at the Major League level, while the other half was spent in AAA with the Durham Bulls. Winn had so-so years with the Devil Rays those two years, but did incredibly well during his run with the Bulls. While he was in Durham he never hit below .330, not to mention he hit for 10 home runs and 70 RBI in the 125 games combined over those two seasons. Despite being in such a crummy situation of coming and going Winn proved that all the effort he put into stepping up his game paid off. In 2001 he played in 128 games and boasted a .273 average with six home runs and 50 RBI. In 2002 Winn took off. That year he made his one and only All-Star Game appearance for his 13-year career by hitting .298 with 181 hits, 17 home runs, 75 RBI and 27 stolen bases. Despite all the good he did for the club that season h was traded away to the Seattle Mariners at season’s end.

#3- If there was ever a name that deserved to be on the list of the greatest baseball names of all-time Quinton McCracken certainly needs to be in the Top-10. McCracken was drafted by the Colorado Rockies in the 25^th round of the 1992 amateur draft out of Duke University. Not a bad year to be enrolled at Duke either, especially considering they had just won their second and arguably best National Championship in basketball.

McCracken played in the outfield for three seasons in Colorado, averaging .291, three home runs and 38 RBI per season in the 274 total games he played. But, despite his services with the Rockies, McCracken’s name ended up on the same list as Winn’s for the expansion draft as he was selected with the fourth overall pick behind Jeff Suppan.

Playing in a career-high 155 games, McCracken had his best-ever season, batting .292 with 7 home runs, 59 RBI, and was named the Devil Rays first-ever most valuable player. After playing only 40 games in 1999, because of a torn ACL he suffered after getting his foot caught in the padding on the wall during an attempted catch at Tropicana Field, he spent most of 2000 in the minors with AAA Durham. The Devil Rays released him on November 27, 2000, and he signed with the St. Louis Cardinals on December 22, he was released in spring training. On April 13, 2001, McCracken signed with the Minnesota Twins. He again spent most of the year in Triple-A, where he batted .338 for Edmonton.

#33- The number is pretty obvious, but the how he got there and the results of him leaving are merely small chapters in the Major League Baseball career of Jose Canseco. Despite a great 1998 campaign with the Toronto Blue Jays where he hit 46 home runs and stole 29 bases, the most since the 40 he stole in 1988, he was signed by the Devil Rays right before the 1999 season. That year he hit .279 with 34 home runs and 95 RBI in only 114 games. He made his sixth and final All-Star Game appearance that year, but had his seasoned shortened due to intense back pain he was suffering. Nonetheless, he still had one hell of a “quiet” year.

In 2000 Canseco got off to a poor start. He was batting .257 with two home runs which led the Devil Rays to waiving him after 61 games that year. He was claimed off waivers by the New York Yankees in August 2000, which caught many, including Yankee manager Joe Torre off guard, as the Yankees had four other players who fulfilled a similar role to Canseco. Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman made the claim to prevent the Blue Jays, who were in a close race with the Yankees, from acquiring Canseco. He made one appearance in the 2000 World Series against the New York Mets and earned his second World Series ring when they defeated the Mets in five games. Despite this achievement Canseco later called his Yankees tenure "the worst time of [his] life" due to receiving limited playing time.

June 6- New York Giants

It’s funny how much the game has evolved in a little over a century. Pitchers can top out at a little over 100-MPH, home runs are hit on a near game-after-game basis and no one has managed to hit or top the .400 batting average mark since Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox bested that mark during the campaign of 1941. But with all of the records that have come to be shattered over the last 15 to 20 years or so very few people have any idea how or when a lot of the more obscure stats came to be. Yes, we have ESPN and the Elias Sports Bureau to help out on occasion with literally the most random of stats that we all secretly enjoy reading in our heads using Tim Kurkjian’s voice, but very few of us really know anything about those particular games. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if most of you read the rest of this pot with Kurkjian’s voice providing the narration.

I should first point out that I received a heavy amount of bad intel about this cap, which, in the end, is really my fault for not double-checking my sources. I bought this New York Giants cap off of the Lids Web site a few months through their Cooperstown Collection line as I have been trying to build up my collection of older caps as they tend to have better stories that have proven the test of time. Based on the colors alone I knew that it was a cap used before the 1950s as the cap worn in their later years pretty much resembled an all black version of the current home New York Mets cap. Basically it’s the most iconic of all New York era Giants caps. What every few people outside of the New York era seem to remember is that there was a vast time period in which the Giants’ team colors where blue, white and orange, the colors that the Mets wear today. If you read my post from June 5^th you’d know that the two sources I use the most are Sportslogos.net and BaseballHallOfFame.org. Now, when researching this cap I did in fact use both of those sources and in both cases they said that this cap was used from 1936-1939, which is perfect for the story and my marking below. However, upon further review from various other hat Web sites including Mickey’s Place, I have come to find out that the cap used from 1936-1939 resembles the modern day Mets cap but with a white “NY.” I verified this through five Web sites, all of which are shops based out of Cooperstown. What’s even more unusual is that the logo on this cap was in fact used on the jersey for a much longer time from, but in an array of colors. For instance, this shape of the “NY” logo with a blue border and white interior was used from 1936-1939. The version currently shown on this cap was used on the jerseys from 1940-1946. This exact hat was only used for one year in 1948. After finding all of this out I about had a cow. If there’s one thing I hate it’s having all of the wrong facts because the last thing I want to do is mislead all of you, the readers. Rather than be frustrated I continued my search to figure out why the intel I had received from such reliable sources in the past could be so wrong, especially considering the fact that after scanning through several photos on the Hall of Fame Web site my original findings appear to be correct. So, I did one more search to figure out what the problem was. This time I typed in “1948 New York Giants cap,” and much to my approval, I found out that I was only off by one year. The all black with an orange “NY” logo was first used in 1947. This particular cap was used from 1940-1946. I could have been a lot worse I suppose. Granted, I did have a few posts earlier in the year where I made a mistake or two in my research, which I really hoped wasn’t going to happen again.

When it came to marking this cap up I came across a stat from 1939 which trigged this whole research and hat purchase mess. And while it started with one particular game I soon came to find out that it has become a pleasant surprise for some teams and a truly nightmarish reality for one team.

6/6/39- Hall of Fame manager John McGraw’s final year as manager of the Giants came about a quarter of the way through the 1932 season. He had gone 17-23 that season and decided to hang it up for good. McGraw only managed one more professional game in his lifetime, the 1933 All-Star game as an honorary manager. In 1934 McGraw died at the age of 60 due to uremic poisoning, a condition caused by poor kidney functioning which causes urine to contaminate the blood.

After McGraw had stepped down in 1932 the Bill Terry era begun as he finished the season with a 55-59 record. In his first full season in 1933, Terry and the Giants finished the season with a record of 91-61, the best in the National League. The Giants then squared off against a Joe Cronin managed Washington Senators team who had gone 99-53 in the World Series. The Giants won handily four games to one. Despite four consecutive 90+ win seasons following their World Series victory the Giants only made to one more Series in that stretch in 1937 in which they lost to the New York Yankees in five games. After that loss, the dark years came for Terry as he was replaced by Hall of Famer Mel Ott at the end of the 1941 season.

In 1939 the Giants went 77-74 on the season, good enough for a fifth place finish out of the eight teams that made up the National League. Despite how tenacious the Giants teams of yesteryear were, only three players from this squad ended up making the Hall of Fame: Mel Ott, who I mentioned a moment ago, Carl Hubbell, one of the greatest pitchers of his era and Tony Lazzeri, a player who was voted in by the Veterans Committee and probably wouldn’t have been given a second glance in today’s era. There was one other player on the team this season who should be in the Hall of Fame based on his name alone and that’s Johnny “Ugly” Dickshot, whose only year with the Giants came in ’39.

When June 6, 1939 came around it was pretty much just another day at the ball yard. The 19-24 Giants were playing host to the 29-14 Cincinnati Reds at the Polo Grounds just on the cusp of Harlem, New York. Right off the bat this story gets interesting. The starting pitcher for the Reds was Johnny Vander Meer. For any baseball historian this name should ring a bell. Almost a full year prior (June 11, 1938) Vander Meer threw a no-hitter against the Boston Bees and four days later he threw another no-hitter against the Brooklyn Dodgers, becoming the only person in history to throw no-hitters in back-to-back starts (I’ll go into more detail on this feat in a later post). A year later, he was set to make history again, sort of. Vander Meer only lasted two outs as he gave up three quick runs to the Giants. His replacement, a righty named Peaches Davis, closed out the side. Davis then got tagged for a few runs himself through the next nine outs as he got to two outs in the fourth inning with catcher Harry Danning coming up to bat.

With no one on base Danning tagged Davis for the first home run of the game. Next up, Ott… who hit a single. Next up, first baseman Frank Bonura who hit a single as well. Next up, centerfielder Frank Demaree… who took Davis yard with a three-run shot. Giants. Next up, Lazzeri… who hit a single. Next up, second baseman Burgess Whitehead. With a runner on first Whitehead cranked back and swung for the fences, just like his teammates before him. 12-0 Giants. After the third home run Reds’ manager Bill McKechnie had seen enough of Davis and called to the bullpen for righty Wes Livengood. The next batter, pitcher Manny Salvo. Prior to his at-bat Salvo was batting .077 on the season. With numbers like that, Livengood thought he had an easy final out on his hands. Nope! Salvo cranked a solo shot over the left field wall to give the Giants a 13-0 lead. Next up, left fielder Jo-Jo Moore… who hit a solo shot himself. 14-0 Giants. Next up, shortstop Billy Jurgess… who struck out to finally end the fourth inning.

By the end of the game Ott would get himself a home run off of relief pitcher Junior Thompson and Moore would hit his second of the day for a total of seven home runs hit by the Giants in their 17-3 routing. Seven home runs had been hit in a game before; however, this ended up being the first time in MLB history which five home runs would be hit in a single inning, let alone with two outs.

In MLB history there has yet to be a game in which a team has hit more than five home runs in an inning. In fact, only five times, including this game, has a team hit five home runs in an inning. Of the five games in which this has happened the Reds were the losing/pitching team in four of them. That’s ridiculous!

June 5- San Diego Padres

Tonight I have given myself an inadvertent challenge all because my friend Bryan Mapes (@IAmMapes) suggested that I write about the San Diego Padres tonight. The way this whole decision came about had to do with a lack of historical events in Major League Baseball history occurring on June 4^th and June 5^th. I’ve touched on this in prior posts, but I always do my best to stay up to date with “this day in baseball” Web sites in order to find truly interesting or forgotten stories of MLB’s past. Having found nothing of real note I decided to take my campaign to Twitter and ask for suggestions from my followers as to which team to write about next. Mapes gave me two teams: the Padres and the Kansas City Royals. My biggest issue with the Royals is that, outside of their Stars and Stripes and batting practice caps, they’ve only had four caps they’ve worn on the field throughout their history. Somehow I’ve managed to burn through three (February 4^th, February 24^th and March 26^th) of the four all ready and we’re not even close to the All-Star break yet. Hell, I wrote about all three of those before the season even started. WHYYYYYYY!?!? So, rather than finish one team off for the rest of the year, I opted to go with the Padres.

Like the Royals, I’ve managed to write about three of the team’s caps thus far (February 1^st, March 10^th and April12th). Unlike the Royals, the Padres actually have quite the assortment of hats in their catalog, which is quite impressive considering the fact that they’ve only been around in the Majors since 1969. What I am still trying to track down; however, is their 1936 cap from their old Pacific Coast League days when Boston Red Sox great Ted Williams played for the team. This particular cap, as I said above, gave me a bit of a headache when trying to pinpoint an exact year in which it was first used. Because I’m a huge sucker for details, I always make sure to consult two specific Web sites before writing down any of the dates in stone on any of the caps I write about, because after all, some one may be doing the same research I’ve been conducting and the last thing I want to do is give someone shoddy information. The two sites I use are Sportslogos.net and BaseballHallOfFame.org. Oddly enough, they gave contradictory information about this cap, a huge problem I’ve been dealing with since I started on this mission. According to the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s Web site the Padres didn’t start using this cap until 2004 in which they have been using it as their home come through the present. According to Sportslogos.net this cap was first used in 1998 and then went through a slight color variation from 1999-2003 until becoming the cap the Padres where during all of their home games. So, for those of you playing at home, the cap is definitely the home cap and it for sure has been used since 2004 through the present. But what about the previous six years? This is where things get a pit tricky and I had to put on my detective cap to verify a few details.

The 1998 part is the most confusing of all because I remember vividly watching the Padres playing in and losing the World Series to the New York Yankees wear this cap...

the white and orange interlocking “SD” logo. I don’t really recall the white “SD” at all. Oh, and side note, the way Steve Finley looks in this card is ridiculously amazing. Even when combing through pages and pages of photos from ’98 I still couldn’t find anyone wearing it with the exception of former pitch Brian Boehringer who played with the Padres from 1998 until 2000.

My only beef with this card is that I came cross it when I looked under “1999 San Diego Padres cards.” So, 1998 still remains a mystery. The only thing I can come up with is that the Padres wore the caps and a specific uniform set during Spring Training; however, no matter which Web site I use there is nothing to provide this detail.

Moving on to 1999; yes, this cap was definitely used then as the Boehringer card obviously proves. The other note from 1999 is that it was the first year New Era started making specific batting practice caps, which happened to feature the white “SD,” which the Padres used until the end of the 2003 season where they replaced the “SD” for the white slanted “P” logo and changed the cap from a mesh 59/50 into the low profile 39/30. Upon my research I was able to find photographic evidence to prove that the cap was used on the field for home games from 2000-2003, one of which being the final game of the 2001 season which was a truly historic day as Tony Gwynn played his final home game of his career AND Rickey Henderson recorded his 3,000^th career hit with a double off of Colorado Rockies pitch John Thomson.

Alas, the mystery has been solved, well, except for 1998, which I leave to any of you who read this post to try finding evidence so I can add it to the story and give you full credit for. That is, unless I find it first.

In retrospect of my research I probably should have waited until the end of the season to write about this cap in regard to the final day of the 2001 season. I mean, Gwynn retiring and Rickey getting #3000 are two pretty extraordinary events in MLB history. Not to mention the fact that during that season Rickey also broke Babe Ruth’s all-time walks record (2062*), Ty Cobb’s runs scored record (2246*) and Zack Wheat’s all-time record of games started in left field (2328*). However, I marked this cap up with a few guys who are still currently wearing this cap as I actually wrote the numbers I have back in March of 2012 while I was in the MLB Fan Cave. No worries though. I’m happy with the choices I made, but more important, now all of those facts I just listed will be more in the open, and that’s what’s most important.

*numbers listed indicate previous records.

#24- One of the few guys from the Padres organization I had the fortune of meeting in the Fan Cave, Cameron Maybin was the 10^th overall pick in the 2005 amateur draft by the Detroit Tigers out of high school in North Carolina. Maybin played in 24 games with the Tigers in 2007, but was traded to the Florida Marlins during the offseason as part of a blockbuster trade in which the Marlins sent Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera to Detroit. Maybin played in 144 games for the Marlins from 2008 until the end of the 2010 season in which he hit .257/12/43 during his days playing at Joe Robbie Stadium, or whatever the hell it’s called.

AT the end of the 2010 season Maybin was traded once again, this time to the Padres for Ryan Webb and Edward Mujica. The benefit of Maybin going to the Padres was that he quickly became and every day guy. Maybin played in 137 games, batting .264 with nine home runs and 40 RBI. Maybin also stole 40 bases that season, becoming the ninth player in Padres history to do so. In 2012 Maybin had a little bit of a drop in his numbers, but he was still one of the best offensive producers on the team hitting .243 with eight home runs and 45 RBI, as well as 26 stolen bases.

When Maybin came to the Fan Cave last season he was all smiles. He and I talked about surfing a bit as I have still yet to surf at any beach south of Huntington Beach… which really isn’t that far from San Diego. Maybin didn’t come alone though, Yonder Alonso and current Oakland Athletic Andy Parrino dropped by as well. One of the more interesting moments came when MLB.com writer Mark Newman pulled me aside and asked me if I knew of anything of note off the top of my head about Maybin. Naturally I brought up the 40 stolen bases in 2011; something I thought was really weird of him not to research before he came in. Then again, most people sought my knowledge more times than you can imagine as opposed to looking it up themselves during my time there. During Newman’s interview with Maybin I made sure to pop “the shark” and photobomb him; however, those bits were edited out. But, the video still lives on, and if you look quick enough you can see the tail end of me teaching all three guys how to do it. Also, the link for the Eric Byrnes shark is right next to it.

#7- Another member of the 2005 amateur draft class, Chase Headley was selected by the Padres in the second round out of the University of Tennessee, but after transferring from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California. Headley made his MLB debut on June 15, 2007 but only played for eight games as a fill-in for Kevin Kouzmanoff. Headley played for the Eugene Emeralds the year he was drafted, two years before I moved there. Rats!

In 2008, after playing batting .305 and playing in 65 games with the AAA Portland Beavers, Headley was brought back up to the Majors where he has been ever since, with the exception of a four-game rehab stint with the Lake Elsinore Storm this season. From 2008-2011 Headley put up decent numbers, but nothing extraordinary. His average hung around .271 those three seasons and he only hit 27 home runs and 166 RBI. Headley proved he had the potential throughout his Minor League days; however, something just wasn’t clicking for him in the Majors. But, if there’s one things hitters do, it’s stay patient and keep swinging away… which Headley did very well in 2012.

Something clicked around the All-Star break. At the end of the day on July 8^th Headley was batting .267 with eight home runs and 42 RBI. For the rest of the season (75 games) Headley would boost his batting average to .286, but crank out 23 more home runs and 73 RBI, the most productive of any player in the National League during that stretch besides San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey. Headley’s surge would land him in fifth place for the NL MVP award as well as give him his first Silver Slugger award. Headley also played stellar defense last year as well, winning his first Gold Glove at third base.

June 4- Milwaukee Brewers

I’ll never forget the first time I saw this hat. I was sitting at the lower social media table at Fan Fest for the Oakland Athletics back on January 27^th. I had just wrapped up a Q&A session with a few members of the marketing team and I was still in the process of trying to clarify my answer to the final question as someone had asked me who I thought the starting rotation was going to be. At first I wanted to reply with, “I don’t know, I’m not Bob Melvin, that’s kind of a stupid question for me to answer,” but I didn’t think that anyone would understand that I was joking, so I didn’t say that. Instead, I answered it as best I could, with the knowledge that a few players were still injured and/or suspended. I made sure to type in each person’s Twitter handle when I answered, which was a seemingly easy task considering the fact that I was using the A’s Twitter account and they only follow 149 people. I typed in Tommy Milone, Jarrod Parker, AJ Griffin, Dan Straily and… I mean to type in Brett Anderson, but I hit Travis Blackley’s account by mistake and send at the same time. Almost immediately I had people saying, “Well what about Anderson?” After realizing my mistake I quickly corrected myself and said that I meant to hit Anderson. But even after doing that the questions kept coming, asking why I left him off the list. Others asked about Bartolo Colon, which I didn’t bother going into on account of his suspension. Rather than continue, we just cut it a few minutes short as the main festivities were about to begin.

What was I supposed to be talking about again? Oh yah! This hat. So after the final question fiasco I just sat at the desk, not really knowing what I was supposed to do or where to go from there. Just as I thought they were going to tell me, “thanks, we’re done with you,” they asked if I wanted to run their Instagram account for the day. On the outside I said, “Sure that would be awesome.” On the inside I of course was going crazy with joy. Anyway, I signed out of Instagram on my phone, handed it over, they put in the username and password, handed it back and I was good to go. Now, the Athletics at the time only followed five people with their account: MLB, MLB Fan Cave, Brett Anderson, Travis Blackley and me. That’s still a badge of honor I’m really proud of, but out of the other four I only follow two of them. When they logged me on the first thing that appeared on my screen was the Milwaukee Brewers fan designed uniform and hat combo (this hat) for their YOUnifom contest they had held. Needless to say, as soon as I saw it I couldn’t take my eyes off of it.

My friend Will MacNeil (@RFWill149) talked about this hat at great length in the month to follow. Actually, the thing that really brought that discussion up in the first place was that I wanted to pay Will back for the Stockton Ports hats he had given me during Fan Fest. Will had told me that he and bunch of other people were going to down for Spring Training and I said I was too (or so I had thought). My last day of finals at the University of Oregon was slated for March 18^th, and I was more than ready to get out of Oregon for a few days to enjoy some baseball in Arizona. As payback for the hats all Will asked in return is that I pick him up one of these hats while I was down in Arizona. As it turned out, the Brewers were only selling them during the games in which they were going to be using them (March 22^nd and March 30^th), or so we both thought. Well, to make a long story short, I was broke and couldn’t get down to Arizona; however, we both noticed that Lids and other hat Web sites were carrying them, so there was no need to rush… or so I thought again.

A few days before I went to Florida to visit my girlfriend Angie Kinderman (@sconnieangie) I ordered a few hats for what I got back. One of the hats that I ordered was this one. Now, Will and I both wear the same size cap (7 3/8), but the problem I ran into was that the Lids Web site only had one left. Needing to pay Will back for his generosity, I bought his for sure; however, trying to track down a second one for myself turned into a greater challenge. I would have to wait almost a month and find one by happenstance at the New Era Flagship store in Miami; which if you end up in Miami, go check it out. It’s awesome, and they employees are amazing. When I went back to Oakland this last time for their series against the Kansas City Royals and Bacon Friday, I made sure to pack it along with me and get it to my right field brother.

From early November through December 13^th, the Brewers held the “Design a YOUniform” contest to allow their fans to come up with something clever and develop a stronger interaction with their clientele. The winner, Ben Peters of Richfield, Minnesota, was flown down to Phoenix to attend the March 22^nd game against the Chicago Cubs in which the Brewers would be wearing the uniforms of his creation at Maryvale Baseball Park. In addition, Peters was given as assortment of hats and shirts with his logos. Personally, I think that’s pretty awesome, but a little bit of money would have been nice to come with that too.

Due to the fact that this cap was only worn for two games I had to pay tribute to the players who did well for the Brewers in both of those exhibition games. Much to my surprise it was a ridiculously easy task to figure out.

#18- Khris Davis was drafted in the seventh round by the Brewers in the 2009 amateur draft out of Cal State Fullerton, one of the top baseball colleges of the last 20 years. From 2009-2012 he worked his way through the Minor Leagues, batting.291 throughout his time. On March 22^nd Davis got the call to start in left field in the Brewers’ 4-1 loss to the Cubs. The game wasn’t a total loss to Davis though. In his third at-bat he teed off on Cory Wade scoring the one and only run for the Brew Crew. Davis’ spring training was so impressive that the Brewers invited him to Milwaukee to stay up with the team and made his Major League debut on April 1st. Unfortunately he only lasted 14 games on account of him batting .188. After their game on May 1^st the Brewers demoted Davis down to AAA Nashville for more work with the Sounds.

#23- Rickie Weeks attended Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. As a sophomore in 2002, he batted .495 with 20 home runs, winning the NCAA Division I batting title. The next year, he batted .479 with 16 home runs, winning a second straight batting title and finishing his career with a .473 batting average, highest in NCAA history. In 2003 he also was named Baseball America College Player of the Year and the Golden Spikes Award, given annually to the top amateur player. The Milwaukee Brewers selected him second overall in the 2003 MLB Draft.

He made his major league debut on September 15, 2003, but did not become a full-time player for the Brewers until June 2005, when he was recalled from Triple-A Nashville, despite playing much of the 2005 season with a thumb injury. In his first full MLB season in 2005, Weeks had a batting average of .239 to go with 13 home runs and 15 stolen bases in 96 games and he finished in sixth place for the National League Rookie of the Year award. These HR/SB number are consistent with his minor league totals (playing in 209 games) of 21 home runs and 24 stolen bases. In 2006, Weeks hit .279 with 8 home runs, 34 RBIs, and 19 stolen bases in 95 games.
Weeks has always had a tremendous amount of power, but his consistency at the plate is lacking, as are his defensive capabilities. He has routinely been one of the “worst” firlders for his position on a yearly basis, averaging 13 errors per season. He’s only made one All-Star Game appearance in 2011.
On March 30^th the Brewers went back to Milwaukee to host their final two exhibition games at Miller Park. On this day they were facing the Chicago White Sox. In his first at-bat Weeks ripped the cover off of a Gavin Floyd fastball for a two-run home run, his only hit of the game. The Brewers ended up wining 5-4, but it was Weeks’ momentum in the early going that helped fuel the Brewers for victory.