Baseball Therapy: The ... (02/18)
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February 18, 2015 BP UnfilteredEverybody Played ShortstopThere are phrases that get repeated in the BP Annual that we do our best as editors to avoid, like "at the highest level" or "advanced approach" or "command and control." Then there are the phrases that get repeated because they're so crucial to analysis that you simply can't avoid mentioning them often. Like whether the player who is manning shortstop in A-Ball is going to be able to man shortstop
Similar phrasing gets used to describe third basemen (who tend to end up at first) or center fielders (who gets filtered out and shipped to a corner) or catchers (who disappear in the bowels of the minors if found unable to stick at catcher/remain at catcher/handle catcher/stick at the position). But mostly, shortstops, and for a simple reason: Few can handle shortstop, but becuase the payoff is so great when it works, many, many, many, many are given the chance. How many? A brief rundown of the players who played shortstop in the minors: The Guys Who You'd Forgotten Were Originally Shortstops But, Yeah, Okay, Makes Sense
The Guys Who You'd Forgotten Were Originally Shortstops And In Retrospect Are Momentarily Surprised By, Given Their Body Types And/Or Demonstrated Limitations At Other, Easier Positions
Same Category As Above, But With Exclamation Points In Parentheses After Their Names
Same Category, Except That They Played Shortstop In the Majors
The Outfielders, B.J. Upton Needing Not Be Mentioned Due To Recency And That GIF
I Absolutely Don't Believe These Guys Played Multiple Games At Shortstop
The One-Gamers, And Oh I Bet There's A Story Behind Each Of These
And, Finally, Not The Same Thing, But Not Altogether Different
Of course, everybody didn't play shortstop. All the people who aren't named above, for instance. Like Chris Hoiles, and Richard Hidalgo, and Carlos Gomez, and Mike Sweeney, and Stan Javier, and so on. That list is less interesting.
Sam Miller is an author of Baseball Prospectus. Follow @SamMillerBB
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The Quinton: The Players We Overlook and the...
I swear some of those guys throw left-handed.
1. I thought the same thing.
2. I'm not convinced Coco Crisp isn't still an actual second baseman who's been masquerading as an outfielder for a decade.
I'll bet that anyone who throws left-handed was probably a center fielder at one time.
As an aside, probably the most noteworthy baseball thing to happen on the day I was born was Don Mattingly's lone big-league appearance in center field.