Rawlings declared 2007 the “Summer of Glove,” which sounds vaguely dirty to me, but we’ll go with it. They had fans vote for an All-Gold Glove Team and the winners have been announced. Let’s feast our eyes on some hotties, old and new, who make incredible feats of defense look like patty cake.
Pitcher: Greg Maddux
Mr. Maddux has notched 16 Gold Gloves, which is more than the 1st and 2nd basemen winners combined and tied for the most all-time by any position player (with Brooks Robinson and Jim Kaat).
Catcher: Johnny Bench
2nd Base: Joe Morgan
Johnny “Not On The” Bench nabbed himself 10 Gold Gloves, all while playing 16 years for the Reds. I love to see franchise players. (And yes, I’ll go flog myself for that Bermanism.) Also, it blows my mind that pudgy word-salad Joe Morgan was once an awesome baseball player, but he did collect 5 GGs.
1st Base: Wes Parker
Wes collected his Gold Gloves with the Dodgers, winning every year from 1967 to 1972. He’s the only eligible All-Gold Glove Team member who is not in the Hall of Fame.
3rd Base: Brooks Robinson
He was nicknamed The Human Vacuum Cleaner. Heh. Thatswhatshesaid. He had 16 Gold Gloves.
The look of child-like glee on his face in this picture is outstanding.
Shortstop: The Wizard of Oz
I can’t say enough about him. It could take hours. But he’s the reason I got into baseball. 13 Gold Gloves.
Outfield: Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente and Ken Griffey Jr.
This summer, Mays (12 GGs) received an honorary Ph.D from Dartmouth. Huh. Griffey is adorable and fragile (10). And what can I say about Clemente (12)? He died in a plane crash while en route to deliver aid to earthquake victims in Nicaragua. They never found his body. What a tragedy.
Humanitarian and ridiculously handsome. Thanks, Roberto.
I’m also giving a little love to each runner-up. Bob Gibson, Pudge Rodriguez, Don Mattingly, Roberto Alomar, Mike Schmidt, Derek Jeter, and Jim Edmonds. Way to go, guys.
Gibby, Pudge and a smokin’ Donny Baseball.
(LaRussa has obviously taught Pudge some tricks.)
Alomar, Schmidt and an awesome dive by Jeter.
SO. AWESOME.
And finally, using the Jim Edmonds picture as a segue…..Retro 70s Night at Petco Park. Possibly the greatest set of pictures I’ve EVER SEEN. Thanks to Tim Stoops for the pics.
That is the scrappiest mustache ever.
Hmmmmm……yep, still hot.
GROSS……JUST GROSS.
How you doin?
And my personal favorite:
MUTTONCHOPS FTW!
Look at the air on Brooks.. but then Ozzie beats it… upside down. Chicks dig the long ball? Nah.
I wish I could grow chops or a Fu Manchu like that. Damn.
Chicks dig the defense, Nat’l.
Spezio should be sitting in the giant coke spoon from Studio 54.
My fave all time pic of Roberto! Makes me wish I had been born a decade earlier so I could have seen him play.
You and me both, Thistle. I have some sort of weird infatuation with Roberto, even though I never saw him play.
I love Roberto Clemente (observe) but I never realized what a looker he was. Wow. I also didn’t know the Buccos’ current uniforms were actually throwbacks. Cool.
I read the Roberto Clemente biography last year, and there were some outstanding pictures in there. What a handsome man.
I love the story of how he went to talk to his future wife’s father, and when the father asked RC what he could possibly want with his daughter, when there were 10 girls out on any corner willing to throw themselves at him, he answered: “I don’t want those girls. I love your daughter.” Makes me swoon.
(BTW, that RC bio is a great book.)
I don’t know if they still do, but people used to leave flowers at Clemente’s statue at PNC Clare.
(I love the Stargell one. But the Honus Wagner one is the best, just because it was first put up at old Forbes Field – where he was able to see it erected, and then moved to Three Rivers and now PNC.)
Great, now I’m crying thinking about a Honus Wagner statue.
Yes, it was. I read it within a month or so of its release & it was the best bio I had ever read. I had to go buy my dad a copy for Christmas too. Esp. since he was the one who first told me all about him when I was a kid & he wanted to make me feel better about playing RF.
Has to be Ozzie for SS, but the fact that Omar Vizquel isn’t the runner up makes me think you don’t know much about baseball. Looks like you’re just going off reputation.
Scott, Rawlings ran this contest and the FANS VOTED. I had nothing to do with the winners or the runners-up. Doofus.
Scott’s comment makes me think he doesn’t know much about reading comprehension.
And I don’t care what anyone says- Greg Maddux is hot.
Texy, I didn’t want to include a Maddux pic b/c he’s not my cup of tea…..but I knew you would appreciate it.
HOWEVER: I DO NOT LOVE THE CUBS! YOU WILL NOT TRICK ME THIS TIME, WILY.
Well since you brought it up- HEY EVERYONE! Andrea admitted yesterday that she loves the Cubs! True story.
Maddux is cuter in the glasses.
I absolutely did not. I can admit that Ryan Theriot is cute and still hate the team.
Just like how you LUUUUUURVE RICK ANKIEL, TEXY!!!!
Also worth mentioning…Wes Parker’s cameo on a Brady Bunch episode. Word.
I’m going to have to check out that book Metsy. And I never knew RC was a looker. Damn.
SA: I’d lend it to you, if the person I lent it to at work had returned it to me.
Or I hadn’t gotten laid off a few months after lending it to him. Sigh.
Oh, and the picture of his son looking at a portrait of RC in the outfield makes me cry.
It was a wonder I didn’t ruin the book, I cried so much at the last couple chapters!
Derek Jeter? Laughable. He’s not even the best-fielding shortstop on his own team.
Yeah, Jeter’s inclusion by Rawlings to even be voted on is absurd. As Cameron mentioned, not the best on his own team, and I’d surmise that at least half of the current starting shortstops in baseball are better defensively. Jeter has a cannon arm, and great baseball intelligence and awareness, but no range whatsoever.
Morgan over Maz is bad, but at least Morgan was pretty good defensively.
Good work ladies
Lady Andrea,
Thank you for using a Maddux in a Cubs uniform picture. Wow. You made my day.
TSW,
I love the Maddux in glasses look.
J-No, I know he was a Brave for a long time, but I can’t think of him as anything but a Cubbie.
I just pretend those 10-12 years didn’t happen.
Spiezio showing up one day looking like that would surprise me. Eckstein like that is just wrong though. He looks like he would be a child molester on America’s Most Wanted.
Lady Andrea is a Cubs fan!!!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOO!!!
BTW, I think that baseball players are at their cutest (not nec hottest, but adorable) when making a good defensive play.
I AM NOT A CUBS FAN!
morgan was great. but bill mazeroski was the most dominant defensive player, at any position, of all time.
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Texas Gal: I don’t know if it’s the filthy pitching or the possible role-playing scenarios that come to mind with the much older “Professor,” but Maddux is smokin’. (It’s probably both.)
I’m loving the 70′s retro Cards… Pujols almost looks feminine somehow. Why don’t ALL parks have the retro night?
I agree, Mal. I dig it the most.