All Rooting Interest Team

In an effort to do something softer I have decided to make a team of players that I root for regardless of ability. A common criticism of sabermetricians is that they too often favor numbers over the human element of the game and I think that at times the criticism can be valid, although it is perfectly acceptable to enjoy both.

What follows are my positional picks for players that I support regardless of how good they are. I will include reasoning for why I root for these players. Some of these reasons will be petty or silly but that is part of being a fan. I avoided naming people who play for the Brewers simply because they play for my team and I did not name any players who I root for simply because they are good. Sometimes hoping for someone to do well is as much fun as watching someone do well.

I would encourage my colleagues here to do something similar.

SP - C.C. Sabathia
Reasoning: in a sport so plagued with steroid controversies it is kind of wonderful to watch a 250 lb man; it's nice knowing that there are professional athletes that I can easily outrun; he hit homeruns in each league last year becoming only the third pitcher in history to homer in both leagues in one season, one of those insane, nitpicky records that makes baseball wonderful, his big grin.

RP - David Aardsma
Reasoning: read this if you haven't yet; he is the first player alphabetically in major league history, replacing Hank Aaron and this is funny to me for some reason; his sister is an actress who appeared on CSI. Her character's name? Sexy Mistress.

C - Mike Napoli
Reasoning: was best friends with the man playing in front of him and by all accounts has been really supportive; his entrance song is "I'm On a Boat".

1b - Kevin Youkilis
Reasoning: on his wikipedia page the following phrases are found: "roly-poly", "pudgy", "fat kid"; Terry Francona's response when asked about his nickname (The Greek God of Walks) was "I've seen him in the shower, he isn't Greek God of anything."; holds the major league record for consecutive errorless games at first base, which is the most arbitrary record possible.

2B - Ian Kinsler
Reasoning: he is a small Jewish kid with asthma playing a professional sport; active in community charity work.

3B - Gordon Beckham
Reasoning: Josie's on a vacation far away come around and talk it over so many things I wanna say you know I like my girls a little bit older I just wanna use your love tonight I don't wanna lose your love tonight I ain't got many friends left to talk to nowhere to run when I'm in trouble you know I'd do anything for you stay the night but keep it undercover.

SS - Marco Scutaro
Reasoning: not necessarily stat-based but is supposedly a strong believer in sabermetrics as memorialized here; the entire trivia section of his wikipedia page is awesome but this in particular is incredible: On June 18, 2009, after being issued a walk by Phillies pitcher Joe Blanton, Scutaro immediately took off for second base and slid in safely.

LF - Juan Pierre
Reasoning: as much as he is crapped on my sabermetricians stories of him showing up early to ballparks and throwing balls against the wall to figure out how to play balls are endearing; is named after Juan Marichal; received the Cool Papa Bell award from the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and Cool Papa Bell is tremendous; robbed Barry Bonds of what would have been career home run number 714 on May 9, 2006.

CF - Curtis Granderson
Reasoning: fellow UIC alumnus; charity work; appeared on TNA Wrestling's Slammiversary PPV but I am deciding not to hold that against him.

RF - Ichiro Suzuki
Reasoning: his swing is awesome and I love imitating it during softball; I wish I was left handed so I could actually use his swing; his arm is astounding; he is probably the best current baseball player named Ichiro; his success makes teams continue signing Japanese players for ungodly sums of money in case they found the next Ichiro; they have not.

DH - Jim Thome
Reasoning: second place finisher in 2007 SI poll asking major league players to name the nicest player in baseball (behind Sean Casey who had 46%!!); put all 10 of his nieces and nephews through college; wordupthome.com

Serendipity

When I was a youngin', I dreamt of baseball glory. I collected shoeboxes full of baseball cards. I watched every Cubs game I could to see my idols play and, more often than not, lose (this was the early '90s). I played pickup games with the neighborhood kids at the end of the street ("first base is that oil slick, second is the manhole cover..."), games that lasted until dark or until we hit a tennis ball into a car and had to scatter while the angry owner stormed outside to shut off a screeching alarm. On days when there was nobody to play ball with, I imagined 3-2 counts in the bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, my Cubs down by three and battling the powerhouse A's in game seven of the World Series, then threw pinecones into the air and stroked them into the stands with my whiffle bat amidst the cheers of thousands of imaginary spectators.

So when I turned nine it was only natural that, like so many other nine year olds have done for so many years, I signed up for Little League baseball. And it was there my dreams died.

In retrospect, I really wish I'd stuck with the game. I still love baseball (more than ever, in fact), and who knows? Had I played past my awkward years, I might even have become a respectable ballplayer. But at the time, my eyesight was crap (corrective eyewear would change that soon afterwards), my reflexes at the plate were godawful, and I had this idiotic idea that, despite the fact that I probably weighed something in the neighborhood of sixteen pounds, I should be using a wooden bat like the big leaguers. To top it all off, I was in the North Mission Viejo Little League, which has won at least one Little League World Series title that I'm aware of. In other words, the kids around me were good, and I was not.

Put simply, I absolutely could not seem to hit. I carried a .000 batting average for the entire season (no, that's not a typo, and it's not defeatist hindsight). But when I walked (which was often, since even as a kid with bad eyes, I could lay off a pitch three feet out of the zone) or got hit by a pitch (also often thanks to those "reflexes"), I basically had an automatic triple unless there were runners ahead of me. According to league rules, runners had to wait until pitches crossed the plate before attempting to steal, and leadoffs were not allowed. But even at nine, I was fast. Hell, I even stole home once when I misunderstood a sign. The catcher was so shocked that he dropped the ball, and by the time he had picked it up again and shifted to his left to apply a tag, I was already under his glove.

Unfortunately, my Little League impression of an extremely patient Willie Mays Hayes did not endear me to my teammates, most of whom would probably have preferred to have me handing out bats instead of swinging them. But among the kids who never treated me any differently once it became obvious that I was nothing more than a track and field kid moonlighting in sliding pants and stirrups was David Aardsma.

David was, like me, a diehard Cubs fan who had to watch his favorite team lose from 1500 miles away. Unlike me, he was coordinated and talented. But our Cubs connection meant that we talked baseball a lot in the dugout and at school, and our moms caught on to this and started sitting together at games. But when I foolishly quit Little League after that one dismal season, I saw less and less of David, until he eventually moved away a couple years later.

Flash forward fourteen years. It was April 6, 2004, and I'd tuned in to a Giants/Astros game to listen to in the background while I did some chores when I heard a familiar name: David Aardsma was making his Major League debut in relief for the Giants. I abandoned my domestic plans to sit down and watch as a now 6'5", 200 lb David with a shaved head, a goatee, and one hell of a fastball pitched two solid innings and picked up his first big league win. To this day, I remember him getting that win against his childhood idol, Roger Clemens, though apparently it was Andy Pettite who started for the 'Stros. Perhaps my subconscious decided that absent-mindedly turning on a random baseball game on a random day only to see a childhood friend pick up his first Major League win in his first Major League start wasn't serendipitous enough; this memory had to be Hollywood caliber, and so naturally David would have had to face the Rocket.

Since that afternoon five years ago, I've followed David as he's bounced from team to team. He even landed with the Cubs for a while, during which time I got to see him pitch live for the first time since I was in third grade. But I slacked off a bit this season. I knew that he'd moved out west to pitch for the Mariners, but it wasn't until I stumbled upon an article over at The Baseball Analysts that I realized how good David has been so far in this young season. Dave Allen took a look at the expected run values of every pitch thrown by every pitcher in 2009, and atop the fastball list is David Aardsma.

Here's hoping that Aardsma can continue to keep his hits allowed totals down and cut down on the walks that have largely offset his solid K/9 rates over the course of his Major League career. Best of luck to you, David; you may be in the wrong jersey, but you've got at least one diehard Cubs fan rooting for you from the flatlands.