ATBATT'S All-time All-Stars Shortstop

Hey everybody,

Continuing with the greatest all-star infield ever, that's at least according to my humble little blog and collection.  Speaking of which, you might recall I mentioned these all-stars would be marginally determined by my card collection.  This is one such occasion. 

While I would accept an argument that Honus Wagner was a greater shortstop than Ozzie Smith, I only have two measly tribute cards of Wagner, and that would hardly be enough to fill out a post with some nice cards to look at.  Sorry Honus, The Wizard of Oz gets the nod on this one...

 

 Yankee fans might argue that Derek Jeter should have earned the pick here.  While I certainly have enough of his cards to fill out a post, Jeter was much more of a bat than a glove for the Yanks.

Jeter won several World Series rings, and put up impressive WS offensive numbers, but he was also surrounded by numerous other big bats on those Yankee juggernaut teams, which afforded much more of an advantage than Ozzie ever had playing with Ken Oberkfell and Darrell Porter. 

Ozzie was by no means a slouch with the bat.  He was an all-star 15 times, had 2,460 hits, and stole 580 bases!

 

 But I chose Ozzie over the polyglot of great shortstops in the modern era because he certainly knew how to use the leather out there.  He's got huge numbers for assists (8,375) and double plays (1,590) and won Gold Gloves for shortstop in THIRTEEN CONSECUTIVE SEASONS!

Great "D" will definitely get you included on my all-star team. Smith's career fielding percentage is a sick .978

Have you ever heard that famous home run broadcast call by Jack Buck, "Go crazy, folks! Go crazy!" ?  Yup, that was from a tater blasted by Smith.

"Not only did I wear Number 1, St. Louis retired it after me."

THANKS for reading everybody!

Next post: Trades galore!