He had played some 1st & 3rd before as I recall and I think part of the move to 3B was to take better advantage of his bat. Most Catchers fall off as the year goes on.
I get that. 3B isn’t the same as tucking a bat at 1st or RF though. He obviously had the arm though.
Probably not very common. Although if you will note on BR, before that season he split time between 1B and catcher for several seasons. He played about half the previous season at 3rd.
The catcher for the Cards in 1971 was a guy named Ted Simmons. Easy to see why they moved Torre to third that year.
If you mean Dr. Demento, then yes.
That Pennsylvania minor league team should rename themselves the Lehigh Valley Giant Hogweed. The uniforms could be awesome, along with fan chants.
Turn and run, nothing can stop them
Around every river and canal
Their power is growing
The team could achieve a “thick dark warning odor” if they don’t shower for a few weeks in the height of summer.
I happened to turn on the game yesterday during the horrific inning that included a run walked in, a run on a HBP and a grand slam.
Certainly. The distinction, I imagine, is that the Cards appear to have felt that Torre had a good enough glove (as well as arm) that he wasn’t a serious liability at third. In '71, he was still fairly young (30), and the DH wasn’t an option.
The “hide the guy at first or right field” was really for a guy who was going to be a net defensive liability anywhere on the field (and who, now, would be an everyday DH), but whose bat was too important to leave him out of the lineup, so you put him where he’d do the least amount of damage.
With Giancarlo Stanton down the Yankees brought up Jasson Dominguez to mainly DH. He got hit by a pitch on the elbow and they are doing more tests.
They also DFA’d Grichuk. He’s no superstar but I’m sure he’ll land somewhere.
Which makes me think of Craig Biggio, who played somewhere around 450-485 games as catcher for Houston, and won a Silver Slugger award. He then moved to 2B, where he played almost 1900 games, then ended up in CF, where he played 255 games (all game counts courtesy of Google AI).
His appearances, according to Baseball Reference:
- Catcher: 428 games
- Second Base: 1989 games
- Center Field: 255 games
- Left Field: 109 games
- Right Field: 2 games
- “Outfield” (I suspect this is games in which he played multiple outfield positions): 363 games
Biggio was four years younger than Torre was, when he moved from catcher to the infield, and was clearly a good fielder (he won four Gold Gloves at second), but it’s a not-dissimilar example.
He was pretty bad at it, though, and they started shifting him to first the next year. Of course, the Cardinals ALSO decided to trade away Steve Carlton at the same time, so maybe they weren’t all that smart.
The 1971 Cardinals have five Hall of Famers playing regularly and effectively - Joe Torre, Steve Carlton, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, and Ted Simmons.
Hey, he led the league…in errors for 3rd basemen.
Mets blew another one to the Nationals.
They are heading out for a west coast trip. Unless they pull a Willie Randolph he’s probably not getting fired on the road. If he survived to get on the plane I’m now thinking he’s going to last the season. If they drop any further why bother firing him?
The Mets have the #1 payroll, ahead of Dodgers & Yanks.
This is crazy.
BTW: Phillies are 6th and Astros 7th.
So Mets #1 salaries, #30 in standing
Phillies are #6 & #28
Astros are #7 & #29.
Genius observation from Mets’ losing pitcher Luke Weaver, who gave up the tying and winning runs in today’s loss to the Nationals (on an 8th-inning home run by CJ Adams):
So that’s it - not that the Mets are a lousy team, but their joy is being smothered.
Don’t the Yankees have more cast-off relievers that the Mets could sign to complement Weaver and Williams? Or maybe Jeurys Familia and Hansel Robles could come out of retirement…
Joe Torre was a pretty damn good ballplayer. Fangraphs pegs him at 62.3 WAR and 40% of his plate appearances were as a catcher.
Has he appeared on any of the committee ballots? I’m a little surprised there isn’t more support for him being inducted to the HofF as a player. They’ve certainly voted in players with lesser résumés,
Good point. Maybe because he played 3 positions? I dunno.
Here is May’s thread: