Thursday, February 04, 2010
Favorite Sox By Uniform Number, Part 2: 21-30
Note before we get going: I guess "my favorite" means "the guy who I like the most or liked the most at any time, without doing anything to make me not like him anymore."
21: Well you know who was my favorite from about '86-'96. But now he's my least favorite, so I'm happy to pick someone else. Besides Torrez and Rick Kreuger, none of the others played for the team in my lifetime, so I'll just pick the guy I like best from the rest of the list. Juan Marichal. (9 starts in '74)
22: Ed Jurak. I'll never forget Phil Rizzuto telling the WPIX audience that "they don't pronounce the J's up in New England." Hon. men.: Nick Green. And bonus note: I also was generally a Buckner fan, before and after the thing. So I'll throw him in as another HM in the 22 slot even though the two the numbers he wore are cooler numbers. Which brings up another point--the fact that some guys wore more than one number kind of messes things up, so don't worry about it. Also, coaches and managers don't count.
23: Oil Can Boyd because he was as awesome as his name. Gotta give the HM to Bruno. Okay, and Daubach, I guess.
24: Dwight Evans. No 24 could ever surpass him, though Manny came as close as you can.
25: You slightly older folks better say Tony C. here, but I have to go with Troy O'Leary, albeit the early years of Troy. Gotta put Mike Lowell second. I was also kind of obsessed with Larry Parrish when he came in during Morgan's Magic. I also liked a few other "new" guys, Don Baylor and Jack Clark.
26: Many of you would say the Chicken Man, but I had issues with while he was on the team, and much larger ones just after he left. Proud to pick Merloni over him. HM: Joe Rudi. At age 5, I sang his name to the tune of Roto Rooter, which I thought was "Ro Ro Rooter": "Joe Joe Rudi, that's his name, and the dirty stuff goes down the drain."
27: Carlton Fisk. Wish I'd gotten to see in red socks more often.
28: Jeff Stone. He was almost Dave Roberts.
29: Shea Hillenbrand. So he swung a lot, jeez. HM: Plantier, Kapler. See what I mean about the guys who wore multiple numbers? You start getting repeats. It gets weird, do a list like this and you'll see the plight of the Favorite Sox by Number List-Maker.
30: Leskanic in a landslide. But I also loved the young giant Sam Horn when he was coming up, and was at a game where he hit a grand slam, though we were leaving through Gate A at that moment, unfortunately. I'll also use this spot to note that I liked Psycho back then, though not so much in his Fox days. Even though I think 7 and 12 before I associate him with 30. Or 19.
I've written a lot at this point so I'll cut it off at 30 for now. Remember, the awesome all-time uni # list (if you don't have them all memorized) is here on the great Red Sox Diehard site.
21: Well you know who was my favorite from about '86-'96. But now he's my least favorite, so I'm happy to pick someone else. Besides Torrez and Rick Kreuger, none of the others played for the team in my lifetime, so I'll just pick the guy I like best from the rest of the list. Juan Marichal. (9 starts in '74)
22: Ed Jurak. I'll never forget Phil Rizzuto telling the WPIX audience that "they don't pronounce the J's up in New England." Hon. men.: Nick Green. And bonus note: I also was generally a Buckner fan, before and after the thing. So I'll throw him in as another HM in the 22 slot even though the two the numbers he wore are cooler numbers. Which brings up another point--the fact that some guys wore more than one number kind of messes things up, so don't worry about it. Also, coaches and managers don't count.
23: Oil Can Boyd because he was as awesome as his name. Gotta give the HM to Bruno. Okay, and Daubach, I guess.
24: Dwight Evans. No 24 could ever surpass him, though Manny came as close as you can.
25: You slightly older folks better say Tony C. here, but I have to go with Troy O'Leary, albeit the early years of Troy. Gotta put Mike Lowell second. I was also kind of obsessed with Larry Parrish when he came in during Morgan's Magic. I also liked a few other "new" guys, Don Baylor and Jack Clark.
26: Many of you would say the Chicken Man, but I had issues with while he was on the team, and much larger ones just after he left. Proud to pick Merloni over him. HM: Joe Rudi. At age 5, I sang his name to the tune of Roto Rooter, which I thought was "Ro Ro Rooter": "Joe Joe Rudi, that's his name, and the dirty stuff goes down the drain."
27: Carlton Fisk. Wish I'd gotten to see in red socks more often.
28: Jeff Stone. He was almost Dave Roberts.
29: Shea Hillenbrand. So he swung a lot, jeez. HM: Plantier, Kapler. See what I mean about the guys who wore multiple numbers? You start getting repeats. It gets weird, do a list like this and you'll see the plight of the Favorite Sox by Number List-Maker.
30: Leskanic in a landslide. But I also loved the young giant Sam Horn when he was coming up, and was at a game where he hit a grand slam, though we were leaving through Gate A at that moment, unfortunately. I'll also use this spot to note that I liked Psycho back then, though not so much in his Fox days. Even though I think 7 and 12 before I associate him with 30. Or 19.
I've written a lot at this point so I'll cut it off at 30 for now. Remember, the awesome all-time uni # list (if you don't have them all memorized) is here on the great Red Sox Diehard site.
Labels: favorite sox by uniform number
Comments:
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Before I got heavily into fantasy baseball, I learned about players by hearing about them first then seeing them. When I first heard of Troy O'Leary, I really thought he was an Irish guy, surprise, surprise.
I almost mentioned my Troy O'Leary story--one time at Fenway, he was up and some guy near me yells out "luck o' the Irish, Troy!"
Yeah I like Foulke, he's another guy where it's like, Okay, had we not won it all, would I really be like, Oh yeah he ruled I loved him!!! And while I definitely "liked" him overall, he just wasn't a specific fave, either among 29s or among his teammates of that time.
If it was a best-of or most-important list, he'd definitely be at the top of mine.
If it was a best-of or most-important list, he'd definitely be at the top of mine.
Your comment on #24 is pretty much exactly what I would have said.
As for #21, the funny thing is that I never really liked Duh, Rock-et (as I've referred to Clemens for the past dozen years) much even when he was a Sox, certainly not after the '90 ALCS incident. Maybe it was because I was already a young adult when he became famous, but it was always pretty clear to me (again, certainly from '90 on) that he was a massive dope and an entitled jerk. So yeah, I rooted for him because he was by far our best pitcher back then, and a necessary evil if the Sox were going to do anything, but without any fondness.
And it's a touch inconsistent to go with Pudge at #27, but not El Tiante at #23, no? No disrespect to the Can, who I liked, but Louie was just as entertaining and interesting a personality and player to watch (probably more so) and a far superior pitcher...he's got a fairly decent case that he belongs in Cooperstown.
As for #21, the funny thing is that I never really liked Duh, Rock-et (as I've referred to Clemens for the past dozen years) much even when he was a Sox, certainly not after the '90 ALCS incident. Maybe it was because I was already a young adult when he became famous, but it was always pretty clear to me (again, certainly from '90 on) that he was a massive dope and an entitled jerk. So yeah, I rooted for him because he was by far our best pitcher back then, and a necessary evil if the Sox were going to do anything, but without any fondness.
And it's a touch inconsistent to go with Pudge at #27, but not El Tiante at #23, no? No disrespect to the Can, who I liked, but Louie was just as entertaining and interesting a personality and player to watch (probably more so) and a far superior pitcher...he's got a fairly decent case that he belongs in Cooperstown.
Yeah if I was five years older, I'd have gone Tiant, and I def. should have given him an HM spot since I've come to know the post-playing version of him. I hate this list, it's way too hard to include everyone you like.
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