With the St. Louis Blues kicking off their 50th Anniversary celebration earlier this week, I put together an All-Decades starting six for the organization–the key was one player from each of the six decades of the team’s existence had to fill a spot. Had lots of great suggestions and obviously with this sort of exercise there isn’t room to include all of those you would like, but here’s my six:
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60’s-Glenn Hall, goalie
70’s-Bernie Federko, center
80’s-Brett Hull, forward
90’s-Al MacInnis, defense
00’s-Chris Pronger, defense
10’s-David Backes, forward
Again, lots of great arguments and considerations for those who included the likes of Brian Sutter, Mike Liut, Gary Unger, Keith Tkachuk, Pavol Demitra and others on their teams.
Someone also texted in with a suggestion–to use this same method and put together an All-Decades starting lineup for the St. Louis Cardinals.
A couple of modifications: choose a starting 10 composed of one player representing each of the last ten decades for the team. Two pitchers can be selected–both starters, reliever, right-handed, left-handed, whatever you choose.
Some decisions may be easy–Stan, Albert, Ozzie, Gibson. But keep in mind, those choices eliminate some of the other greatest players we’ve seen such as Jim Edmonds, Terry Pendleton, and Scott Rolen. Nonetheless, here’s my All-Decades Starting 10:
20’s-Rogers Hornsby, 2B…for the decade Hornsby had 2085 hits, 1153 RBIs, and his average was .382.
30’s-Dizzy Dean, RHP. (Earlier, on St. Louis Baseball Weekly I selected Bill Sherdel to have a LHP, but if there’s no restriction on what kind of pitcher, have to go with Dizzy.)
40’s-Wally Kurowski, 3B…Pendleton, Rolen, Torre are out of consideration due to their teammates earning slots but Kurowski more than held his own during his nine seasons with St. Louis. He hit 106 HRs and batted .286.
50’s-Stan Musial, RF…plain and simple, no All-Time greats Cardinals list would be complete without The Man.
60’s-Bob Gibson, RHP…if the Cardinals had to choose one pitcher, for one game don’t you think it would be #45?
70’s-Lou Brock, LF…The stolen bases, 3000 hits but don’t forget 776 of those were for extra bases. Imagine the runs Lou would’ve scored batting at the top of this lineup.
80’s-Ozzie Smith, SS…again, This Wizard is one of the players you start with and build around on this type of list.
90’s-Ray Lankford, CF…overlooked this year in the team’s Hall of Fame candidacy, Lankford is the only player in franchise history with at least 200 home runs (5th-228) and 200 stolen bases (8th-250).
00’s-Albert Pujols, 1B…as noted above, some exceptional teammates got knocked out of consideration by playing alongside one of the best players in the history of the game.
10’s-Yadier Molina, C…the standard of measurement for his position.
Alright, your turn…look forward to your selections. Post them to me @StullySTL on Twitter or send them over to stully@gatewaysportsnetwork.com
photo credit: Jasen Vinlove, Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports
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