Let’s kick this tournament off. Not much discussion necessary, but we’ll look at the matchups in brief. Remember, you can find out more about the tournament as well as see the full bracket in this post. Polls close at noon tomorrow.
A couple of flashy glovemen with devoted fanbases. Ozzie Smith‘s a Hall of Famer with some offensive skills, Brendan Ryan‘s….well, that glove really is nice, isn’t it?
A speed merchant from the ’80’s in Vince Coleman and a home-grown guy in Placido Polanco that folks always seemed to want to reacquire.
Albert Pujols, the man who looked to challenge Stan Musial before leaving town, against Skip Schumaker, one of the various members of the Cards next to the word “scrappy” in the dictionary.
The Secret Weapon Jose Oquendo and a former teammate in Andy Van Slyke that got a blog named after him, albeit a Pirates one.
The second half of the Arch Region will be up tomorrow morning. Come back about 10 for the first matchups from the Ballpark Village Region!
That Pujols/Schumaker one is closer than I thought. I always liked Schumaker. He was one of my favorites on the club, and I have a soft spot for scrappy utility guys. I think that’s why I like Matt Carpenter so much. When he came up, he went to a few different positions and got whatever playing time he could, and even learned a new position to get in the lineup everyday. On top of that, Schumaker left the club on much better terms than Pujols did.