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In response to Brian Kenny...

2013 All-Underrated Team: 1b: Belt 2b: Infante SS: Lowrie 3b: Seager C: Lucroy LF: Nava CF: Rasmus RF: Venable
— Brian Kenny (@MrBrianKenny) January 27, 2014

... below are some thoughts on the 2013 All-Underrated Team:

First Base
Brandon Moss, Oakland A's
Kenny makes a strong choice with Brandon Belt. It seems like Belt's been a part-time player for so long. On the contrary, Belt has compiled impressive numbers in over twelve hundred plate appearances, since his debut in 2011:

Brandon Belt Career Stats (2011-13)

Brandon Belt is a fine choice, but we would have chosen Brandon Moss of the Oakland A's. Both play in the the Bay Area and receive less-than-deserved National acclaim. Last year, Brandon Moss hit more home runs (30) than Brandon Belt hit in the past two years (24) and almost in his entire career (33). Many of Moss's advanced rate stats also compare favorably to Belt's...

Brandon Moss 2011-2013 Stats

Second Base
Daniel Murphy, Mets

Photo by Henry Ray Abrams

How good does an All Star have to be to be underrated? We were going to suggest Jason Kipnis before settling on Daniel Murphy. Few seem to notice how good Daniel Murphy is offensively. This is for at least two reasons. First, the Mets' offense has been largely irrelevant this decade. Second, when thinking of offensive second basemen, most think of Cano, Pedroia, Utley, Kinsler, and Matt Carpenter. People already love Ben Zobrist; he's not underrated anymore. Even Brandon Phillips and Neil Walker seem to have more fans than Daniel Murphy.

Omar Infante, Brian Kenny's choice, has a better slash line than Daniel Murphy. Infante is better in the batter's box, but his base running is not on par with Murphy's, making him a slightly less effective offensive player.

2013 Baserunning Runs Above Average
Daniel Murphy: 6.4 Fangraphs, 5 Baseball-Reference
Omar Infante: 0 Fangraphs, -1 Baseball-Reference

2013 Batting Runs Above Average
Omar Infante: 9 Fangraphs, 7 Baseball-Reference
Daniel Murphy: 4.6 Fangraphs, 5 Baseball-Reference

Among all players who played at least 24% of their games last season at second basemen, Daniel Murphy ranked fourth in hits (188) and stolen bases (23), and fifth in RE24 (see below).

2013 MLB Second Basement by RE24

Please don't get me started on Darwin Barney.

Shortstop
Jed Lowrie, Oakland A's
Good choice by Mr. Kenny. Everth Cabrera, who has lots of speed and a .355 OBP last season, was under consideration.

Third Base
Kyle Seager, Seattle Mariners
Having scoured free agent lists and team rosters from around the globe in search of undervalued third basemen for our last post, we feel most confident in agreeing with Brian Kenny at this position. Kyle Seager is a fine choice. Fans around the country are not very familiar with him, but he's probably too good for even the Yankees to be able to trade for him.

Catcher
Jonathan Lucroy, Brewers
Again, we agree with Mr. Kenny. At first, it looked like Jason Castro is the most underrated, but his under-the-radar offensive production falls just shy of Lucroy's combination of underrated overall game, particularly with his pitch framing prowess.

Left Field
Carlos Quentin, Padres
Oh man, I really wanted this to be Starling Marte of the Pirates. He's a stud, and while I don't think he has enough fans, he's not as good of a choice as Brian Kenny's choice: Daniel Nava. I was just about ready to agree with Kenny once again before turning my attention to Carlos Quentin. The Padres' left fielder had 216 fewer plate appearances than Nava last year, which could disqualify him to many. I still think Quentin is more underrated. Carlos Quentin's 145 OPS+ is the highest among all players who made at least 200 plate appearances and played at least 33% of their games in Left Field. When averaging the WAR between Fangraphs and B-R, then converting them to rate stats, we get...

2013 avWAR per 650 Plate Appearances
Carlos Quentin: 4.2
Daniel Nava: 2.8

Center Field
Mike Trout, Angels

Photo by Cal Sports Media

Sure, he's widely accepted as the best player in baseball. How can he also be underrated? It seems that, as a whole, we are taking Mike Trout's brilliance for granted. His rookie season in 2012 was so spectacular that we expected his numbers to crash in 2013, and he'd still be one of the best players of the game. Remarkably, Trout matched his 2012 performance with an equally stellar 2013 campaign. How rare is this? Mike Trout leads every offensive baseball player ever, through their age-21 seasons, in Career RE24 and Wins Above Replacement. Hall of Famer Willie McCovey had a 188 OPS+ across 219 plate appearances in his age-21 rookie season. Besides McCovey, Trout has the highest OPS+ among all offensive players with at least 200 plate appearances before the age-22 season.


Basically, Mike Trout is the best player ever.

Right Field
Will Venable, Padres

Photo by Chris Hardy

Shane Victorino had an underrated season last year. Victorino missed some time, and most fans outside of Boston did not realize that he bounced back after a poor showing in 2012. That being said, Shane Victorino has a lot of fans, from Boston to Philadelphia, and all the way to Hawaii. Will Venable is much lesser known. A big key to his success last season, when he hit 22 home runs and stole 22 bases, was Venable's ability to hit lefties. Besides his rare combination of power and speed, Venable's .484 slugging percentage, playing half his games in San Diego, is most impressive.


All in all, we agree with Brian Kenny on half of his selections. I wonder what he thinks of my Moss, Murphy, Quentin, and Trout substitutions? Thanks for reading. How does your most underrated team look?

As soon as Alex Rodriguez's 162-game suspension was announced, baseball writers and bloggers speculated as to who'd play 3rd base for the Yankees.

Jay Jaffe summarized internal and free agent candidates to replace A-Rod as"a fairly dismal array of options". Including Kelly Johnson and Brendan Ryan as candidates, Jaffe suggests the Yankees find an upgrade via trade.

Dan Martin, of the New York Post, says the Yankees have few quality options other than Chase Headley from the Padres. Most agree that the Yankees do not have enough prospects to get Headley. It has been widely reported that when the Yankees called San Diego to inquire on trading for an infielder, talks veered away from Chase Headley, towards utility infielder Logan Forsythe.

Kelly Johnson is a good addition.

Bryan Hoch of MLB.com and Craig Calcaterra of NBC Sports think Kelly Johnson is poised to take the majority of playing time at the hot corner.

Kelly Johnson is a boom or bust one-trick pony. Expect a notch below Curtis Granderson's production. Kelly Johnson's swing is presumably well-suited for the dimensions of Yankee stadium. Curtis Granderson hit 40 home runs a couple of times in pinstripes, and Johnson might have a chance to top 30. Looking at their stats the past four seasons...

Curtis Granderson (as a Yankee, 2010-13)
2,148 PA, .245/.335/.495, 38 nSB

Kelly Johnson (2010-13)
2,272 PA, .243/.326/.424, 31 nSB

Granderson carried a career .488 SLG when he was traded to the Yankees. We don't expect Johnson to begin slugging .480 or .490, he's been a .427 career slugger.

The Yankees have a roster of infielders, many of whom cannot be expected to stay healthy for more than 120 games, including "starters" Brian Roberts and Derek Jeter. If both of them are out the same day, Kelly Johnson and Brendan Ryan will play up the middle. Third base would be manned by Scott Sizemore or Eduardo Nuñez.

Yankee fans are all too familiar with Nuñez. The best analytic complement for Eduardo Nuñez is that he makes good contact, although he swings at too many pitches outside the strike zone.

Perhaps, the best move would be to keep the Roberts/Johnson time-share at 2nd base, start Brendan Ryan every day at shortstop, and split third base duties between Derek Jeter and Scott Sizemore. Jeter could also DH on days that Alfonso Soriano gets a day in left field or needs a rest.

Sizemore will play.

The Yankees are playing an infield-by-committee strategy wherein having enough brittle players ensures they won't all be hurt at the same time.

Scott Sizemore is another good player with a troubling injury history. Oliver loves Scott Sizemore. Oliver is a simple projection model that takes injury/platoon out of the equation, using 600 plate appearances for all players. Oliver projects a .345 On Base Percentage and 3.8 WAR for Sizemore. That is the highest WAR projection from Oliver for any player mentioned in this essay, including Chase Headley (3.5) and Kyle Seager (3.3). Someone at the Yankees likes this Sizemore guy and has evidence that will look good somewhere in Girardi's Binder. The team is hoping they could rekindle the same kind of magic they had when they hooked up with Eric Chavez in 2012. In case you're curious, Oliver projects 1.7 WAR for Chavez, with more than that coming in from his defense. Oliver projects Chavez to be a below replacement offensive player in 2014.

The average age of Jeter (40), Roberts (36*), Johnson (32), and Ryan (32) will be 35 at the 2014 All Star Game (July 15).

*Roberts will be 37 for the Playoffs

Is an infield of Sizemore (3b), Ryan (SS), Johnson (2b), and Mark Teixeira (1b) a lineup the Yankees would take into October?

Considering the Yankees don't have enough prospects to acquire Chase Headley, we eliminate Kyle Seager from any Yankee fan's dream list. Chase Headley has produced 4.7 avWAR/650 PA from 2011-2013. Seager is at 3.2 avWAR/650, but he is more valuable than Headley becauase he's younger and under team control through 2017. Headley can become a free agent this Fall.

Let's keep looking for further possibilities.

Mustelier looks like Yuniesky

How much potential is in Ronnier Mustelier? He's a Cuban refuge, who has spent the past three seasons in the Yankees' minor league system, and will turn 30 this August. If promoted to the big leagues, Oliver projects just a .318 OBP. Mustelier's past 3-year stats tell a better story, with a .306/.357/.460 slash line in 1,030 plate appearances (over 700 PA's in Triple-A).

After combing through organizational depth charts and free agent lists, we've come up with the following groups of trade targets and free agents, sorted by wOBA from the past three seasons:

Trade Targets 2011-2013 OBP, wOBA, wRC+
Aramis Ramirez, Brewers .363, .376, 136
Josh Satin, Mets .361, .332, 114
Chris Johnson, Braves .329, .333, 108
Jeff Keppinger, White Sox .316, .304, 91
Luis Valbuena, Cubs .316, .299, 83
Pedro Ciriaco, Royals .304, .295, 81
Logan Forsythe, Padres .252, .243, 45

Josh Satin's numbers are a really small sample size, just 249 plate appearances with the Mets. He's had an unsustainable .397 BABiP in that time, so his career numbers should go down with more opportunities. Valbuena and Forsythe at least bring better defensive skill than the other five on this list.

Drew 96 wRC+ (2011-13)

Looking at past 3-year stats for potential free agents, including Stephen Drew, do not look better than trade targets.

2011-2013 OBP, wOBA, wRC+
Michael Young .343, .330, 103
Wilson Betemit .328, .327, 103
Jeff Baker .311, .321, 97
Stephen Drew .322, .318, 96
Justin Turner .327, .310, 97
Chris Nelson .312, .310, 82
Ty Wigginton .309, .303, 81
Jerry Hairston Jr .323, .302, 90
Placido Polanco .320, .289, 78

Michael Young is already much worse than he was in 2011 and trending badly.

Jeff Baker mashes lefties, but his 3rd base defensive is atrocious. Can he hit enough to make up for it? A left side of the infield of Jeff Baker and Derek Jeter would be the worst in the game.

I think he was safe.

Stephen Drew and Justin Turner may provide the highest floor. There's a good chance they produce relatively similarly, and Turner will come at a substantially lower price tag.

Frank Wren, GM of the Braves should be texting and calling Brian Cashman twice a day, in an effort to trade Chris Johnson to the Braves. Atlanta lucked out with Chris Johnson's 2013 season. His .397 BABiP last year is certainly something the Yankees are aware of, but his track record is nevertheless better than just about any other option. Would you take Chris Johnson over Aramis Ramirez for this next season?

Aramis Ramirez is the best option, isn't he? This is the last year of his contract, making $16 million. The Brewers are not likely to contend in a division with St. Louis, Pittsburgh, and Cincinnati. Ramirez is far from an iron horse, but if he can sit or DH once in a while, he could see 600 plate appearances.

Yankee fans would love Aramis

Inserting Aramis Ramirez's bat into the Yankees lineup looks great...

Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
Derek Jeter, SS
Carlos Beltran, RF
Brian McCann, C
Aramis Ramirez, 3b
Mark Teixeira, 1b

Girardi has a solid bench

Alfonso Soriano, DH
Roberts/Johnson, 2b
Brett Gardner, LF

Brendan Ryan, Ichiro Suziki, and Scott Sizemore make a potent bench.

In conclusion, we suggest the Yankees trade for Aramis Ramirez. If they want a lower cost move, they should look at signing Justin Turner or trading for Luis Valbuena.

Without an upgrade at third, Derek Jeter should take some grounders over there. Mostly, we would bolster a plan that relies quite a bit on Scott Sizemore and Ronnier Mustelier.

Let your voices be heard, Yankees fans. What should they do?

Buster Olney reported in his column today that, contrary to trade speculation earlier in the season, David Price will likely stay with the Rays this season. "Ninety percent chance he stays," one rival executive said. "The [trade] market hasn't materialized."

AP Photo/Charles Krupa

This makes sense. Most teams have learned from the mistakes of teams like the '07 Braves who traded Elvis Andrus, Neftali Feliz, Matt Harrison and Jarrod Saltalamacchia for Mark Teixeira. To look at it another way, the Cubs held on the Matt Garza until he only had a couple of months left on his contract, and they still got a great return.

The Rays have two years left of control over David Price. If they keep him for another year and trade him in 11 or 12 months, they'll likely still get about 95% of the return they would get from trading him right now.

***

Quick non-baseball thought...

Not that this is different from any day in the past few years, but I was listening to a Bob Dylan bootleg this afternoon and concluded that he must've been on a different wavelength (read: drugs) when he wrote "Highway 61 Revisited".

Please allow me to paraphrase the opening of the song below...

God: Kill me a son
Abe: Man, you must be putting me on
God: No
Abe: What?!
God: You can do what you want, Abe, but the next time you see me comin’ you better run
Abe: Where do you want this killing done?
God: Out on Highway 61

You'll be hard pressed to find a bigger fan of Bob Dylan's poetry than me, but WTF man? This is some weird stuff.

***

Who's going to sign Ervin Santana? It sounds like the Orioles.

***

Cobb, from 1906 Tigers team photo

While researching on Hall of Famers last week, I found a set of surprising stats...

Hack Wilson is a pretty famous Hall of Famer, right?

Wilson holds the record for most RBI's in a season (191), which is a terrible reason to be in the Hall of Fame, but he's not thought of as an undeserving member of the Hall of Fame the way we think of Rabbit Maranville, Lloyd Waner, or Rube Marquard. Is he?

Hack Wilson's 144 OPS+ over a 12-year career makes him sound like a deserving Hall of Famer. If that's the case, this stat is another testament to the greatness of Ty Cobb.

In his career, Hack Wilson had 5,556 plate appearances. Ty Cobb reached base safely 5,532 times. That doesn't include how many times he reached base on errors because those stats were not accurately kept a century ago. It's safe to say that Ty Cobb reached base on an error more than 25 times in his 24-year career. Therefore, Ty Cobb reached base safely more times than fellow Hall of Famer, Hack Wilson, stepped into the batters' box.

Have you ever heard of a ballplayer from the 1920s and '30s named Max Bishop? More than likely, you have heard of the '27 Yankees, with their menacing nickname: Murderers' Row. Max Bishop was not a member of Murderers' Row.

Grove, Gehrig, Simmons and Cochrane

On the contrary, Max (or "Maxie") Bishop was the Second Baseman for Connie Mack's great Philadelphia A's teams that took the American League crown from Murderers' Row by winning the AL pennant in 1929, '30, and '31. More famous from those A's teams were all-time greats Lefty Grove, Jimmie Foxx, Al Simmons, and Mickey Cochrane.

Lefty Grove has a claim as the best pitcher of all time. He debuted late, at 25 years old. He led the league in ERA nine times, first when he was 26 and latest when he was 39. Grove also led the league in strikeouts the first seven years of his career, and K/BB ration eight times.

Jimmie Foxx and Connie Mack

Jimmie Foxx won three MVP awards, was often called the right-handed Babe Ruth, and his top comps on Baseball-Reference are Ted Williams, Lou Gehrig, Manny Ramirez, Frank Thomas, Mel Ott, and Mickey Mantle.

Al Simmons began his career with eleven consecutive seasons of a .300 or higher batting average. Over a seven consecutive seasons, from 1925 through 1931, Al Simmons batted .372/.415/.622. Shibe Park was a pretty good hitters' park, but Simmons still average a 159 OPS+ those seven years.

Michey Cochrane is one of the two or three best hitting catchers of all time. His career .419 OBP is the highest of all qualified catchers, as is his .413 wOBA. Cochrane wasn't as much of a slugger as Mike Piazza, but his .320/.419/.478 slash line compares favorably to Piazza's .308/.377/.545 (.390 wOBA).

Max Bishop has a rare stat line in his own right. His .423 Career On-Base Percentage is the 14th best OBP of all time, tied with "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and Dan Brouthers*. Bishop walked over 80 times in ten consecutive seasons, over 100 walks in eight straight. Five times, he had more walks than hits. That's rare.

*You've certainly heard of Joe Jackson, but a here's little background on Brouthers: Dan Brouthers is a Hall of Famer who was born before the first Lincoln-Douglas debate, before Minnesota became the 32nd state, before the Civil War. His Major League debut was in June 1879, four months before Thomas Edison demonstrated electric light. Okay, enough about would be 155-year old Dan Brouthers.

Camera Eye

No player in the history of baseball mastered the art of working a walk as well as Max Bishop. His nickname, Camera Eye, was well earned; he must have had one of the best set of batting eyes of all time.

Unlike most players with great on-base skills, Bishop was not a feared hitter. Over his career, Bishop had a .271 Batting Average and .366 Slugging Percentage. For more contemporary comparisons, Bishop's Batting Average and Slugging Percentage are identical to those of Jason Bartlett (.271/.336/.366) and roughly the same as Dave Roberts (.267/.342/.366) and Francisco Cervelli (.271/.343/.367). The difference is in the walks, to get to the .423 on-base percentage. Wow, Max Bishop could walk...

All Time Career BB% (Qualified Hitters)
Ted Williams 20.6%
Barry Bonds 20.3%
Max Bishop 20.0%
Babe Ruth 19.4%

The career slugging percentages for the four players listed above are .634, .607, .366, and .690, respectively.

The largest difference between career Batting Average and OBP, among all 5,219 players who've had at least 500 plate appearances, belongs to Max Bishop (.423 OBP - .271 AVG = .152).

Conversely, the smallest differential belongs to Warren White (.256 OBP - .255 AVG = .001). Warren White has the lowest BB% of all time, at 0.1%. He walked just twice in 725 recorded career plate appearances, but that was in the 1870s, when it took nine balls for a walk. Since 1920, the lowest career BB% of any batter with at least 500 plate appearances belongs to another middle infielder from the A's. Rob Picciolo played mostly for the Oakland A's during an eight year career from 1977 to '85. Picciolo walked just 25 times in over 1,700 plate appearances.

Rob Picciolo Statistics

Does it mean anything if WAR does not align with Win Shares?

Working on a project for another site, had me doing an analysis of Orel Hershiser, Bret Saberhagen, and Steve Garvey.

avWAR*
Bret Saberhagen 59 (4.6 per 200 IP)
Orel Hershiser 49 (3.1 per 200 IP)
Steve Garvey 38 (2.6 per 650 PA)

*Average of fWAR and rWAR

Career Win Shares
Garvey 279 (19.2 / 650 PA)
Hershiser 210 (13.4 / 200 IP)
Saberhagen 193 (15.1 / 200 IP)

As a rate stat, Win Shares has Saberhagen ahead of Hershiser.

Is it normal for Win Shares and WAR to disagree? Maybe it's as simple as the positional adjustment for first-basemen in WAR is so much higher. Has anyone else run across this before?

We began this post a couple of months ago. We've written thousands of words about whom we would, and would not, vote for if we had a Hall of Fame ballot. For the sake of our readership, we've decided to strip this down to the bare minimum. For example, how long would you stay on this site if 3,000 words in, we start getting into why we wouldn't vote for Ray Durham?

This is a different ballot than we've ever seen. Not only is it overstuffed, with more than 10 deserving candidates, we have the moral dilemma of decided what to do with steroid users, suspected users, and if it makes sense to keep steroid users out of the Cooperstown when the Hall already honors racists,  amphetamines users, coke heads, and wife beaters. I don't know about you, but if I had a son, I'd rather he grow up to use steroids than beat his wife.

That being said, I do not support the Hall of Fame induction of Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens. It's not so much because of the steroid use as their natural state of being sleazy, lying jerks.

Enough with that, this is supposed to be fun, and we're going to have fun. As Clark W. Griswold said, we're going to have so much fun, we'll need plastic surgery to remove the goddam smiles from our faces.

Quickly, as this is our fifth year of publishing an imaginary ballot, here is a recap of our past votes...

That's a Hall of Fame Smile

2010
Bert Blyleven
Tim Raines
Roberto Alomar
Barry Larkin
Edgar Martinez
Alan Trammell
Andre Dawson HOF
Fred McGriff

Andre Dawson was the only player from our ballot to get it in. So the following year, it was easy to add newcomers Jeff Bagwell, Larry Walker, and John Olerud to the seven remaining players.

2011

Olerud has a nice case.

Bert Blyleven HOF
Tim Raines
Roberto Alomar HOF
Barry Larkin
Edgar Martinez
Alan Trammell
Fred McGriff
Jeff Bagwell
Larry Walker
John Olerud

Blyeleven and Alomar got the nod this year, but Olerud fell off the ballot for failing to reach 5% of the BBWAA vote. Players to appear on the ballot for the first time the following year, in 2012, made little-to-no impact on the voting. In fact, only Bernie Williams received more than 5% of the vote in 2012, but he only stayed on the ballot for one more year, falling below 5% in 2013. We did not "vote" for him either time he was on the ballot. As foreign as a concept as this seems now, 2012 was the last year we had fewer than 10 names on our list...

Larkin was a Hometown Hero

2012
Tim Raines
Barry Larkin HOF
Edgar Martinez
Alan Trammell
Jeff Bagwell
Larry Walker

Larkin graduated in 2012, but no-one received 75% in 2013...

2013
Tim Raines
Edgar Martinez

It's a shame Kenny Lofton didn't get 5% of the vote

Alan Trammell
Jeff Bagwell
Larry Walker
Craig Biggio
Kenny Lofton
Fred McGriff
Mike Piazza
Curt Schilling

Looking back, the only player we've waffled on is Fred McGriff, who received our support in odd numbered years. Over the past few years, we've given strong consideration to Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy and Dave Parker. Plus, it would've been nice to vote for Al Leiter as a tip of the cap in 2011. Moises Alou is in the same position this year. We love Moises Alou. Having watched them both play hundreds of games, I'd say there's a great case that Moises Alou was a better player than Sammy Sosa. Alou would have absolutely received a gratuitous "vote" if fewer than 10 players deserved actual consideration this year. That is not the case. This year's ballot is jam packed. Even if voters say "no" to anyone with a whisper of drug rumors, there are more than 10 good candidates. There's no good excuse for having a ballot with fewer than ten names in 2013.

There are lots of places to read why someone did/didn't vote for everyone on this year's ballot. The best explanation we've seen this year is from Ken Rosenthal on Fox Sports. Our ballots don't totally agree, and I rarely link to Rosenthal because he's just not in my personal inner circle of writers. But, the explanation for his ballot is so clear and reasonable that he almost took 80% of the words right out of my mouth. In fact, most of our thoughts on these players are echoed in what we wrote last year. Straying from our normal form, let's avoid some redundancies and get straight to our 2014 "ballot"...

Greg Maddux was the best.

- Jeff Bagwell
- Greg Maddux
- Edgar Martinez
- Mike Mussina
- Mike Piazza
- Tim Raines
- Curt Schilling
- Frank Thomas
- Alan Trammell
- Larry Walker

For argument's sake, our most difficult were Tom Glavine and Craig Biggio, and our weakest support probably went to Alan Trammell.

The good people at Baseball Think Factory publish a Hall of Fame Ballot Collection Gizmo that provides a preview for what we may see when the results are announced in a week and a half.

The most fun we can have on this topic is in the discussion. Please let us know what your Hall of Fame ballot would look like in the comments below, on Twitter, or if we see each other in person.

It's been a long time since we've had a not-baseball post.

With the best time of the year to go to the movies upon us, below is a humbly ranked list of cinema options this holiday season:

1. American Hustle
2. Inside Llewyn Davis
3. Her
4. The Wolf of Wall Street
5. Nebraska
6. Philomena
7. Dallas Buyers Club
8. Out of the Furnace
9. Anchorman 2
10. 12 Years a Slave
11. Delivery Man
12. Grudge Match
13. The Book Thief
14. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
15. Lone Survivor
16. Last Vegas
17. The Best Man Holiday
18. Homefront
19. Frozen
20. Mandela
21. Saving Mr. Banks
22. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
23. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
24. Thor: The Dark World
25. Tyler Perry’s A Madea Christmas

Thoughts? Any glaring omissions or under/overrating?

Let us know in the comments below...

Earlier this week, I emailed Graham Womack my submission for Baseball: Past and Present's fourth annual "50 Best Players Not in the Hall of Fame" project.

Back in the Summer of 2010, we assembled our first occasional (non-annual) non-Hall of Famers squad. At the time, we knew we wouldn't do it every year, and we haven't done it since.

Without out further ado, below is our selection of non-Hall of Famers who've appeared on at least one Hall of Fame ballot.

2nd occasional non-Hall of Famers
Batting Order

Versatile glove, good bat

1. Kenny Lofton, CF
2. Jeff Bagwell, 1b
3. Barry Bonds, LF
4. Mike Piazza, C
5. Larry Walker, RF
6. Dick Allen, 3b
7. Bobby Grich, 2b
8. Alan Trammell, SS

Bench: Edgar Martinez, DH
Bench: Tim Raines, LF
Bench: Bo Jackson, CF
Bench: Lou Whitaker, 2b

Bill Freehan in Boston

Bench: Buddy Bell, 3b
Bench: Craig Biggio, 2b/CF/C
Bench: Reggie Smith, CF/RF
Bench: Graig Nettles, 3b
Bench: Bill Freehan, C

SP: Roger Clemens
SP: Curt Schilling
SP: Rick Reuschel
SP: Kevin Brown

P: Luis Tiant
P: David Cone

Nobody messes with Buck O'Neil

P: Dave Stieb
RP: Dan Quisenberry

Manager: Buck O'Neil

Please let us know what you think. Did we leave anyone off that should really be included? Keep in mind, people who have still not been voted on, like Greg Maddux, Frank Thomas, Mike Mussina and Tom Glavine are not eligible for this list until after the Hall of Fame results are announced the second week of January.

Let us know how your team would look. Thanks for reading!