Roster of the Month: 25 Nations
Last month, with the MLB Amateur Draft ongoing, we published a Roster of the Month with one representative from each of the 50 states. Of course, Americans are not the only people who play baseball. Beginning on July 2, hundreds of international amateurs will sign with MLB organizations. While baseball is huge in Central America and East Asia, it’s much more of an international game than that. The Yankees-Red Sox series in London sold out quickly, and every continent has sent players to MLB. Well, not Antartica; but all of the continents with people. It feels like we are not far removed from a truly international baseball team.
This month, we’ve got a roster with exactly one player from each of 25 countries. For this purpose, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands will count as separate countries, even though their residents are American citizens. First of all, they compete separately in the World Baseball Classic, and secondly, they weren’t represented on the 50-states RotM. We don’t want to leave them out altogether!
There have been 55 nations that have sent a native son to the major leagues. They can’t all fit onto this roster, so we just tried to get the best team possible. There were some excruciating decisions as well- how do you choose just one player from the Dominican Republic? Not easily. Nevertheless, here’s the roster!
Lineup
- 2B Rod Carew, Panama– While there is no disputing Carew’s Hall of Fame qualifications (seven batting titles and 3,053 hits), his inclusion leaves out Mariano Rivera. Ouch.
- DH Miguel Cabrera, Venezuela– With 404 major leaguers, Venezuela is third behind the Dominican Republic and the United States in producing baseball talent. Cabrera leads his nation in bWAR (69.7), home runs (469 and counting), and OPS (.940).
- 1B Joey Votto, Canada– Votto, a Toronto native, has tough competition for this roster spot from Fergie Jenkins and Larry Walker. While one is a Hall of Famer and the other should be, a first baseman fits better on this team than a right fielder (see Japan below).
- C Iván Rodríguez, Puerto Rico– Pudge Rodríguez is one of four Puerto Ricans in the Hall of Fame, joining Roberto Alomar, Roberto Clemente, and Orlando Cepeda. Any of them would do well for this squad, but catchers are hard to find, and he was one of the greatest ever.
- 3B Tony Perez, Cuba- Perez enjoyed a 23-year Hall of Fame career, most notably serving as a key component of The Big Red Machine in Cincinnati.
- RF Ichiro Suzuki, Japan- Were you expecting Kei Igawa?
- CF Andruw Jones, Curaçao- For such a small island (population 160,000), Curaçao has sent an impressive 15 players to MLB, five of whom are currently active. With ten Gold Gloves and 434 home runs, Jones is the standard bearer.
- SS Xander Bogaerts, Aruba– At the age of 26, Bogaerts is already the greatest player in Aruban history, having surpassed Sidney Ponson in bWAR a few years ago.
- LF Bobby Thomson, United Kingdom– Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Thomson is most famous for his pennant-clinching home run in 1951. Most people don’t realize how good he was outside of that moment. He slashed .293/.385/.562 with 32 home runs that season and got MVP votes in 3 separate seasons.
Bench
- 1B/OF John Anderson, Norway– A lot of European-born MLB players emigrated to the US as children in the late 1800s. This includes John Anderson, who amassed 28.9 bWAR from 1894-1908.
- OF Shin-Soo Choo, South Korea– At age-36, Choo is having a resurgent season for Texas, batting .287/.385/.500. However, we may have to re-evalute this roster spot, given that Hyun-Jin Ryu looks like the NL Cy Young front-runner.
- C Yan Gomes, Brazil– Gomes was an all-star in 2018 and won the Silver Slugger in 2014. When he debuted in 2012, he became the first Brazilian in MLB history.
- SS Edgar Renteria, Colombia– Renteria hit the game-winning single for the Marlins in the 11th inning the 1997 World Series Game 7. Then in 2010, he won the World Series MVP with the Giants.
- OF Devon White, Jamaica– There have been four MLB players born in Jamaica, three of whom were all-stars. This roster spot is a toss-up between White and Chili Davis– two switch-hitting outfielders with long careers in the 80s and 90s. While Davis was the better hitter, White’s defense and baserunning win him the job.
Rotation
- RHP Pedro Martinez, Dominican Republic– We could easily make a whole roster of Dominican-born players, and it would beat just about any other RotM so far. That being said, Pedro is arguably the greatest living pitcher. He posted a 2.20 ERA, 2.26 FIP and 213 ERA+ from 1997-2003, which also happened to be the peak of The Steroid Era.
- RHP Bert Blyleven, Netherlands– Blyleven and his 3,701 strikeouts are responsible 94.4 of the country’s 116.7 bWAR.
- RHP Dennis Martinez, Nicaragua– El Presidente finished his career with 3,999 2/3 innings pitched. Apparently, pitching at age-44, the 1998 Braves couldn’t let him get one more out!
- RHP Jack Quinn, Slovakia- Quinn wasn’t really from Slovakia, because Slovakia didn’t exist yet. He was born in Štefurov, current population of 113, in 1883. At the time, the village was part of the Astro-Hungarian Empire. Czechoslovakia gained independence following World War I, and then split into Slovakia and the Czech Republic in 1993, 47 years after Quinn’s death. As a pitcher, Quinn lasted from 1909-1933, retiring at the age of 50 as one of the last remaining legal spitballers.
- RHP Chien-Ming Wang, Taiwan– Wang won 19 games in consecutive seasons for the 2006-07 Yankees. However, he was never the same after injuring himself running the bases in interleague play.
Bullpen
- RHP Grant Balfour, Australia– Balfour struck out 571 batters in 539 2/3 innings over a 12-year career.
- RHP Moe Drabowsky, Poland– The introduction to Drabowsky’s SABR bio is as follows. “He terrorized teammates with snakes. He tossed firecrackers under benches and into bullpens. He was a master of the fine art of the hotfoot. Often forgotten is that Moe Drabowsky could pitch a little, too.” If you want to learn about a great character from baseball history, it’s recommended reading.
- LHP Craig Lefferts, Germany– While Max Kepler is the most well-known German in baseball these days, we need a lefty reliever. Lefferts pitched in the majors from 1983-94.
- RHP Al McBean, US Virgin Islands– McBean was a quality reliever in the 1960s, pitching mostly for the Pirates. From 1963-67, he had a 2.50 ERA over 543 2/3 innings.
- RHP Joakim Soria, Mexico– Earlier this season, Soria broke Dennys Reyes‘ record for most MLB games pitched by a Mexican. He has a 2.99 ERA and 3.02 FIP over his career.
- RHP Alex Wilson, Saudi Arabia– Born to a military family, Wilson has compiled 5.0 bWAR in seven seasons to date.
-Daniel R. Epstein
(Editor’s note: This is Dan’s last post on OTBB for awhile. We’re going to miss him dearly and we hope that we’re able to maintain the same high quality that Dan always brings to our site. Please follow him on Twitter @depstein1983 and give his OTBB archives a read. I guarantee you’ll learn something and you might even smile a few times.)
