The Major League Baseball All-Time Team was chosen in 1997 to comprise the top manager and top player in each of 13 positional categories across Major League Baseball history. The team, announced by Classic Sports Network in conjunction with the events celebrated around the 1997 Major League Baseball All-Star Game, were chosen by a panel of 36 members of the Baseball Writers Association of America in a first- and second-place Borda count voting system.
Position | First-team selection | Team(s) represented by season |
Year of induction into National Baseball Hall of Fame |
Total votes (First-team votes) |
Runner-up | Team(s) represented by season |
Year of induction into National Baseball Hall of Fame |
Total votes (First-team votes) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Catcher | Johnny Bench | Cincinnati Reds (1967–1983) | 1989 | 52 (24) | Yogi Berra | New York Yankees (1946–1963) New York Mets (1965) |
1972 | 22 (4) |
First baseman | Lou Gehrig | New York Yankees (1923–1939) | 1939 | 66½ (31) | Jimmie Foxx | Philadelphia Athletics (1925–1935) Boston Red Sox (1936–1942) Chicago Cubs (1942, 1944) Philadelphia Phillies (1945) |
1951 | 19 (3) |
Second baseman | Rogers Hornsby | St. Louis Cardinals (1915–1926, 1933) New York Giants (1927) Boston Braves (1928) Chicago Cubs (1929–1932) St. Louis Browns (1933–1937) |
1942 | 44 (17) | Joe Morgan | Houston Astros (1963–1971, 1980) Cincinnati Reds (1972–1979) San Francisco Giants (1981–1982) Philadelphia Phillies (1983) Oakland Athletics (1984) |
1990 | 23 (6) |
Shortstop | Honus Wagner | Louisville Colonels (1897–1899) Pittsburgh Pirates (1900–1917) |
1936 | 55 (23) | Cal Ripken, Jr. | Baltimore Orioles (1981–2001) | 2007 | 24 (6) |
Third baseman | Mike Schmidt | Philadelphia Phillies (1972–1989) | 1995 | 50 (21) | Brooks Robinson | Baltimore Orioles (1955–1977) | 1983 | 37 (13) |
Left fielder | Ted Williams | Boston Red Sox (1939–1942, 1946–1960) | 1966 | 68 (32) | Stan Musial | St. Louis Cardinals (1941–1944, 1946–1963) | 1969 | 36 (4) |
Center fielder | Willie Mays | San Francisco Giants (1951–1952, 1954–1972) New York Mets (1972–1973) |
1979 | 57 (25) | Ty Cobb | Detroit Tigers (1905–1926) Philadelphia Athletics (1927–1928) |
1936 | 22 (7) |
Right fielder | Babe Ruth | Boston Red Sox (1914–1919) New York Yankees (1920–1934) Boston Braves (1935) |
1936 | 67 (31) | Hank Aaron | Milwaukee Braves (1954–1974) Milwaukee Brewers (1975–1976) |
1982 | 36 (5) |
Designated hitter | Paul Molitor | Milwaukee Brewers (1978–1992) Toronto Blue Jays (1993–1995) Minnesota Twins (1996–1998) |
2004 | 48 (22) | Harold Baines | Chicago White Sox (1980–1989, 1996–1997, 2001–2002) Texas Rangers (1989–1990) Oakland Athletics (1990–1992) Baltimore Orioles (1993–1995, 1997–1999, 2000) Cleveland Indians (1999) |
Not applicable | 12 (3) |
Right-handed starting pitcher | Walter Johnson | Washington Senators (1907–1927) | 1936 | 30 (9) | Cy Young | Cleveland Spiders (1890–1898) St. Louis Perfectos (1899–1900) Boston Americans (1901–1908) Cleveland Naps (1909–1911) Boston Rustlers (1911) |
1937 | 25 (12) |
Left-handed starting pitcher | Sandy Koufax | Los Angeles Dodgers (1955–1966) | 1972 | 32 (11) | Warren Spahn | Milwaukee Braves (1942, 1946–1964) New York Mets (1965) San Francisco Giants (1965) |
1973 | 28 (11) |
Relief pitcher | Dennis Eckersley | Cleveland Indians (1975–1977) Boston Red Sox (1978–1984, 1998) Chicago Cubs (1984–1986) Oakland Athletics (1987–1995) St. Louis Cardinals (1996–1997) |
2004 | 40 (16) | Rollie Fingers | Oakland Athletics (1968–1976) San Diego Padres (1977–1980) Milwaukee Brewers (1981–1982, 1984–1985) |
1992 | 29 (9) |
Manager | Casey Stengel | Brooklyn Dodgers (1934–1936) Boston Braves (1938–1943) New York Yankees (1949–1960) New York Mets (1962–1965) |
1966 | 22 (6) | Joe McCarthy | Chicago Cubs (1926–1930) New York Yankees (1931–1946) Boston Red Sox (1948–1950) |
1957 | 18 (6) |
Famous quotes containing the words major, league, baseball and/or team:
“Power is not of a man. Wealth does not center in the person of the wealthy. Celebrity is not inherent in any personality. To be celebrated, to be wealthy, to have power requires access to major institutions.”
—C. Wright Mills (19161962)
“I am not impressed by the Ivy League establishments. Of course they graduate the bestits all theyll take, leaving to others the problem of educating the country. They will give you an education the way the banks will give you moneyprovided you can prove to their satisfaction that you dont need it.”
—Peter De Vries (b. 1910)
“Compared to football, baseball is almost an Oriental game, minimizing individual stardom, requiring a wide range of aggressive and defensive skills, and filled with long periods of inaction and irresolution. It has no time limitations. Football, on the other hand, has immediate goals, resolution on every single play, and a lot of violenceitself a highlight. It has clearly distinguishable hierarchies: heroes and drones.”
—Jerry Mander, U.S. advertising executive, author. Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television, ch. 15, Morrow (1978)
“I also heard the whooping of the ice in the pond, my great bed-fellow in that part of Concord, as if it were restless in its bed and would fain turn over, were troubled with flatulency and bad dreams; or I was waked by the cracking of the ground by the frost, as if some one had driven a team against my door, and in the morning would find a crack in the earth a quarter of a mile long and a third of an inch wide.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)