Carl Yastrzemski

Carl Yastrzemski turned 71 today. Happy birthday Captain Carl. His birthday made me take a another look at his Baseball-Reference.com page.

In Boston Yaz still has to live in the shadow of Ted Williams. He played the same position as Teddy Ballgame and while Yaz was a great hitter - he wasn't the greatest hitter who ever lived. Having said that - how easily do we forget how good Yaz was with his glove? I had forgotten that Yaz had 7 Gold Gloves. Honestly Williams was a hack in the field. Not Yaz. And durable? Yaz is second in games played all-time. In 16 of his 23 seasons he played at least 148 games.

Yaz' name is mentioned every once in a while when a player has a chance to win the Triple Crown (Yaz was the last player to win the Triple Crown when he hit .326 with 44 HR and 121 RBI in 1967) but with his contributions to the game his name isn't mentioned enough.

As an aside - I was amused that Old Number 8 is 8th all-time in hits, total bases and doubles.