To my surprise both Hendrick and Dawson were available. I decided to go with Dawson, the younger player. I believe we're set for years to come with him patrolling CF.
Because we had a need at 1B, due to the release of Joe Torre, I expected to address that need in the 2nd round. With Gene Tenace gone to Honey Brook, the best 1B option appeared to be Davey Johnson and he was available when my turn came. But I had another dilemma. OF Tony Scott was the best player on the board. Taking the slick fielding Scott would allow me to use Greg Luzinski as designated hitter.
The temptation was too much to pass up. I took Scott and hoped Johnson, with his limited available usage, would still be there at the end of the 3rd round. Lo and behold Johnson was still on the board so I grabbed him. He'll platoon at 1B with Ed Kranepool. Now and again I'll cross my fingers and start Jerry Martin at 1B to give the aged Davey and Ed some extra rest.
I figured Martin, when not playing 1B, could platoon with Scott in LF. But come the end of round 4, Gene Clines was still available. He'll make an even better platoon pairing with Scott.
In round 5 I was pleased to be able to get Fred Holdsworth to help alleviate the vacuum left in the bullpen with the retirement of Ken Sanders and release of Al Downing. In the 12th round I picked 40-year old Vic Davalillo and will use him as a left-handed pitch-hitting specialist. Maybe Vic will provide some of that "secret sauce" that gave us .390 pinch-hitting in our pennant run last season.
So, here is the group I'm going with:
1977 Lionville Tiger-Cats Black=on active roster Blue=minor leaguers
Batters CODES YEAR TEAM BAL AB DO TR HR BAVG BB K'S RBI OB% SL%
Joe Morgan (L) 1 0 1977 CIN 1L 521 21 6 22 .288 117 58 78 .417 .478
Greg Luzinski (R) 2 0 1977 PHN 3R 554 35 3 39 .309 80 140 130 .394 .594
Ted Simmons (S) 3 0 1977 SLN 1R 516 25 3 21 .318 79 37 95 .408 .500
Jerry Morales (R) 4 0 1977 CHN 4L 490 34 5 11 .290 43 75 69 .348 .447
Ken Reitz (R) 5 0 1977 SLN E 587 36 1 17 .261 19 74 79 .291 .412
Ed Kranepool (L) 6 0 1977 NYN 8R 281 17 0 10 .281 23 20 40 .330 .448
Chris Speier (R) 7 0 1977 MON 4R 548 31 6 5 .234 67 81 38 .317 .339
Ed Ott (L) 8 0 1977 PIN 2R 311 14 3 7 .264 32 41 38 .334 .395
Jerry Martin (R) 9 0 1977 PHN 1L 215 16 3 6 .260 18 42 28 .328 .447
Andre Dawson (R) 10 0 1977 MON 2L 525 26 9 19 .282 34 93 65 .326 .474
Tony Scott (S) 11 0 1977 SLN 2L 292 16 3 3 .291 33 48 41 .368 .397
Davey Johnson (R) 12 0 1977 PHN 4L 156 9 1 8 .321 23 20 36 .408 .545
Gene Clines (R) 13 0 1977 CHN 1L 239 12 2 3 .293 25 25 41 .358 .397
F. Gonzalez (R) 14 0 1977 PIN 2L 181 10 0 4 .276 13 21 27 .320 .398
Ray Knight (R) 15 0 1977 CIN 2R 92 5 1 1 .261 9 16 13 .324 .370
Dane Iorg (L) 16 0 1977 SLN 6R 62 2 0 0 .242 6 7 6 .304 .274
Bob Davis (R) 17 0 1977 SDN 3L 94 2 0 1 .181 5 24 10 .235 .234
Vic Davalillo (L) 18 0 1977 LAN 4R 48 2 0 0 .313 0 6 4 .313 .354
Pitchers LEFT% BAL WON LOST ERA IP HITS WALKS K'S HR GS SV
Randy Jones (L) 21 6R 6 12 4.58 147 173 36 44 12 25 0
Burt Hooton (R) 41 4R 12 7 2.62 223 184 60 153 14 31 1
Steve Carlton (L) 17 1R 23 10 2.64 283 229 89 198 25 36 0
Ron Reed (R) 39 4R 7 5 2.75 124 101 37 84 9 3 15
Bruce Kison (R) 43 7R 9 10 4.90 193 209 55 122 25 32 0
Joe Sambito (L) 28 4L 5 5 2.33 89 77 24 67 6 1 7
Craig Swan (R) 42 1R 9 10 4.23 147 153 56 71 10 24 0
Max Leon (R) 44 1L 4 4 3.97 82 89 25 44 9 9 1
Fred Holdsworth (R) 51 9L 3 3 3.19 42 35 18 21 6 6 0
Dan Schatzeder (L) 29 5L 2 1 2.49 22 16 13 14 0 3 0
Terry Cornutt (R) 35 9R 1 2 3.86 44 38 22 23 4 1 0
Don Collins (L) 33 5L 3 9 5.09 71 82 41 27 8 6 2
My guess is the road to a pennant won't be nearly as smooth this season. Our starting pitching will not be nearly as reliable. Furthermore, I expect a falloff in Morgan's performance. How could he possibly duplicate what he did last season? On the plus side we have more power and speed with the addition of Dawson. I'm expecting an uptick in the power numbers of Simba and Reitz. As good as Bull was last year, he could be even better this season, assuming he takes a liking to his new role as DH.Triple-digit wins is within sight - and 100 should be enough for us to repeat.
