Maine's Baseball All-Time Dream Team
What would a dream team roster look like for major league players born in Maine?
Issue #170
This is the 49th (and final, since I combined North and South Dakota together) article in a series where I am creating all-time dream teams for players born in each of the fifty US states. I’m publishing each write-up on the anniversary date that the particular state joined the union. So far I’ve covered Maryland, Louisiana, Minnesota, South Carolina, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, West Virginia, New Hampshire, Virginia, Idaho, Wyoming, New York, Colorado, Missouri, Hawaii, California, Nevada, North and South Dakota, Montana, Washington, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Illinois, Delaware, Mississippi, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Alabama, New Jersey, Iowa, Texas, Georgia, Alaska, Utah, New Mexico, Connecticut, Michigan, Kansas, Massachusetts, Oregon, Arizona, Ohio, Nebraska, Florida, and Vermont.
The final in this series is Maine, which became the 23rd US State on March 15th, 1820 (according to Wikipedia.)
Important caveat to what follows: I’m creating these all-time dream teams based on the birthplace data available at baseball-reference.com. I realize this might mean some players will appear for a state’s all-time dream that seems odd, e.g., a player who was born in one state but lived there only briefly, while then spending most of his youth, or especially critical years playing baseball in high school in another state. So that is an important caveat to the below dream team roster—and I’ll discuss the players that I know went to high school in a state other than Maine towards the end of this article (and vice-versa, those born elsewhere but who went to high school in Maine.)
Here is the all-time dream team I came up with for players born in Maine:
Maine might be the largest state in New England by land area, but it ranked only 42nd in the US by population as of 2020. So I knew going into the research that a Maine All-Time Dream Team wouldn’t be loaded with superstars. And sure enough, the above roster lacks any Hall of Famers—or even many players who were All-Stars even a couple of times.
The most accomplished position player on this roster is 19th century CF George Gore, who led his league in runs twice and had 100+ runs an impressive seven times. He led the NL in batting average in 1880 with a .360 mark, and retired with a .301/.386/.411 slash line and a strong 136 OPS+.
A generation later, SS Freddy Parent (1899, 1901-1911) played for the Red Sox and White Sox, stealing 20+ bases four times, while also generally playing good defense. Catcher Bill Carrigan’s (1906, 08-16) time with the Red Sox overlapped with Parent’s in 1906, and he similarly provided Boston with good defense, if a bit less offensive value.
A generation after Parent and Carrigan, Del Bissonette (1928-31, 33) was the opposite in providing more offense for Brooklyn, including an impressive age-28 rookie season in which he hit 25 HR, 106 RBI, and a .320/.396/.543 slash line and 145 OPS+. He had double-digit triples and double-digit HR in each of his first four seasons. But then he suffered a torn Achilles tendon injury during spring training—and worse, soon after the surgery suffered blood poisoning and nearly died.
A starting lineup for this all-time dream team could look like this:
George Gore CF (L)
Harry Lord 3B (L)
Freddy Parent SS (R)
Del Bissonette 1B (L)
Candy Nelson 2B (L)
Chet Chadbourne LF (L)
Irv Ray / Billy Maloney RF (L)
Sid Farrar DH (unknown)
Bill Carrigan C (R)
This dream team’s roster is so light that I didn’t bother creating separate lineups vs. RHP and LHP as I did for most of the other states in this series. Gore seemed like the obvious leadoff hitter, as he was a great run-scorer and you’d want to get him as many at-bats as possible. Bissonette has the most power on this roster, so he makes sense as a third or fourth hitter. Beyond that, you could juggle the players around in any number of ways and I wouldn’t argue.
As for the pitching staff, the ace is Bill Swift (1985-86, 88-98), who had a career 3.95 ERA and 106 ERA+ over 13 seasons. He began as a starter, then had several seasons as a reliever, before leading the AL with a 2.08 ERA in 1992 and then posting a 21-8 record and 2.82 ERA in 1993.
After Swift, you could debate how to rank the other starting pitchers that I included above. Irv Young (1905-08, 10-11) started his career strong in the sense that he led the NL in games started and innings pitched in both of his first two seasons. He only played six seasons though, and while a career 3.11 ERA looks good, given the years he pitched, that translates into an 88 ERA+. In the 19th century, Willard Mains (1888, 1891, 1896) similarly had a short major league career, but in his case a 3.53 ERA (in only 267.2 IP) translates to a 116 ERA+.
The bullpen is headlined by two-time All-Star and lifetime Boston Red Sox hurler Bob Stanley. He managed 10+ saves in seven seasons, with highs of 33 in 1983 and 22 in 1984. He retired with a 3.64 ERA and 118 ERA+. After Stanley, as with the starters, how you rank the rest of relievers could be argued.
What about players who went to High School in Maine?
As noted at the outset of this article, and as I’ve done for my other US State dream team write-ups, what if you change the criteria from players who were born in the state of Maine to players who grew up—which we’ll define as going to high school—in the state of Maine?
First off, I found three players—all relief pitchers—who were born in Maine but went to high school elsewhere:
RP Bob Stanley – New Jersey
RP Tim Stauffer – New York
RP Pete Ladd – Georgia
So losing them would definitely hurt the bullpen. And its possible there were more players who didn’t grow up and go to high school in Maine—but I don’t have that data for very many players prior to the 1950s, and for this dream team roster that is a lot of the players included.
On the other hand, I found three players who went to high school in Maine but were born elsewhere:
SS Mike Bordick – Michigan
SP Jack Coombs – Iowa
SP Jim Beattie – Virginia
Mike Bordick (1990-2003) was an All-Star in 2000 when he had a career high 20 HR and 80 RBI. Defensively he was regularly amongst the league leaders in SS assists, putouts, and fielding percentage.
SP Jack Coombs (1906-18, 20) twice led the AL in wins, with impressive records of 31-8 in 1910 and 28-12 in 1911. He retired with a 2.78 ERA, though that translates to only a nearly league-average 99 ERA+. And Jim Beattie (1978-86) pitched nine years for the Yankees and the Mariners, retiring with a 4.17 ERA, which again translates to a nearly league -average 98 ERA+.
All data is from Baseball-Reference.com, and also their subscription service Stathead.com. If you are a big sports fan, be sure to check out the latest features at Stathead and the Sports Reference family of sites. The state map, flag, flower, and bird images are from Wikipedia.
Did you know? I wrote a book with the same title as this Substack newsletter / blog: Now Taking the Field: Baseball’s All-Time Dream Teams for All 30 Franchises. It was published in early 2019, by ACTA Sports, the publisher of the annual Bill James Handbook and other popular titles. You can learn more about it at www.NowTakingTheField.com, or buy directly at Amazon and other booksellers.
