Let’s assemble the best possible Angels team by letter of the alphabet to begin a player’s last name. Today is B. 100 men whose last name started with “B” played major league baseball in an Angels uniform.
C – Bob Boone
1B – Steve Bilko
2B – Rocky Bridges
3B – Gordon Beckham
SS – Rick Burleson
OF – Bobby Bonds
OF – Juan Beniquez
OF – Bruce Bochte
DH – Baylor
With apologies to Peter Bourjos, here is the B-Team, featuring the only solid starter at 2B with a B starting his last name, Rocky Bridges. Bobby Bonds delivered a 130 OPS + in two mid-1970s seasons; Bilko batting behind Bonds would be a thing to see, but if wishes were horses we’d be riding a few seasons of Lyman Bostock delivering at the plate like he did in 1978. Bob Boone’s D behind the plate would help the following B pitchers.
SP – George Brunet
SP – Bert Byleven
SP – Bo Belinsky
RP – Cam Bedrosian
RP – Jaime Barria
While Paul Byrd’s 113 ERA+ as an Angel tops these three starters, he only pitched in one season (albeit to a division title and was the Angel arm who got the lone W in the 2005 ALCS), Brunett started 157 games, Blyleven is a HOFer and Belinsky put the Angels on the map, media-wise, in their infancy. Cam Bedrosian’s 285 games is the most by an Angels B pitcher and lookie there, Jaime Barria is fantastic out of the pen!
That the best 1-2 punch in a rotation we’re likely to see.
Would the B team beat the A team in a 7 games series?
Very good, lots of fun seeing this. Brunet had a rubber arm, lol. Thanks Rev can’t wait for “C”. See u later. 😀
Blyleven? But don’t we hate the Dutch?
I would rate this team a B, meaning I would expect it to win between 82-84 games
Yeah, I got the Sesame Street letter B song going in my head. Good times.
I guess Mike Brown wasn’t around for very long. I remember he came up and hit well
Joe Blanton you are the weakest link
nice to see Burleson and Beniquez. They were two favorites from the 80s
You have Brunet – thats what i wanted to see – this is probably the best baseball interview ever he pitched in the first game i ever saw at the Big A in 1968
Bochte had the sweetes swing – no power though and he went to the M’s in expansion draft IIRC – he was primarily 1B –
Lyman Bostock should be an OF
no better RP than Cam? Butcher?
Bochte spent 188 games at 1B and 149 games in OF for us. While he made it to Seattle it wasn’t through us or the expansion draft. we had traded him to CLE before that but he was a Mariner their 1st year
Then onto Oakland.
Lyman Bostock would have been an all time great Angel. Of course with our his tragic death, the Angels never would have acquired Disco Dan ford. And without Disco Dan , there would have not been Doug DeCinces (or super balls)