Society for American Baseball Research
Collegiate Baseball Committee Newsletter
November 2002 (02-1)

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the position or official policy of SABR or its Collegiate Baseball Committee

The SABR collegiate committee is alive and well after several dormant years. Thanks to board member Andy McCue’s hard work and time spent contacting past committee members (and possible new members), the committee is active again and has some big plans for the future. Co-chairman Rick Benner has defined our overall objectives thusly:

The committee’s primary project is the creation, confirmation and update of a searchable database of all major league players who played college baseball. We will be confirming which players played at which schools; what seasons they played at the school; and identify players who did not play at a college ball at all. This type of database has been in the works for many years, thanks to the efforts of former committee chairmen Tom Shea and Cappy Gagnon. Now it is being fine tuned and will be put into a format which will allow committee members and other researchers to see what information has been gathered and what is still needed. We will also provide committee members with a set of standards to follow as well as details needed to narrow down a search. This is an ambitious effort but will be most rewarding and beneficial to all SABR baseball researchers and perhaps even media outlets.

In the interim, if anyone is interested in assisting with this project, please contact me. We’ll be looking for people to search college yearbooks, record books and media guides; contact various athletic departments for clarification in person or by phone; look through local newspapers, etc. If you want to help, tell me what area you can help with and I can forward to you what I have.

Other projects under consideration include a history of the College World Series; an alltime register of CWS participants; a history of college baseball; Olympic team rosters; and an index to the amateur draft from 1965 to the present. We would like to know which committee members have an interest in those areas and are certainly would like to know of other projects that interest you. We can now reach other committee members through the e-mail network that has been set up by committee member Bruce Brown or through this newsletter.

The impact of college baseball upon the major leagues continues to be very strong. How about this 2002 major league all-star team made up of collegians?

Thanks to Biographical Committee chairman Bill Carle for providing his yearly list of players who made their major league debuts. We cross checked his list to see which players came from four year college programs and are providing the list below. Three schools had their first former players reach the majors in 2002: Albertson College of Idaho (Jason Simontacchi), North Carolina-Asheville (Ty Wigginton) and Wilkes University (Kevin Gryboski)). Here’s the complete list:

New committee member John Vorperian, host and producer of cable TV sports talk show BEYOND THE GAME, highly recommends new college baseball book THE HIT MEN AND THE KID WHO BATTED NINTH by author David Siroty, who interviewed over 100 people. While serving as assistant sports information director at Seton Hall during the 1987 college season, Siroty worked closely with Craig Biggio, Mo Vaughn and Marteese Robinson (dubbed The Hit Men) and walk-on shortstop and ninth batter John Valentin. The book covers their careers as collegiate players and tracks them on their life paths after college ball. The book is available from Diamond Communcations.

This fall, the Atlantic Coast Conference announced its 50th Golden Anniversary Team, which included 52 honorees:

Clemson led all ACC schools with 12 men on the Golden Anniversary Team while Georgia Tech was second with nine selections. Other selections by schools were North Carolina State (seven), Wake Forest (7), Florida State (six), North Carolina (four), Duke (three), Maryland (two) and Virginia (two).

We will try to put out a newsletter every two to three months and welcome input from our committee members and those interested in joining the committee. Please send any feedback via e-mail to newsletter editor Jay Langhammer (jay@totalshow.com).