... and Playing for the Davis Cup
Auld Will the Bard once noted, "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." Though perhaps in baseball terms, we would simply say "That which we call a Rose by any other name would still be Pete."
Anyway, I recently found myself scanning the list of the most common surnames (family names, last names, whatever you want to call them) in the United States, birthplace not only of shloads of people with these names, but of the Great Game of baseball itself. According to the good folks over at InfoPlease, these are the most commone surnames in the U.S. right now:
- Smith
- Johnson
- Williams
- Jones
- Brown
- Davis (Added 8/12/05)
- Miller (Added 8/13/05)
- Wilson
- Moore
- Taylor
- Anderson
- Thomas
- Jackson
- White (White/Gray/Black)
- Harris
- Martin
- Thompson
- Garcia
- Martinez
- Robinson
- Clark
- Rodriguez
- Lewis
- Lee (Added 8/15/05)
- Walker
Note: despite my best effort and gaggles of Googling, I haven't yet been able to locate a most-common Canadian surnames list; if you have one, please send it my way, or drop me a note if you know where one is on the Web: mickwrites@hotmail.com.
You'll note that, quite by accident, we've already covered the top five with teams of their own; so now we'll simply move down the list to the next most common name for which we've never done a team -- and if you're thinking Eric the Red and Doug the ex-Jay, you're bang on ... it's the All-Davis team.
As always, we are not allowing first or middle names -- eliminating both WWII-era OF Davis Short and half of our two Hall of Famers, as we bid adieu to Zachary Davis Wheat. However, we are left with the inimitable George Davis, primarily a SS who moved around a bit to 2B, 3B and the OF, and whose most-similars include Frank Frisch, Luke Appling and Nellie Fox, so he was pretty good. Also, alas, farewell to Mike and Scott Davison, apparently no relation to each other, two cuppajoe relievers who probably wouldn't have made this team anyway.
It's shocking that backstop Spud Davis never made an All-Star team, though his very best seasons came just before the inaugural midsummer classic in 1935; the best years of our starting 1B, Harry Davis, came well before that, though we'd be just about as comfortable with the more powerful Glenn or Alvin in that spot. Both get bench roles.
Ben Davis has been a fine receiver recently, but loses out his backstop bench spot to former All-Star Jody Davis. Even featuring George, the team's only Hall-of-Famer, the middle infield is a weak spot, with the real (that is, non-Costner) "Crash" Davis our best starting option at 2B. Maybe the thing to do here is play Russ Davis at 2B and give Jumbo Davis some time at the hot corner -- we'd be sacrificing some defense but helping the offense at least a little bit.
Three Davises have managed in the bigs, though two of those for just part of one season; Harry was 54-71 with the 1912 Indians while Spud was 1-2 in an interim role with the '46 Pirates. But our starting shortstop, George -- again, as our sole Hall of Famer, there's some leadership credibility there, too -- managed the Giants for parts of three seasons and compiled a .435 career mark, better than either Harry (.432) or Spud (.333).
The team takes its name from the University of California at Davis (UC-Davis) Aggies; just for the record, the only major league player to come out of that program so far is 1983-84 Angel RHP Steve Brown. Anyway, now it's time to meet ...
The You-See Davis Aggies:
Player/Manager: George Davis
LINEUP
C Spud Davis (.308 over 16 seasons)
1B Harry Davis (.277, 285 SB, 1895-1917)
2B Lawrence "Crash" Davis (.230, 1940-42 PHA)
SS George Davis** (.295, 1437 RBI)
3B Russ Davis (.257, 84 homers, retired at 31)
LF Willie Davis* (.279, 182 homers)
CF Eric Davis* (.269, 282 homers)
RF Tommy Davis* (.294, 153 homers)
DH Chili Davis* (.274, 350 homers)
BENCH
C Jody Davis* (.245, 127 homers)
COR IF James "Jumbo" Davis (.272, 1884-91)
MID IF Ike Davis (.240 in 146 games for 1925 CHW)
OF Mike Davis (.259, 91 homers, 134 SB over 10 years)
PH/DH/1B Glenn Davis* (.259, 190 homers)
PH/DH/1B Alvin Davis* (.280, 160 homers)
ROTATION
RHSP Curt Davis* (154-131, 1934-46)
LHSP Doug Davis (40-41 through 2004)
RHSP Storm Davis (113-96; 19-7 in 1989)
RHSP John "Daisy" Davis (16-21, 1884-85)
5SP Frank "Dixie" Davis (75-71, 1912-26)
CL-LHP Mark Davis* (1989 NL Cy Young)
RHRP Ron Davis* (130 career saves)
LHRP Steve Davis (3-2, 1985-86 TOR, 1989 CLE)
RHRP Roy "Peaches" Davis (27-33, 11 saves, 1936-39)
LHRP Tim Davis (6-5, 2 saves, 1994-97 SEA)
Okay, the rotation is weak by the usual Hall of Names standards, but that bullpen, presuming Mark and Ron in their primes, could really be something special. One guy missing the cut is a career .265-hitting outfielder named Dick Davis, for whom the Blue Jays traded the legendary Wayne Nordhagen waybackwhen. Speaking of outfields, even if the pitching staff isn't a shining example of one, say, Jefferson Davis would be proud to lead into battle, with the defensive prowess in the oufield -- that's Willie, Eric and Tommy, left to right -- there won't be too many extra-base hits against this staff.
But someone has to ask -- with Peaches, Daisy, Dixie, Jody and Chili, what's up with the Davises?
