Ozzie Smith won 13 straight Gold Gloves at shortstop from 1980 through 1992 and retired with 8,375 assists, a record at the position that has not moved since. He got to balls in the hole that other shortstops watched go into left field. Omar Vizquel is the answer a lot of people give and I respect it. He had the softest hands of anyone I watched, barehanding grounders he had no business barehanding and making it look like the ordinary way to do the job. The reason I still go Ozzie is not the part people remember. The backflip and the acrobatics made him famous, and the actual reason he was the best was footwork. He was always in position, so the spectacular plays were plays other shortstops never even reached. Which is the part that never shows up on a highlight. A man who arrives early makes a hard play look routine, and routine plays do not get replayed. Defense first here, and I am not counting the bat at all. Best defensive shortstop ever, who is it?

He threw out Jim Rice at third and Brian Downing at the plate in the 1979 All Star Game and walked away with the MVP. That October the Pirates won the World Series. He had already won two batting titles and the 1978 NL MVP by then. Later he went home to Cincinnati and drove in 125 in 1985, more than anyone in the league, and he won another ring with the 1989 A's. He finished with 2,712 hits and 339 homers across six stops, and he was voted into Cooperstown in December 2024. Six stops and 2,712 hits, got him yet?

Barry Bonds to San Francisco in 1992. Greg Maddux to Atlanta that same winter. Randy Johnson to Arizona in 1998. David Ortiz to Boston in 2003 after a release. Which signing paid off the most?

Paul Waner hit .380 for the 1927 Pirates and won the National League MVP. His kid brother Lloyd was a rookie in the same outfield that year and hit .355 with 223 hits. Paul went on to 3,152 hits and Lloyd to 2,459. That's 5,611 between them, the most by any pair of brothers in major league history, and both of them ended up in Cooperstown. Paul's tenth among right fielders, the last spot, and it'd be hard to name the guy who should bump him. Anyone you'd bump off this right field list?