My memories of AstrosConnection will always be associated temporally with two things: watching perhaps the best right side of the infield in baseball history, and enjoying four division titles in five seasons. Granted, Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio are now in decline, and the Astros never got within six victories of the World Series. But sharing some of the 40-year-old franchise’s finest moments with an electronic community of devoted fans was pleasurable nonetheless.
Is it hyperbole to suggest that Bagwell and Biggio are perhaps the best right side of the infield in baseball history? They certainly have an argument. Consider the all-time greats, besides Bagwell and Biggio, at first and second base: Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Hank Greenberg, Mark McGwire, Willie McCovey, Harmon Killebrew, Johnny Mize, Rogers Hornsby, Joe Morgan, Eddie Collins, Jackie Robinson, Nap Lajoie, Charley Gehringer, Frankie Frisch, Ryne Sandberg, Roberto Alomar.
Of these 16 players, Gehrig (Tony Lazzeri), Foxx (Max Bishop), Greenberg (Gehringer), Morgan (Tony Perez), Collins (Stuffy McInnis), Robinson (Gil Hodges), Gehringer (Greenberg), Frisch (Jim Bottomley), Sandberg (Mark Grace) and Alomar (John Olerud) spent at least five seasons next to a notable partner. Only Gehrig/Lazzeri (12 seasons) and Sandberg/Grace (nine seasons) spent anything near the 11 seasons Bagwell and Biggio have played the infield together.
Empirical evidence can be brought to bear on this discussion. Bill James’ Win Shares are one way to look at the question of best duo. Here are the Win Shares totals for the top tandems with at least five years of shared tenure:
Pair Seasons Win Shares ---------------------------------------- Gehrig/Lazzeri 12 689 Bagwell/Biggio 11 *580 Greenberg/Gehringer 8 430 Sandberg/Grace 9 385 Robinson/Hodges 6 316 Morgan/Perez 5 309 Foxx/Bishop 6 287 Frisch/Bottomley 6 254 Collins/McInnis 5 242 Olerud/Alomar 5 209
*Excludes 2002 Win Shares, which are not yet available.
Just missing the list was Hornsby, who played next to Bottomley for four seasons, in which they accumulated 211 Win Shares. These totals exclude seasons played on the same team but at other positions. For example, Bagwell/Biggio had 43 Win Shares in 1991, when Biggio still played catcher. Robinson/Hodges had 122, Foxx/Bishop had 46, and Greenberg/Gehringer had 12 additional Win Shares at other positions.
While Bagwell/Biggio trail Gehrig/Lazzeri overall, they certainly rank as the best partnership in National League history. James’ numbers estimate that from 1991 to 2001, Bagwell and Biggio were responsible for 208 of the Astros’ 903 wins over that span, 23 percent of the club’s total. The numbers underpin the conclusion that our observation and intuition have told us for years: the Killer B’s — the real ones, not Derek Bell or Sean Berry, but with all due respect to Lance Berkman — have been the two vital cogs in the Astros machine.
Their tenures are the most storied in club history and deserve to be remembered fondly whether Bagwell and Biggio ever take home a ring. Which leads to the other part of my nostalgia. AstrosConnection has been home to plenty of axe-grinding about a team unable to win the big game or get over the hump. The Division Series exits are of course frustrating and disappointing, no more so than in 1998, when the Astros had the league’s best offense and that elusive ace in Randy Johnson.
As miserable as the playoff demises have been, ask yourself whether you would rather have rooted for the Royals, Brewers, Pirates or some other team not within spitting distance of the playoffs. Some might say yes, it beats the Astros teasing us. I say no way. After having only three occasions to root for the home team in the postseason in its first 34 seasons, four trips in five years, with at least a fighting chance the sixth season, has been a relative luxury.
Without the Astros’ winning ways over much of the last six years, AstrosConnection would likely not have become the fan site phenomenon that it did. Interest in the regular season would have been meager. Obsession in October would have been nonexistent. And the offseason would have been a dreary interlude between interminable suffering. Instead, there was almost always something to hope for, as there still is in 2003 even as 2002 ends for the Astros on the downside.
And just as AstrosConnection prospered from the Astros being perennial contenders, my experience of the club’s success benefited from having an online herd of fellow travelers, particularly since I live 1,200 miles from the home park. Not to take anything away from the Zone Dwellers in Houston and Austin, but the appreciation of AstrosConnection is all the stronger for us Texpatriates, who have to rely on the World Wide Web to encounter like-minded fans.
Which is why my orange cap comes off for two Louisianans — we excuse their geographic origin — for their tireless efforts. I have never met them, but Kevin and Scott are surely among the funnest fellows in the world to be around. Their sense of humor, their earnestness, their creativity, their talent, their dedication and their generosity with their time and design abilities are on pervasive display throughout AstrosConnection. The decision to turn out the lights marks the passing of an era.
But it is a fully comprehensible decision. Around three years ago I started a piddling statistical Web site of my own, which pales in size and professionalism to what Kevin and Scott have created. Even updating it just annually, I was quickly overwhelmed. That our fearless hosts devoted themselves to this endeavor daily, while attending to jobs and families, makes them the truest of fans. They deserve a virtual plaque in the Internet Hall of Fame. Thanks, fellas.