Bonifacio - fluke

I know that Jon Rauch has been horrible, but I hope fellow D-backs fans don't look at Bonifacio's early season success and think that this was a bad trade. Bonifacio is having flukish early season success. According to scouting reports, Bonifacio is able to turn on the ball pretty well on pitches thrown inside or over the plate, but struggles greatly against pitches thrown to the outer part of the plate and after his early hot streak in the first five games, he's 3 for 20 with 9 k's.

wieters, upton, strasburg

I think you make some good points about comparing upton, wieters, and strasburg, but at the same time, it seems somewhat futile. I know you touched on Wieters being a catcher, but I think it needs more emphasizing than just comparing minor league offensive numbers at similar ages. Upton should be compared to the likes of Griffey, Albert Belle, and Juan Gonzalez, outfielders that came up at a young age. The demands of a catcher are MUCH greater than that of an outfielder, so to see a guy like Wieters that has the ability to mash as he does at the position he plays seems more impressive, even with Uptons much younger age.

I never realized how good Juan Gonzalez was at age 21, and even though Upton has more potential and promise than Juan Gone did at similar ages, at this point, I'm sure all D-backs fans would be thrilled if he could match Juan Gone's numbers at age 21.

Also, in regards to Strasburg, I'm as excited as the next guy at seeing what this kid can do (and I hope the Nationals do draft and sign him, that franchise needs a ray of hope), but as someone much smarter than I has said "There's no such thing as a pitching prospect".

Phillies

PHXMLB, I think you make a great argument for Schilling getting in as a D-back. There is NO WAY that Schilling is going in as a Red Sox. I, for one, actually think that he should go in as a Philly. He spent 9 years with the Phillies compared to the 4 with the Dbacks. I guess part of my reasoning is as a baseball fan, I do consider regular season performance and length of service more important than the post season. In Schillings case, I think it is VERY difficult to figure out which team he should represent considering that he would not get in the HOF solely based on his regular season, but he would also not get in solely based on his post season. It is the combination of the two that gets him in, but his length of service, plus almost half of his wins came as a memeber of the Phillies pushes him ahead.

Either way, it will be interesting to see which team the Hall of Fame decides to put Curt Schilling in with...

Steve Finley

actually, I meant to put in Steve Finley at the #5 spot...

top 5

PHXMLB, I was wondering what your criteria was in creating your top 5 list? looking at the first four players, I thought it was based on guys that came up through the dbacks system, but then there's Orlando Hudson at #5, so I guess not. Or is this your list of personal top 5 players that you like?

My favorite top 5 D-backs players are:

1. Dan Haren
2. Justin Upton (yes, it's just potential right now)
3. Brandon Webb
4. Stephen Drew
5. Chad Tracy

My list is all current Dbacks players because I only became a fan of theirs beginning in 2006.

My list of all time greatest Dbacks players:

1. Randy Johnson
2. Curt Schilling
3. Brandon Webb
4. Luis Gonzalez
5. Matt Williams