centerfield maz

Daniel Dean Warthen was born on December 1, 1952, in Omaha, Nebraska. Warthen was an All-American High School quarterback, getting college scholarship offers from Nebraska, USC, UCLA, & Northwestern universities.   Warthen chose to play baseball instead, getting drafted in the second round, by the Montreal Expos in 1971.  The left hander would get brought up to the majors in May 1975 making his debut, pitching a scoreless inning against that year's World Champion, Big Red Machine. He pitched in relief in his first few outings, going 4-2 with three saves toward the end of July.  He was thrown into the Expo rotation finishing the season at 8-6 with 3.11 ERA, striking out an impressive 128 batters in 167 innings. He also walked 87 batters. The following year he was 2-10 as he walked 66 batters in 90 innings pitched, allowing 53 earned runs. He would only pitch 20 more games in the majors at Montreal, going to the Philadelphia Phillies & Houston ...

Mathew Lawton III was born on November 30, 1971, in Gulfport Mississippi. The five-foot ten left hand hitting Lawton was drafted by the Minnesota Twins in the 13th round of the 1991 draft.  In 1994 he hit .300 at A ball Fort Meyers & played in the Florida State League All Star Game. As an outfielder he was rated a poor defensive player who sometimes made basic fundamental mistakes. He made the best of his abilities, hit well & got to the major leagues for brief call ups in 1995 & 1996. MLB Career: By the 1997 season Matt was a main stay in the Twins outfield, remaining a regular for parts of five seasons.  Lawton had some good hitting seasons with the Twins, batting over .300 twice, driving in 75 or more runs & hitting over 35 doubles twice. Unfortunately, the Twins never finished better than fourth in his seven years playing in Minnesota. In 1998 he batted .278 with 21 HRs 36 doubles 77 RBIs & 91 runs scored with a 16 stolen bas...

Brian Duncan Schneider was born November 26, 1976 at Jacksonville, Florida. Schneider attended high school in Pennsylvania & won two Lehigh Valley Player of the Year Awards there.  Trivia: Brian's nickname was "Hoops". The six-foot, 200 pound left-handed hitting catcher was drafted by the Montreal Expos in the fifth round of the 1995 draft. He spent five seasons in the minors batting .280 with 10 HRs & 60 RBIs in 1998 in A ball.  By 2000 was AAA Ottawa's top catcher, getting called up to the Expos squad.  Brian would be the Expos backup catcher to Michael Barrett for three seasons from 2000-2002. By 2003 he was the teams main catcher finishing up in that role as Montreal's last catcher. Schneider was a solid defensive catcher, ranking 5th in the league in fielding percentage in 2003 making only three errors in 709 chances.  Each season from 2003-2005 Schneider led all catchers in throwing out would be base stealers and threw out a leading 44% ratio....

Carlos Ephriam Torres was born on October 22, 1982 in Santa Cruz California. The six foot one right-handed pitcher attended Kansas State University & San Jose State University, getting drafted by the Chicago White Sox in the 15th round of the 2004 draft. Carlos began as a starting pitcher but by the time he got to AA ball he was becoming more of a full time reliever. In 2009 he made 20 starts at AAA Charlotte & pitched a rain shortened five inning game against Pawtucket. He went 10-4 that season getting a call up to the White Sox big league team. MLB Career: Torres debuted on July 22nd, pitching six innings & allowing three runs to the Tampa Rays, earning no decision in the 4-3 win. On September 3rd he pitched five shut out innings against the Cubs in an interleague Chicago matchup, earning his first career win. On the year he was 1-2 in eight appearances posting a high 6.04 ERA. He appeared in just five games at the big-league level in 2010 & then ...

Pedro Julio Astacio was born November 28, 1969, in Pilar Rondon in the Dominican Republic. He grew up on a rural farm raised by his father, after his other's passing when Pedro was just eight years old. He had three sisters & two brothers as well.  In 1987 the six foot two, 19-year-old right hander signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers.  He was brought up to the Dodgers in 1992 at age 23, pitching a five-hit shutout over the Phillies, striking out ten. In his rookie season, he was up & down to the minors going 5-5 with an impressive 1.98 ERA for the last place Dodgers.  In 1993 he was 14-9 with a 3.57 ERA tossing four shut outs (third best in the NL). His wins were best on the fourth place Dodgers staff that season. That season Mile Piazza was his batterymate, winning the Rookie of the Year Award. Astacio would pitch five and a half seasons in Los Angeles (1992-1997) going 48-47 with a .368 ERA, striking out over 100 batters four times...