When people are searching for ways to pass time, it’s common to create an escape from boredom during a long car drive or a wait in a doctor’s office. Often games are generated for fun and interest—one that I drummed up was comparing birthdays of famous people to close, immediate family members and friends.
Extending this to baseball, here’s an idea I created to name a birthday of a major league player or personality for each day of the year. The format is to take the top player for each day.
In doing this, it was difficult to take one name, but the object is to select the best for each day. I included multiple players to certain days when their contributions or excellence in the game was comparable. For example, January 31 is a birthday shared by three Hall of Famers—Jackie Robinson, Ernie Banks and Nolan Ryan. Each of these stars deserves to be recognized on that day for their achievements in the game. Robinson for breaking the color barrier in 1947, being the first recipient for Rookie of the Year honors, capturing an N.L. MVP award and helping Brooklyn to a World Series title. Banks for becoming the first power-hitting shortstop and the first at his position to win consecutive league MVP honors. Ryan for becoming the all-time strikeout king for a single-season and a career, winning 300 games and tossing a record seven no-hitters.
For the date February 5, two Hall of Famers share that birthday—Hank Aaron and Roberto Alomar. But if I had to choose one over the other, Aaron is an easy choice. The same can be said of Honus Wagner over Eddie Murray (Feb. 24), Ron Santo over Monte Irvin (Feb. 25), Mickey Cochrane over Bert Blyleven (April 6), Miguel Cabrera over Sam Crawford (April 18) or George Brett over John Smoltz (May 15). There were several others, so I picked the player I believed was the one most fans would choose as the better big league performer.
There were some players who share the same birthday that were equal and were both named. And for some dates lacking a big-time star  . . . well some dates just didn’t have a superstar born on that day, which is why such players like Donn Clendenon was the winner of the July 15 B-day.
The choices made are all for fun, so here are my selections for the top players for birthdays for each day of the year.
 

For most, 50 years seems like a lifetime and when you look at that time line in baseball, it’s interesting to see how the game has changed—especially regarding some historic statistics that fans have used to gage the top players in major league history.
Let’s take hits for example. Going back half a century, the player with the most career hits entering the 1966 major league campaign was Ty Cobb with 4,189—and at that time it was believed his hit total was 4,191, but researchers found an error in his total and it has been corrected to the 4,189 number. Before the ’66 season began, only eight players had 3,000 or more career hits and Sam Crawford was 10th on the all-time hit list with 2,961.
Jump into our time machine to the current rankings in the year 2016 and we see there are now 29 players with 3,000 or more hits and Crawford has plunged from No. 10 on the hit chart to No. 31. Over the last 50 years, 21 players have joined the 3,000 hit club—an elite group that still merits Hall of Fame status, unless gambling (Pete Rose) and performance enhancing drug use (Alex Rodriguez and Rafael Palmeiro) interfere with a players legacy as a big league performer.
Babe Ruth was the king of the home run as the only player with 600 or more lifetime dingers and his 714 total appeared to be an unbreakable mark 50 years ago. Ruth was one of only five players with 500 or more. As the 1966 season got started, Duke Snider was 10th on the all-time HR chart with 407. Hank Aaron ranked 12th with 398 and Chuck Klein’s 300 homers put him among the top 25 power hitters in the history of the game.
Today, Klein’s name has been far removed from the leader board of MLB’s top home-run hitters, spiraling downward from No. 25 to No. 138 over the last five decades. Ruth has been joined by seven other sluggers with 600-plus homers and has been surpassed in the 700-club by Hank Aaron and Barry Bonds, with A-Rod only 28 homers shy of eclipsing the Babe’s career total.
At the end of the 1965 season, Del Ennis (288), Bob Johnson (288), Hank Sauer (288) and Frank J. Thomas (286) were ranked 27 through 30 on the all-time HR chart. Today, their totals don’t seem too impressive as Ennis, Johnson and Sauer are tied for 149th and Thomas is tied for 157th among HR hitters.
As for pitching, the top seven victory leaders have not changed over the last half-century. Warren Spahn retired after the 1965 season with 363 career wins, tops among left-handers and sixth on the all-time list. Entering the 2016 campaign, he still holds those positions, but the total number of 300-game winners has jumped from 14 to 24.
The list of the top career strikeout leaders for pitchers has changed dramatically over the last 50 years. As the 1966 season got underway, Hall of Famer Walter Johnson was the lone member of the 3,000 Strikeouts Club. In fact, at that time registering 2,000 lifetime whiffs was as big as the 3,000 plateau is today. There are currently 16 pitchers with 3,000 or more strikeouts, while 50 seasons ago there were only 15 hurlers with at least 2,000—a number that has now catapulted to include 74 pitchers.
At the beginning of 1966, the legendary Bob Feller was fourth on the career strikeout list with 2,581. Today his total ranks 26th. Fifty years ago Chief Bender was 31st on the strikeout chart with 1,711 Ks, a total that today is an afterthought among strikeouts artists, dropping him into the 128th slot among career leaders.
It does appear Nolan Ryan’s mark of 5,714 strikeouts will not be approached and that we may have seen the last of the 300-game winners. But rest assured, we will continue to see newcomers into the 3,000-Hit and 500-Home Run club in the near future.
 

The death of baseball beat writer Tom Singer, 67, on Monday was heartbreaking news to all his family and friends. We will all miss his friendly words and outstanding baseball reporting and writing.
 
I had the opportunity to talk to him a handful of times and assigned him a story to write for the Jan./Feb. issue of Baseball Digest on Pittsburgh Pirates closer Mark Melancon. After Tom submitted the story, he asked me if I was aware of his relationship with Baseball Digest and I told him I was aware that he wrote for the publication when my father was the editor and that I enjoy hearing stories of how some veteran writers got their beginning with my Dad. Tom went on to tell me he had his first story published in the magazine when he was still in school—"It was in 1969," he said, "and it was on Willie Stargell." Then a couple of weeks ago, he emailed me:
 
Bob, 
So guess what I came across while rummaging for something entirely different? 

Cheers,
Tom 
 
What Tom came across was the 1969 Baseball Digest, with Tom Seaver on the cover, that included his first article he had published in the magazine as a 21-year old student. Attached below is the Willie Stargell article Singer wrote.

As the 2016 Major League Baseball season inches closer to Opening Day festivities, the countdown to batting and pitching milestones will begin for some of the game’s top veteran players.
“I’m not numbers oriented—which some people may find hard to believe—because there are so many numbers associated with my career,” Nolan Ryan said as he was approaching his 300th career victory in 1990. “But this is one of the few years when I’ve wanted to do something. I feel if I don’t win my 300th game this year, then I’ve had a bad year.”
Those thoughts can be associated with a number of great players who are on the verge of historic achievements prior to the start of a new major league campaign. But as much as players want to reach individual plateaus, they also know that the importance of the success in the game is through team work and to keep their mind focused on the job they have at hand in each and every game.
So entering the 2016 season, here are some milestones on the docket to be matched by some outstanding big-league performers.
 
3,000 Hits
Ichiro Suzuki will begin his 16th major league season 65 hits away from becoming the 30th player to reach the 3,000-hit plateau. And if you count his 1,278 career hits in the Japanese League, Suzuki is still 470 hits away from tying Pete Rose’s mark of 4,683 lifetime professional hits.
 
2,000 Hits
Although it’s not a Hall of Fame numbers marker, 2,000 career major league hits is quite a milestone when you consider there have been more than 18,000 men who have played in the big leagues and through 2015, only 279 of them have surpassed 2,000 hits. Those who could pass that total in 2016 include A.J. Pierzynski of the Braves (1,989), who is 11 hits away; Carl Crawford of the Dodgers (1,916), who is 84 his shy; Jose Reyes of the Rockies (1,904), who is 96 hits away and Matt Holliday of the Cardinals (1,901) who needs 99 hits to reach the 2,000 plateau. The players who have an outside shot at joining this fraternity in 2016 are Adrian Gonzalez (208 hits away) of the Dodgers, Mark Teixeira (217 hits short) of the Yankees, Alex Rios (222 hits away) and Victor Martinez (224 hits shy) of the Tigers. Among these four hitters, only Gonzalez has ever had a 200-hit season—213 in 2011 for the Red Sox.
Teixeira hasn’t had 180 or more hits in a season since 2005, Rios’s career high mark is 191 in 2007, and Martinez has never surpassed 188 hits in a season during his 13 years in the majors.
 
700 Home Runs
Despite his controversial career totals, Alex Rodriguez enters the year only 13 homers away from joining Hank Aaron (755), Babe Ruth (714) and Barry Bonds (762)—whose total is also a steroid-riddle controversy—in the 700-HR Club. If A-Rod remains healthy and away from suspension for any more wrongdoing, he could hold the all-time mark for homers, since he is 65 homers away from that historic baseball landmark.
 
600 Home Runs
If Albert Pujols can equal his 2015 homer output (40), he will become the ninth player to club 600 or more career home runs . . . and in the process will surpass Reggie Jackson (563), Rafael Palmeiro (569), Harmon Killebrew (573), Mark McGwire (583) and Frank Robinson (586) on the career HR leader board.
 
500 Home Runs
No major league player is within a shot at reaching the 500-Home Run club in 2016, but it is interesting to note that David Ortiz, who has 503 career home runs and is likely to retire at the end of the season, is only 53 homers away from clubbing 500 lifetime homers as a designated hitter.
 
400 Home Runs
There are 53 players with 400 or more career home runs, a total that was equaled by only 12 players at the start of the 1966 season (50 years ago). But no matter how many players have joined this select group, it is still a special plateau for power hitters. The men with a chance to reach this milestone in 2016 include Yankee teammates Mark Teixeira (394) and Carlos Beltran (392), and Ryan Howard of the Phillies (357).
 
600 Doubles
Entering the 2016 season, only 14 players have exceeded 600 or more career doubles and 12 of those players are enshrined in the Hall of Fame. The two that are not are Pete Rose and Barry Bonds. Boston’s David Ortiz (584) and the Angels’ Albert Pujols (583) should both become members of this select group, and it will be interesting to see which of these sluggers reaches the milestone first.
 
500 Doubles
Over recent years the number of players to reach 500 lifetime doubles has been increasing steadily—30 years ago at the start of the 1986 season, there were 24 members of the 500-Doubles Club. Before the 1996 campaign, the group increased to 32, and prior to the start of 2006 the number of 500-double hitters was 43. Entering the 2016 season there are 61 players with 500 doubles, with Detroit’s Miguel Cabrera (492) the only player likely to reach the plateau in the coming year. Seattle’s Robinson Cano has an outside shot, but would need a career high in that department since he is 54 two-base hits away from the coveted mark.
 
 500 Stolen Bases
There are currently 37 players with 500 or more career stolen bases in the major leagues, with four active players in position to surpass the historic total in the near future. Aging legs may prevent some from reaching the mark in ’16, but a sure bet is Ichiro Suzuki of the Marlins, who enters the year two steals away from 500. If Suzuki can get his two stolen bases for 500 and 65 hits for 3,000, he will become the seventh player to reach both milestones. The others include Rickey Henderson, Lou Brock, Ty Cobb, Eddie Collins, Honus Wagner and Paul Molitor.
Others in line to reach 500 steals in 2016 are Carl Crawford (480), Jose Reyes (479) and Jimmy Rollins (465), who are all within 35 steals of accomplishing the impressive stolen base plateau. Reyes should swipe 21 or more bases if he remains healthy. Crawford, who is only 20 SBs away, has exceeded 20 steals in a season only once in the last five years. The venerable veteran Rollins is 35 stolen bases away, but he hasn’t stolen as many as 35 in a season since 2008 when he had 47.
 
1,000 Runs Scored
Although it has been matched by 326 players, it is an impressive total and indicates production value from a player who has been consistent for a number of years. In 2016, there are nine players within 119 runs from reaching 1,000 for their career--Carl Crawford (990), Chase Utley (963), Robinson Cano (958), Curtis Granderson (951), Ian Kinsler (942), David Wright (931), Adrian Gonzalez (899), Alex Rios (885) and Hanley Ramirez (881).
 
1,000 RBI
Between all-time RBI king Hank Aaron (2,297) and Darryl Strawberry (1,000) there are 277 other players with 1,000 or more career big league RBI. Here is a list of active players with a chance to climb into this plethora of run producers in 2016--Victor Martinez (991), Prince Fielder (984), Robinson Cano (983), Justin Morneau (960), David Wright (956), Jimmy Rollins (928), Chase Utley (925), A.J. Pierzynski (886) and Adam LaRoche (882).
 
1,000 Walks
With high on-base percentage totals being more mainstream in today’s game, the number of players drawing high walk totals has increased and the number of major leaguers with 1,000 or more career walks has jumped to 117. Miguel Cabrera (936) appears to be the only player to have a legitimate shot at joining this fraternity in 2016.
 
400 Saves
The small group of pitchers with 400 or more career saves includes Mariano Rivera (652), Trevor Hoffman (601), Lee Smith (478), John Franco (424) and Billy Wagner (422), but could increase by two with active relievers Francisco Rodriguez (386) and Jonathan Papelbon (349) both within 51 saves of the coveted mark
 
2,000 Strikeouts
It is unlikely fans will see Nolan Ryan’s strikeout total of 5,714 broken, but CC Sabathia could be the next member of the 3,000 strikeout club if he can get his career back on track as he enters the 2016 season with 2,574 lifetime Ks. But another fine milestone for a pitcher is 2,000 strikeouts, a feat accomplished by 74 mounds men. The hurlers arming to reach that career output this year include John Lackey (1,965), Justin Verlander (1,943), Cole Hamels (1,922), Zack Greinke (1,887), James Shields (1,842) and Clayton Kershaw (1,746).