The All-Time Kansas City Area Baseball Team
This article was written by Bill Carle
This article was published in From Unions to Royals: The Story of Professional Baseball in Kansas City (SABR 26, 1996)
The Kansas City area has been the home of many fine ballplayers over the years. What follows is the all-Kansas City team of players who were either born or grew up in the Kansas City area.
MGR—Casey Stengel: It is only appropriate the manager of this team was nicknamed after his hometown. One of the greatest managers in the history of the game began his career at Central High School in Kansas City. Known as “Dutch” at that time, his professional debut consisted of a handful of games with the hometown Kansas City Blues in 1910. Later a fine National League outfielder, Casey as a young man had dreams of becoming a dentist, attending a local dental college. One can only imagine what it might have been like listening to Stengel explaining a complicated dental procedure to a patient.
1B—George Stovall: Stovall was born in Independence, just a stone’s throw from present-day Kauffman Stadium. A very fiery first baseman for the Cleveland Indians and St. Louis Browns from 1904-13, Stovall became the player-manager for the 1914-15 Kansas City Packers of the Federal League.
2B—Frank White: Although born in Mississippi, White grew up and attended high school in Kansas City. Incredibly, White was never drafted but was discovered while attending the Royals Baseball Academy. One of the best defensive second basemen in the history of the game, White won a record-tying eight Gold Glove awards while amassing more than 2,000 hits.
3B—Ken Boyer: Boyer was born in the northern suburb of Liberty, Missouri and his family moved south to Alba, Missouri soon after he was born. Making his name on the other side of the state with the St. Louis Cardinals, Ken was the only of three major league brothers not to play in Kansas City. (Clete and Cloyd both played with the Kansas City Athletics and Cloyd later became the pitching coach for the Kansas City Royals.) Ken was the National League MVP in 1964.
SS—Glenn Wright: Wright hailed from Archie, Missouri, a small town just south of Kansas City. Another local player who began his career with the Kansas City Blues, Wright hit the first home run in Muehlebach Field (later Municipal Stadium) in 1923. Wright was one of the finest fielding shortstops of the 1920s and also a fine hitter (just missing .300 lifetime) for the Pittsburgh Pirates and Brooklyn Dodgers.
LF—Bob Allison: Allison was born in the eastern suburb of Raytown. Allison was a star football player at the University of Kansas prior to winning the Rookie of the Year award with the Washington Senators in 1959. A powerful hitter, he also made a terrific, sliding catch of a Jim Lefebvre liner in the 1965 World Series. Allison unfortunately died of the mysterious disease ataxia in 1995.
CF—Brian McRae: Although born in Florida, Brian grew up in the Kansas City area, attending Blue Springs High School. Brian is the son of long-time Royals designated hitter Hal McRae. Brian was the Royals’ first round draft choice in 1985, finally making his eagerly anticipated debut with the big club in 1990. Brian frequently electrified the Kauffman Stadium crowd with spectacular catches from his post in center field prior to being traded to the Cubs just prior to the 1995 season.
RF—Zack Wheat: A Hall of Famer with the Brooklyn Dodgers, Wheat was born in Hamilton, a small town northeast of Kansas City. The National League batting champion in 1918, Wheat fashioned a .317 lifetime average. Wheat is buried in Forest Hill Cemetery just a few hundred yards away from the great Satchel Paige.
C—Johnny Kling: Kling was the Cubs’ outstanding catcher in the early part of this century. After his playing career was over, he became a champion bowler and pool player, owning a pool hall in Kansas City. Kling owned the Kansas City Blues in the mid-1930s before selling them to Jack Ruppert of the New York Yankees in 1937.
P—Joe Wood: Although Cy Young Award winners Rick Sutcliffe and David Cone both hail from the Kansas City area, the outstanding native Kansas City pitcher is Smoky Joe Wood. Wood had one of the best years any pitcher ever had in 1912, going 34-5 with 10 shutouts and a 1.91 ERA.