Talk:Phantom ballplayer

Dubious

The statement that Ed Nottle pitched in a 1963 mid-season exhibition game between the Cubs and White Sox is not supported by contemporary accounts of the game. The minor league pitcher the White Sox used in that game is identified as Mike Joyce.

Removing Nottle—unsourced, and unsupported by contemporary reports. Dmoore5556 (talk) 20:17, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

The statement that Jamie Werly was on the Opening Day roster for the 1982 Yankees is suspect. An April 5, 1982, news item notes that Werly will start the season on the Triple-A disabled list. The 1982 Yankees were scheduled to open on April 6, but it was snowed out along with several other games; they did not play their first game until April 11. So there is additional question of what (if any) dates Werly may have been on the Yankees' active roster.

I agree that there is no solid evidence that Jamie Werly was ever on the Yankees' regular-season roster in 1982. I think this item should be removed. Rory1262 (talk) 20:50, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Juan Veintidós

According to this blog article, pitcher Juan Veintidós made the Twins' Opening Day roster in 1975 but was sent down to AAA without having appeared in a game: [1]. Does anyone know where one can locate official Opening Day rosters from 1975? And has anyone been able to find a reliable source stating that Veintidós indeed made the Twins' roster out of Spring Training that year? AuH2ORepublican (talk) 23:18, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

Hi AuH2ORepublican, I'll take a look at contemporary reporting via newspapers.com — local papers often talk about "new faces" on teams for Opening Day — and will note any findings here. Thanks. Dmoore5556 (talk) 23:32, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

AuH2ORepublican, I did some searching and I don't think the blog is accurate; while a nice story, it doesn't hold up. For background info, the Juan Veintidós page on Baseball-Reference.com is here, and the Twins 1975 game log on Retrosheet is here. The blog article states "He made the team out of spring training in 1975 and came north to Met Stadium with the Twins." — actually, the Twins opened their season with a pair of three-game road series, first in Texas and then Kansas City, before playing their first home game at Metropolitan Stadium ("Met Stadium") a week into the season. Veintidós was optioned to the Triple-A Tacoma Twins in later March, as reported here. The MLB Twins first regular season game was played April 8. On April 1, a UPI story about the MLB Twins ran in several papers (example here) noting that either Veintidós or Mike Pazik could make the team (Pazik would debut with the Twins on May 11). On April 5, this article in The Minneapolis Star stated there were 4 new players on the MLB Twins roster: Lyman Bostock (rookie), Dan Ford (rookie), Jim Hughes (who had 2 appearances in MLB in 1974), and Danny Walton (who had several seasons of MLB experience). The article also stated that Hughes was the only "new face" to join the MLB Twins pitching staff. I can't find any reference to Veintidós being with the MLB Twins at the start of the season, but he is mentioned in this story in Honolulu as being the scheduled opening day starter for the Triple-A Twins, scheduled for April 10. The April 11 game summary here shows that he did pitch for Tacoma on the 10th. I searched through the end of May, and all the reports mentioning Veintidós are of him still with Tacoma. Dmoore5556 (talk) 00:17, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

Dmoore5556, thanks for the yeoman effort that certainly was fruitful. Your impressive findings certainly put the kibbosh on that story. It seems as if everything in the blog post was true except for the part about Veintidós making the team out of Spring Training, which happens to be the only relevant part of the story for purposes of the "phantom players" article. Again, thank you very much.

The ironic part is that, because Veintidós was featured in a Topps baseball card, but didn't appear in an MLB game, he *is* a "phantom player" of a sort, the kind of guy whom fans of that generation (of which I would have been part had I been just three or four years older; the first Topps packs that I bought were from the 1979 set and the first set from which I saw a lot of cards as a kid was the 1978 set) assumed was an MLB player yet wasn't one. I think that cases such as Veintidós are deserving of being included in a third category of phantom player: those with baseball cards in MLB sets but who didn't actually play in the majors. Those would be easy enough to compile prior to the 1990s, when baseball-card companies started issuing earlier and earlier "pre-rookie cards," but I do think that players in MLB card sets do meet the spirit of the criteria. What do other editors think? AuH2ORepublican (talk) 01:25, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

AuH2ORepublican, you are welcome. Phantom (or perhaps "false rookie") cards are somewhat interesting. George Pena falls in the same category as Veintidós, as Pena never played in MLB yet was on a Rookie card issued by Topps in 1973 (example here). Conversely, Harry Saferight, an actual phantom ballplayer (he was listed on an active roster), was featured on a 1980 Topps future stars card, which by its nature is speculative, so I'd not put that in the same category as players who appeared on Rookie cards. I could see making a brief mention of Veintidós and Pena as an addition to the "Honorable mentions" section (along with noting that there may be other such cards, and a caveat that future stars or prospect cards are intentionally speculative) but I wouldn't split it out as a standalone category. (As an aside, I will likely make an edit to clear the "Former phantom players who made MLB debut in subsequent seasons" section as there is not really anything distinguishing about former phantoms.) Dmoore5556 (talk) 02:37, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

FYI that I've now added Veintidós and Pena into the "Honorable mentions" section per the above. Dmoore5556 (talk) 04:25, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

"Honorable mentions"

A player who played in a major league game is by definition not a phantom ballplayer, and most of these examples are already listed in a separate article labeled "cup of coffee". I propose ditching all the one-game players, and explaining that notable one-game players can be found in the cup of coffee article. 174.95.162.236 (talk) 15:53, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Looks like a good suggestion. I'd like to go through the list in this article, to move/merge any unique content over to the cup-of-coffee article, then one-game content here can be replace by a "main" link to the cup-of-coffee article. Some of the content here, that is not covered in cup-of-coffee, should remain (such as the segment about rookie cards and the segment about Brian Mazone). I should be able to get to this in the next few days. Dmoore5556 (talk) 19:12, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree, most of the one-game players could be removed from the Honorable Mentions section and moved to the Cup of Coffee article, but I would keep Larry Yount and John Oldham in the Phantom Players article (because both were pitchers who didn't pitch in the Majors). I also would leave the Honorable Mentions who didn't play in a regular-season game but didn't meet the official-roster criteria for the main section: Jimmy Whalen, Bugs Baer (along with a brief description of the 1912 Tigers game), Brian Mazone and Mark Kiger. With regard to the players who lost phantom status by playing in the Majors years after they first were on the roster, and the baseball-card "phantoms," I agree that they likewise should remain in the article. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 20:50, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Update: I've made edits both to Phantom ballplayer and Cup of coffee consistent with the above discussion. Also, sub-sections have been added to relevant parts of each article. Feel free to take a look; suggestions or constructive edits welcome. Thanks. Dmoore5556 (talk) 04:54, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

I think this is a great improvement -- nice job! 174.95.162.236 (talk) 00:14, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

New player

I am unsure if I’m wrong on this, but shouldn’t Carlos Narvaez be added? Called up, then optioned w/o an MLB appearance. Would edit it myself, but I can’t remember when he was optioned, so not sure how to source. AmericanAssociationKnowItAll (talk) 02:19, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

@AmericanAssociationKnowItAll:, a convenient source for player transactions are the transaction logs maintained on MLB.com for each team. The log for the Yankees is here; use the arrows next to the month box to change from month to month. The logs show he was called up on April 29 and optioned back on May 2, and his page on BR (here) shows he didn't play in an MLB game, which does indeed make him a phantom (at least for now). Feel free to add him to the article, if you have a chance. Dmoore5556 (talk) 04:08, 4 May 2024 (UTC)