My Top Five Baseball Families 3/2/13

Hey baseball fans!

Matt Nadel here with another dose of baseball history. In today’s post, I will be telling you all who I think are the top five families in baseball history. (Note that I originally posted this for Big Leagues Magazine, a really great online magazine that I write for. Hope you check it out.)

Number Five-The Ripkens: Why? Cal Ripken Sr. and  Cal Ripken Jr. basically represent the Orioles in the ‘80s. You may think that Cal Jr. was the only Ripken great, but Cal Sr. was involved in the O’s organization for 36 years and managed Baltimore in the 1987 season. In that season, Cal Jr. and Billy Ripken played in Baltimore. Billy Ripken wasn’t a superstar like is brother, but I think we can all agree that Cal Ripken Jr. deserves to be in the Hall.

Number Four-The DiMaggios: Why? Vince DiMaggio wasn’t really the best baseball player, but Dom DiMaggio and Joe DiMaggio both were consistently good ballplayers for the Red Sox and Yankees, respectively. Dom went to seven All Star games, while Joe went to 13. Joe is in the Baseball Hall of Fame but, sadly, Dom isn’t. However, he is in the Red Sox Hall of Fame. All in all, the DiMaggio parents should be proud of how successful their three sons were at playing the game they loved, baseball.

Number Three-The Bondses: Why? Bobby Bonds was a great ballplayer in the sixties and seventies, while his son, Barry Bonds, dominated the nineties and two thousands. They have a combined 1,094 homers, the most homers between a father and son. The only reason they aren’t number one is because Barry took steroids. Steroid use is not tolerated with me, and it is definitely not tolerated with the BBWAA.

Number Two-The Griffeys: Why? Ken Griffey Jr. and Ken Griffey Sr. were both big helpers in some teams’ successes. Griffey Sr. helped the Reds to two consecutive World Series titles, while his son helped the Mariners become an AL powerhouse in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Also, the Griffeys are the only father-son combo to hit back-to-back home runs. Now, that is what I call “like father, like son”.

NUMBER ONE-THE WANERS: Why? Little Poison and Big Poison, Lloyd Waner and Paul Waner, are both in the Hall of Fame. They both contributed to the Pirates of the ‘20s and ‘30s and they were both hitting machines. It’s funny how they played together on the Pirates and not the Phillies. Why do I say that? I say that because the Phillies play in the "City of Brotherly Love."

Well, that’s my top five families in baseball history. There are some honorable mentions, though. The Alous, Felipe, Jesus, and Matty, were once the family dynasty in San Francisco, while the Delahantys, Ed, Frank, Jim, Joe and Tom, were great ballplayers during the Dead Ball Era. Anyway, do you agree with my list? Leave me a comment and tell me your list of top five baseball families of all time. Thanks for reading and I hope you all enjoyed this post about "all the buzz on what wuzz".