All-Time Home Run Derby Draft: Picking dream teams with history’s top sluggers

It’s one thing to draw up a Home Run Derby dream team from one particular season, it’s another task entirely to go through the history of baseball and put together dreams teams featuring the best sluggers throughout the history.

Ahead of Monday’s Home Run Derby, we figured it would be fun to mix present and past and create all-time derby squads. It was fun, sure. But it was also a lot of era vs. era comparing and thinking about how players from the history books might fare in a modern competition like the derby.

To add another layer of fun and strategy, we made it a draft. The Stew’s Mike Oz, Israel Fehr, Mark Townsend and Chris Cwik snaked through baseball history to put together their dream teams. Let’s see how things turned out.

1. BABE RUTH
Picked by Mike Oz: With the No. 1 overall pick, I could obviously go anywhere I wanted. But nobody intrigued me like The Babe. There’s some risk here, since we’ve never seen him do the Home Run Derby we know today. But this isn’t exactly like an NBA team picking an unknown European with a lottery pick. We know Ruth’s power, credentials and potential. We’ve just never seen them applied in this way. I’m confident in him, unwaveringly so.

2. MICKEY MANTLE
Picked by Israel Fehr: I’ll keep in the Yankee family and go with Mickey Mantle. With a big dynamic swing and a flair for the dramatic, Mantle in his prime is the perfect player to take part in the Home Run Derby. If the venue for this fictional showdown favors hitters from one side of the plate, Mantle’s switch-hitting abilities are a bonus.

3. HANK AARON
Picked by Mark Townsend: The former home run king is a no-brainer pick in the first round. Though he may not produce the amount of oohs and aahs as others in this draft, he’s the ultimate foundation and a reliable source for production. Also, he was my dad’s idol growing up and one of the most respected men to play the game, so I simply couldn’t pass on Hammerin’ Hank.

4. BARRY BONDS
Picked by Chris Cwik: I would like to thank my colleagues for allowing the consensus No. 1 pick to fall to the fourth spot. I’ll gladly accept the all-time home run leader with the fourth pick in the draft. Now I know how the Nationals felt when Anthony Rendon fell to them!

5. ALEX RODRIGUEZ
Picked by Chris Cwik: I didn’t get involved in this draft to impress the morality police, I came to win. Rodriguez is fourth on the all-time home run list with 672 bombs, and that’s with him missing a whole season due to a suspension and a significant amount of time due to a devastating hip injury. I’m happy to have him here.

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6. KEN GRIFFEY JR.
Picked by Mark Townsend: One key to dominating a Home Run Derby is consistency, which is why this competition has always suited Ken Griffey Jr. so well. The former three-time winner has the sweetest, smoothest and most consistent swing I’ve ever seen, and I’d enjoy just sitting back and watching him launch.

7. GIANCARLO STANTON
Picked by Israel Fehr: Experience be damned. Giancarlo Stanton is still young but he’s quite possibly the strongest player in the history of baseball and would have been the favorite for the 2015 derby if he weren’t currently injured. Remember the 510-foot bomb he hit last year at Target Field? Yeah, get ready for even more of that.

8. WILLIE MAYS
Picked by Mike Oz: At the risk of turning my Home Run Derby team into an all-time team, I’m going with another guy we’ve never seen in the competition. But just like Babe Ruth at No. 1, you can’t question Willie Mays’ credentials. He was more an all-around player than a straight-up slugger, but he won the home-run crown four times in his career and is a double member of the 50-homer club. I’m good with all that.

9. YOENIS CESPEDES
Picked by Mike Oz: Only three players have repeated as Home Run Derby champs — Griffey Jr., Prince Fielder and my third-round pick: Yoenis Cespedes. In fact, Yo won the last two, but he won’t be back Monday night to defend his crown, which is a bummer. Still, in two derbys, he’s hit a total of 62 homers, which is sixth all-time for the event. He’s not an All-Time home-run titan, but he’s damn good at this competition.

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10. JOSH HAMILTON
Picked by Israel Fehr: No one has put on a better show in derby history than Josh Hamilton did in 2008 when he hit 28 homers in a single round. That kind of prodigious power potential makes him really dangerous in this kind of contest and a dark horse to win the whole thing.

11. MIKE TROUT
Picked by Mark Townsend: First of all, Trout can’t turn this one down so he’ll just have to deal with this. Second, while he’s an unknown commodity in derby competitions, he’s pretty much a natural at all aspects of baseball. With that in mind, I would confidently predict multiple double-digit rounds and a special honor for hitting the longest home run in the competition.

12. MARK MCGWIRE
Picked by Chris Cwik: After my first two picks, I was dubbed Team Villain by one of my colleagues. I’ve opted to embrace the role with this pick. McGwire’s chase for the single-season home run record in the 90s briefly reinvigorated the game. He could hit bombs with the best of them during his prime.

13. SAMMY SOSA
Picked by Chris Cwik: Fine, fine, I admit it. All four of my picks have been players who either tested positive for steroids, or are highly suspected of using during their careers. Again, I came to win. From 1995 to 2004, Sosa averaged 48 homers per season. That will play in the derby.

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14. TED WILLIAMS
Picked by Mark Townsend: The best pure hitter the game has ever seen is a welcome addition to any squad. Make no mistake about it, Williams could hit for power with eight seasons of 30 or more homers, so it’s easy to envision him stepping right in and thriving. He was the type of hitter who could call his shot, and right now I’m calling plenty of bombs.

15. FRANK THOMAS
Picked by Israel Fehr: If Stanton isn’t the strongest man in the history of the game, it might be Frank Thomas. The Big Hurt can put a big hurt into many baseballs in a short amount of time and won the event back in 1995.

16. DAVID ORTIZ
Picked by Mike Oz: Here’s a fun fact for you: Big Papi has the most homers in Home Run Derby history, with 77. That’s also more than Griffey, who is second on that list with 70 and won the event three times. That’s fourth-round value, folks.

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17. DICK ALLEN
Picked by Mike Oz: I could have picked someone with a higher Q-rating than Dick Allen, the former Phillies, White Sox and Dodgers slugger, who won two home-run titles in his career and led the league in OPS four times. The rap on Allen is that he was a supremely talented player whose turbulent career — which was dragged down of racial harassment and bickering with fans — never realized its full potential. But dude could hit the ball FAR. So the Home Run Derby would have been perfect for him.

18. ALBERT PUJOLS
Picked by Israel Fehr: Adding maybe the greatest right-handed hitter of all–time with my fifth and final pick? Sign me up. Albert Pujols plays for keeps and will have something to prove having waited so long to hear his name called.

19. PRINCE FIELDER
Picked by Mark Townsend: This squad is deceptively strong across the board, but there’s no questioning Prince Fielder’s thump whatsoever. The former two-time derby champion is capable of catching fire and reaching every part of the ballpark in a given round. When looking for an anchor, I didn’t have to look far.

20. ICHIRO SUZUKI
Picked by Chris Cwik: My team is so dominant that I’ve decided to test out an experiment with my final pick. When Ichiro was in his prime, there were some who said “he could hit 30 home runs if he wanted, but he chooses to be a contact hitter.” Let’s see about that. My team will already have a commanding lead by the time he steps to the plate, so I’m not worried if that myth turns out to be a lie.