Monday winner is Jason Michaels; he will go on to face David Eckstein in the next round.

Tuesday’s Matchup

Jerry May (Staunton 1960) vs. Adam Everett (Winchester 1996)- two excellent defenders!

  • Jerry May was a Staunton native- he was born there in 1943. He made the major leagues with the Pittsburgh Pirates when he was only 20, in 1964. He spent parts of seven seasons with the Bucs, and was traded to the Kansas City Royals in December, 1970. He was sold to the New York Mets in the middle of the 1973 season, but the team released him in July of that year, and that was the last he played at the game’s highest level. Known as an excellent catcher, May hit .234/.307/.318 in a little over 1,500 major league at-bats. He was the primary catcher for the ’68 Pirates, a team that went 80-82 overall, but had luminaries such as Roberto Clemente, Willie Stargell, Bill Mazerowski, Maury Wills, and Jim Bunning playing major roles. May was killed in a farming accident in 1996 at the young age of 52.
  • Adam Everett was drafted 12th overall in 1996 by the Boston Red Sox (actually, Everett was drafted just a little over three weeks before May passed away). In December of 1999, he was traded to the Houston Astros for… wait for it… Carl Everett, in a never-seen-before Everett-for-Everett swap. He made his major league debut with the ‘Stros in late August, 2001, and went on to be the starting shortstop for the team from 2003 to 2006. Known as a sterling defender, Everett finished in the top four in Defensive WAR in the National League in every one of those years- leading the league in 2006- but he never won a Gold Glove. After he was granted free agency in 2007, he spent a year with the Minnesota Twins, a year and a half with the Detroit Tigers, and then finished things up with the Cleveland Indians. He ended his career with a slashline of .242/.294/.346 in over 3,000 major league plate appearances. After he retired he was a special assistant in baseball operations in Cleveland in 2012, and then spent several years as a roving infield instructor and bench coach for the Astros. He is currently the owner of D-BAT Marietta Baseball/Softball Academy.

Vote by going to twitter.com/JohnATVL to vote! (Closes Tuesday morning)

And by the way, if you want to read much, much more about the 2019 VBL season, be sure to check out the 2019 Valley League Annual!

May
Everett