Shawon-O-Meter

Great piece on Shawon Dunston on the Cubs website this morning. It's good to see Shawon back in a Cubs uniform. Although sabermetrically Dunston is the antithesis of what you look for in an offsensive player (a career .296 OBP with just 203 walks in over 6,000 plate appearances) I always rooted hard for Shawon and fondly remember the daily Shawon-O-Meter (a cardboard sign that tracked Dunston's batting average) held by a fan down the first base line as Dunston made his quest for .300 in 1995, although falling a bit short at .296.

Dunston had his best year in 1997 when he split time between the Cubs and Pirates, hitting .300 with 14 homeruns.

  G   AB    R    H   2B 3B  HR  RBI  SB CS  BB  SO   BA   OBP   SLG   

132  490   71  147  22  5  14   57  32  8   8  75  .300  .312  .451  

I think I rooted for Shawon for two reasons. First, he was the Cubs shortstop and I'd always loved to watch the shortstop turn the DP and make backhanded stops in the hole. Of course watching Dunston fire one across the infield to Mark Grace, who saved Shawon double digit errors every year, was also entertaining. Ivan DeJesus was also a favorite during his time with the Cubs. But more importantly, and as brought out in the article, Dunston hustled on every play both at bat and in the field. I can truly say that Dunston and Pete Rose are the two players I never saw loaf on the field. I think some of Dunston's honorable attitude comes out in the article as well. I hope he does come back as a coach, just not a hitting coach. :)