Line-Up for Yesterday

"Line-Up for Yesterday: An ABC of Baseball Immortals" is a poem written by Ogden Nash for the January 1949 issue of SPORT Magazine. In the poem, Nash dedicates each letter of the alphabet to a legendary Major League Baseball player. The poem pays tribute to 24 players altogether, plus one winking reference to himself (under "I") as a fan of the game, and concludes with a final stanza in homage to the players collectively.

Baseball players referred to in the poem

 * Grover Cleveland Alexander
 * Roger Bresnahan
 * Ty Cobb
 * Dizzy Dean
 * Johnny Evers
 * Frankie Frisch
 * Lou Gehrig
 * Rogers Hornsby
 * Carl Hubbell
 * Walter Johnson
 * Willie Keeler
 * Nap Lajoie
 * Christy Mathewson
 * Bobo Newsom
 * Mel Ott
 * Eddie Plank
 * Connie Mack
 * Babe Ruth
 * Tris Speaker
 * Bill Terry
 * Dazzy Vance
 * Honus Wagner
 * Jimmie Foxx
 * Cy Young

Statistics

 * Eighteen of the players were also in the Hall of Fame at the time, and all but one (Bobo Newsom) would eventually be inducted.
 * Eight players—Cobb, Gehrig, Hornsby, Johnson, Mathewson, Ruth, Wagner, and Young—would be elected to the All Century Team in 1999.