New site feature

From the moment I decided to start this blog, I knew that I would also want to try and create a list of every player to ever suit up for the Beavers. There already are a couple of similar lists out there, but despite their impressive size, none are complete. In fact, the two largest are at best, maybe halfway complete. I'm sure that's more than enough for most folks, but for my, and this blog's purposes, a much more finished list is/was going to be needed.

I've spent quite a bit of time over the last few months working on my list, and even though it's still not complete, I've decided to publish it anyway. I'm hoping that putting out an unfinished list will inspire me to put in the extra effort to get it finished, as I've really started to slack off as of late. If I had to guess, I'd say that I still have around 1,500 to 2,000 more names to add to the list, but even so, what's currently up is still the largest list of former Beavers that I know of. I didn't anticipate it taking so long to complete, and as such, don't know when it'll be done. I'd like to think that I could finish it by summers end, but who knows. Anyways, if anyone's so inclined, the page is now up, and can be found up under the header (and yes, I know, I still need to figure out how to make the link more noticeable).

Oh, and for the couple of people who've been kind enough to ask, the all-time list also contains my list of specific cards that I'm looking to add to the collection, as well as the cards that I've already acquired. Unlike the all-time list, I haven't spent much time looking for the ideal card for each guy -- I've found that to be even more tedious than working on the all-time list. I'll be very surprised if I ever get the want list completed. And as far the all of the guys who never had a card, or other ephemeral item, produced with their likeness on it goes, well, in a perfect world, I'd seek out customs for all of them at some point; but I don't see that happening either. I'm thinking that I'll just have to make some kind of placeholder for all of them, and call it good.

Now that that's out of the way, I wanted to spend moment to publically thank, Jeff, from Wax Pack Wonders, for all of the behind the scenes assistance that he's been providing. Not only has he clued me into multiple sites for researching, he's also taken the time to look up a few things for me on sites that I don't have access to. He's also been kind enough share all of his crossover research that was acquired while working on his book. That material is particularly interesting because it deals with pre-Beavers baseball in Portland, and has given me an idea for a future series that I'm tentatively calling "Before there were Beavers". To say that Jeff's efforts have been appreciated, would be an understatement, but for lack of knowing how else to say it, they are appreciated, and I'm very grateful!

I had hoped to have another real post (i.e. one featuring a player) up by now, but am currently working on four write-ups, three of whom are guys that have yet to have anything written about them (at least online). Assembling all of the material that I've accrued, and trying to present it in an entertaining manner, is taking longer than expected (I think that that's going to be a reoccurring theme around here). As I've mentioned multiple times already, the kind of researching, and writing, that I'm trying to do for this blog is new to me, and has seemingly created somewhat of a learning curve. I have no doubt that the process will speed up as I become more accustomed to it, but for the time being, new posts probably won't be coming as frequent as I would like.

Coming soon: We'll be looking at a guy who was a big star in another league, joined the Beavers, then left before ever playing a single game for the team.