The hot corner has been home to a host of heavy hitters and a plethora of premier players who can pick it. But the best of the best could both mine a web gem at third and strike gold with the lumber at the dish. My list of third baseman encapsulates these types of players who make up The Top Third Basemen…Of My Lifetime.

10. Terry Pendleton

No single player embodied the 1991 “Worst to First” Atlanta Braves like Terry Pendleton. TP, who signed as a free agent with the Braves prior to the aforementioned ’91 season, was coming off a year with the St. Louis Cardinals in which he only hit .230 with 6 home runs. His turnaround in 1991 seemingly came from nowhere, much like the Braves team that season. Pendleton’s performance mirrored the Braves success. He finished that season with a .319 batting average and 22 homers, while leading the league in hits and leading the Braves to their first World Series appearance since the franchise moved to Atlanta in 1966. Although the team would fail to capture the World Series title that season, Pendleton would personally capture the NL batting title while leading the league in hits and eventually being crowned NL MVP. I guess you could say that he had his own worst to first season. Pendleton’s improbable personal best year combined with the 1991 Braves going from the outhouse to the penthouse are reasons enough to secure the number 10 spot on my list.

9. Austin Riley

From a former Braves legend to a current, emerging one, Austin Riley checks in at number 9. Although Riley has only been in Atlanta and MLB for 4 years, he’s already made an immediate impact on the franchise and has put the rest of the league on notice. Speaking of making an immediate impact, Riley did exactly that when he was called up to bigs in 2019. He began his career by hitting 8 HRs in his first 16 games and won NL Rookie of the Month. The new frontier of third basemen was upon us and Austin Riley was leading the way. Much like the previous entrant on the list, Terry Pendleton, Riley also helped turn around an unlikely Braves team into pennant winners. But whereas Pendleton and the 1991 Braves came up a little short, Riley and the 2021 Atlanta Braves were ultimately able to win it all and hoist the World Series Trophy. Riley’s torrid second half in 2021 coupled with several key trade deadline acquisitions helped propel the Braves from a 51-54 record at the deadline to eventual World Series Champions. Riley’s continued rise to stardom and his importance to the 2021 team place him at number 9 on my list. But check back in ten years and I can almost guarantee his spot, much like his star, will have ascended.

8. Scott Rolen

Scott Rolen is the most recent inductee into The Baseball Hall of Fame. And deservedly so. Rolen had a great 17 year MLB career with 4 different teams, most notably the Phillies and Cardinals. He was Rookie of the Year with Philadelphia in 1997, was named to 7 All-Star teams, won 8 Gold Gloves and tossed in a Silver Slugger in 2002 for good measure. Rolen was a member of the great Cardinals teams from the early to mid 2000’s and won a ring with St. Louis in 2006. He finished his career with a .281 career batting average, 316 career HRs and a 70.1 WAR. Rolen’s induction into the Hall of Fame was somewhat debatable and I think his 70 WAR represents the shift in HOF voting based mainly on counting stats to the more metric oriented analytics of today’s baseball. Rolen could do it all but what I remember him for the most is being a near nightly feature on Baseball Tonight’s Web Gem segment, turning in highlight reel defensive plays on a regular basis.

7. Nolan Arenado

Speaking of third basemen and web gems, it would be an error not to include Nolan Arenado on my list. Arenado is undoubtedly the best defensive third baseman…Of My Lifetime. This opinion can be backed up by the fact that Arenado has won ten Gold Gloves. One for every year he’s been in the majors. He’s also added six Platinum Gloves, the award for best defensive player in baseball, regardless of position. Such defensive dominance would definitely be enough to be included on the list, but Arenado also gets it done at the dish. Evidenced by his .288 career batting average and 301 career HRs. Arenado is also a personal favorite of mine because I’ve owned him in my fantasy baseball dynasty league his entire career and reaped the many benefits of doing so.

6. Manny Machado

While we’re on the subject of players I’ve owned their entire career in my fantasy baseball dynasty league, let me present Manny Machado. Needless to say, third base has not been a problem for my fantasy team over the past decade. Machado broke into the bigs only a half season ahead of Arenado, and they’ve had similar career numbers and accolades up to this point in their career. Machado has a career .281 batting average and 287 career HRs. He has 2 Gold Gloves and 1 Platinum Glove compared to Nolan’s 10 and 6, but would most likely have more if they weren’t both in the National League now. Machado gets the slight edge ahead of Arenado on my list due to cool points, which Manny has in abundance. He looks cool playing third base, being one of the pioneers of the large shades that are popular today and also being a Jordan Brand athlete, meaning he has Jumpman gear and Jordan cleats. In the immortal words of “Prime Time” Deion Sanders, “If you look good, you feel good. If you feel good, you play good. If you play good, they pay good.” Machado can definitely back this up as he signed a $300 million extension earlier this season, becoming the first player in MLB history to sign multiple $300 million contracts. Must be the money.

5. Adrian Beltre

If it’s possible to have a sneaky Hall of Fame career, I think Adrian Beltre did just that. He was really good for a really long time but seemed to somewhat fly under the mainstream radar that most superstar players appear on. Beltre played 21 years for 4 teams and was named to 4 All-Star teams, won 5 Gold Gloves, 2 Platinum Gloves, and 4 Silver Sluggers. He finished his career with a .286 batting average, 477 home runs and a 93.5 WAR. Despite his under the radar profile Beltre ended up being one of baseball’s most beloved players due to his on the field performance as well as his antics and personality. It became a running joke that he didn’t like to have his head touched and his teammates would go out of their way to do so. His reactions were always priceless. It’s fitting that the guy who didn’t like his head to be touched will soon have it immortalized on a plaque in Cooperstown.

4. Mike Schmidt

Michael Jack Schmidt. Schmidt’s career is legendary. His awards and accolades are so numerous that I can feel the carpal tunnel creeping in as I prepare to list them. First-ballot Hall of Fame, 3 NL MVPs, 12x All-Star, 10x Gold Glove winner, 6x Silver Slugger winner, 1980 World Series Championship, 1980 World Series MVP, 548 career HRs, 8 NL HR titles, 4 NL RBI titles, and he also shares the MLB record of 4 HRs in a single game. Simply put, Mike Schmidt was an all-time great. I always liked Schmidt as a kid and I remember being particularly fond of his Starting Lineup figure with the powder blue Phillies uniform. And if you’ve read my Top MLB Uniforms post, you know how partial I am to powder blue. And I’m equally partial to great third baseman like Schmidt.

3. George Brett

Ok, these transitions from list to list are just becoming too easy. Powder blue uniforms. Great third basemen. Mike Schmidt. George Brett. Too easy. A lot like baseball was for George Brett. Or at least it appeared to be judging by his stats and accolades. First-ballot HOF. 13x All-Star. 3 Silver Sluggers. 3 AL batting titles including a .390 average in his MVP season of 1980. 3,154 career hits and a career .315 batting average. He won a Gold Glove and was a member of the 1985 Kansas City Royals World Championship team. Brett was also involved in one of the most memorable events in Major League history, “The Pine Tar Incident”. A brief summary is that Brett hit a go ahead homer against the Yankees and the Yankees manager, Billy Martin, had the umpire inspect his bat for excessive pine tar. After it was examined the umpire determined the bat to be illegal and disqualified the homer and called Brett out. An enraged Brett stormed up the dugout steps and charged at the umpire with what can only be described as murder in his eyes. The clip of Brett rushing the umpire would be replayed countless times over the years and is the main reason the incident became so infamous. I read and reread countless times a lengthy article on The Pine Incident in Beckett Magazine when I was a kid and was always amazed at the story and all the little details about it that you couldn’t get from the bull-rushing Brett video clip. The story and the clip are core baseball memories for me. The Pine Tar Incident along with the greatness of George Brett as a player see him land as the number 3 entry on the list.

2. Wade Boggs

Wade Boggs was born to hit baseballs. And seemingly born to hit them at Fenway Park in Boston. Banging opposite-field doubles off the Green Monster almost at will. His iconic stance and swing would serve Boggs well throughout a career that included 12 All-Star selections, 8 Silver Slugger Awards, 5 AL batting titles, 2 Gold Gloves, 3010 career hits, a .328 career batting average, a World Series ring in 1996 with the Yankees and culminated in a first-ballot Hall of Fame induction. A legendary career to be sure. But almost just as legendary are some of Boggs’ off the field tales. He ate chicken before every single game. It started out in 1983 as a way to sell his chicken cookbook “Fowl Tips”, but baseball superstitions being what they are, the ritual continued for the next 17 years of his career and earned Boggs the nickname “Chicken Man”. Quite a story but perhaps an even more infamous one is the urban legend of Boggs drinking 107 beers on a cross country flight. Any man that can hit like that and drink like that is much deserving of the number 2 spot on my list.

1. Chipper Jones

If you’re a frequent reader of my blog posts there should have been little doubt as to who would claim the number 1 spot. Chipper Jones. The greatest Atlanta Braves player Of My Lifetime. Jones was drafted first overall by the Braves in 1990. I didn’t know much about the MLB draft at the time but I knew being picked first in it was a big deal. It came with a lot of hype and expectations and Chipper exceeded them all. A first-ballot Hall of Famer. An 8 time All-Star. Two Silver Slugger Awards. The NL MVP in 1999 spurred by his performances against the hated division rival Mets. The Braves led the National League East by only one game as they entered a three-game September series against the Mets. Atlanta swept the series, largely thanks to Jones, who hit four home runs and drove in seven of the 13 runs that the Braves scored. Chipper hit against the Mets so well during his career that he named his daughter Shea after the former Mets ballpark, Shea Stadium, in which he hit .317 with 19 HRs and 55 RBIs during his career. Jones made his MLB debut with Atlanta in 1993 with a September call up but tore his ACL in 1994 and missed the entire year. So his rookie season didn’t occur until 1995. The year the Braves won their first World Series in Atlanta. Jones would spend his entire career with the Braves racking up numerous franchise records along the way. Chipper also won the NL batting title at the age of 36 with a .364 average. He was a rare switch-hitter that could hit for average and power from both sides of the plate as he finished his career with 468 HRs and a .303 career batting average. All of this and so many great memories of Chipper in a Braves uniform are reasons why Larry Wayne Jones is The Top Third Baseman…Of My Lifetime.