I'd be inclined to take Wagner over Williams. A great-fielding SS who could fill in at any other position if needed. But then do you keep Vaughan as a backup SS, or get another V? I think our defense is a little rough, with Foxx catching, Ott at 3B, Hornsby, and that outfield. Dick Allen and Frank Thomas certainly aren't coming in for defense either. I guess this team can outhit and outpitch most everyone. Of course, I don't know what level of competition an imaginary team is expected to face...

Regarding the all-alphabet team, how about Buck Ewing, Monte Irvin and Arky Vaughan for E, I and V (HOFers all). He's young, but Chase Utley still might be the best U. Other alternatives (not necessarily better) are Joe Jackson and Jim Thome. (I admit I used b-r.com, my memory isn't that good.)

There are no pitchers in the list; if you allow them there are definite upgrades: Kid Nichols and Dan Quisenberry for N and Q. Other alternatives are Eckersley, Walter Johnson, Koufax, Mathewson, Palmer/Plank, Santana, Urbina, Dazzy Vance, Cy Young and Zito/Zambrano. Maybe it's better to do two lists -- one for pitchers and one for position players.

There doesn't appear to be a single player with an X last name, although there are plenty with a first, middle or nickname (as a search for X will show). So there are 25 letters possible, which suggests ...

a 25-man roster, one for each letter -- but you have to have pitchers and position players in the right ratio, and subs at all positions. This brings some really hard choices: M is really bad (Mantle,Mays, Musial, Mathewson, Pedro Martinez). Other pitcher/position dilemmas are Aaron/Alexander, Johnson/Jackson and Schmidt/Santana. I started looking at this -- you need guidelines, like how many games are needed to qualify at a position.

Using OPS+ and ERA+ as a guide, and a 100 game minimum for positions, I came up with (qualified positions in parens): Dick Allen (357), Bonds (78), Cobb (89), Dimaggio (8), Ewing (2395), Foxx (352), Gehrig (3), Hornsby (465), Isringhausen (1), Walter Johnson (1), Koufax (1), Lajoie (43), Pedro Martinez (1), Nichols (1), Ott (958), Pujols (37), Quisenberry (1), Ruth (971), Santana (1), Frank Thomas (D3), Urbina (1), Vaughan (65), Ted Williams (79), Cy Young (1), Zambrano (1). That's only 10 pitchers, but Ruth can be the 11th (an OPS+ of 122 is not too shabby). The starting lineup has Foxx at C and Ott at 3B, the rest of the IF is Gehrig/Hornsby/Vaughan, and an outfield of Williams/Bonds/Ruth. If Pujols had qualified at 3B, he would probably start there; since he doesn't, Dick Allen was chosen to back-up at 3B (he has a surprisingly strong -- to me -- OPS+ of 156). Aaron is great, but there are a lot of other OFers with much better OPS+. Not having Mantle's OPS+ of 172 was hard, but it was hard to argue with Pedro's ERA+ of 161 (and the Mick would not have cracked the starting line-up, anyway). Williams over Wagner (191 vs 150 OPS+) was an easy choice with Vaughan, being one of the few strong players for V, available at SS. There are some really good pitchers for R (Rivera) and W (Wood, Walsh), but it's hard to not have Ruth and Williams, the top 2 OPS+ players.

I spent way too much time working on that, but it was fun.

Try doing it in the dark, when you cannot sleep.