Hall Bound

For the first time ever, a Rockie is headed to Cooperstown. In his final year on the ballot, Larry Walker earned 76.6% of the vote, just squeaking past the 75% threshold.

I watched the announcement live, and must admit that my heart skipped a beat when his name came up. For too long my hometown team has been denied a presence in the Baseball Hall of Fame, and I can't wait to finally make a trip there and see a Rockies cap on a plaque.

I certainly can't think of a better reason for a one-card post than a Hall of Fame election. But which card to use? He's had some great ones over the years. As I was making my selection, I thought something from 1997 would be most appropriate. That was his MVP year, which remains the only time a Rockie has won the award. Night Owl's recent “Best MVP-year cards” post omitted Walker's 1997 Topps card, as he came out on the wrong end of a split hair, to paraphrase.

As one of the few Rockies fans in this community, I'm glad I have the chance to put a candidate forward for that list. Here's what I came up with:

1997 Bowman International Best #BBI7 Larry Walker

This one checks all my usual boxes. Rockies card. Shiny card. Topps card, the brand that leads off every one of my annual binders. Granted, Bowman falls toward the back of the pack in the Topps section, mainly because I've never been able to keep the designs straight, and because the numbering system is far too counterintiutive.

Bowman's Best, on the other hand, gave us designs that I consistently enjoyed and can recall from memory better than the base Bowman sets. And in 1997, both the base and Best sets included the inaugural version of International parallels, where the card background was modified in some way to match the player's country of origin. The 1999 set channeled the card backs from 1993 Leaf by including photographs of local landmarks. But in 1997, International cards simply had the flag of the player's home country. I have the normal version of this card, but because Walker is just the second-ever Canadian to reach the Hall of Fame, after Fergie Jenkins, choosing the parallel containing the flag seemed especially appropriate.

We strongly associate this red maple leaf on a white background with our neighbors to the north, but it's really a relatively recent creation. Prior to 1965, the Canadian flag included the Union Jack with a red field, as well as a coat of arms. Quite a Canadian form of rebellion against the British Empire, if you ask me. No wars, no riots, just a polite, "we'd like a new flag, please."

Anyway, on the card back, underneath a United Nations-esque banner of various flags, there's a small paragraph featuring Walker's best season, for which they selected 1995. He hit 36 home runs and had 101 RBI, stole 16 bases, and slugged .607. He also led the NL in outfield assists, and his arm was truly something to behold. Just ask Metal Universe. Those 36 homers were also a record for a Canadian-born player.

Of course, he'd break his own record just a couple years later. Bowman couldn't have known it yet, but 1997 was undoubtedly his best year. As I mentioned before, he won the NL MVP, and led the Majors in home runs, on-base percentage, total bases, and slugging percentage. He was second in batting average behind the great Tony Gwynn, and third in RBI behind Jeff Bagwell and Andres Galarraga, his own teammate who took the league lead.

Like his shirt said, he ain't no ordinary sponge.

As amazing as that season was, if he had managed to eke out just a dozen or so more hits, he might have won the Triple Crown, which would have completely changed the conversation about his Hall of Fame candidacy.

Congratulations are of course in order for Derek Jeter as well, a nearly unanimous inductee and one of the many greats to wear the Yankee pinstripes. Ted Simmons and Marvin Miller will join them, thanks to the Veterans Committee.

I doubt I'll be able to witness Walker's induction speech in late July, but I do plan on seeing the Rockies retire his uniform number 33 prior to the game on April 19th. Todd Helton blazed that trail in Rockies history, and here's hoping he'll also get the call before too long.

Gift Cards

At least once a year, and twice if I'm lucky and get a birthday bonus, I can count on my mom to check my Eight Men Out list and gift me a few cards around the holidays. This year a trio of cards slipped out of an envelope on Christmas morning, and fortunately they were not blown away by the whirlwind of gift-opening that my two-year-old nephew led.

2016 Topps Chasing 3000 #3000-60 Ichiro Suzuki

In 2016 Topps Update, Topps managed to squeeze in the final half of a 60-card insert set counting down Ichiro Suzuki's progress toward the 3,000 hit milestone. It led off with card # 3000-1 in 2016 Topps Series 2, culminating with this card #3000-60 in Topps Update. That final card does indeed commemorate hit number 3,000, which he hit on August 7th, 2016 at Coors Field, and which I had the great fortune to witness.

I purchased the Topps Now card documenting the event, but I also wanted this insert card in my collection, because it's not every day you can collect a card from a game you attended, let alone one about such a milestone.

Keep in mind, that was 3,000 Major League hits. He had well over a thousand more in the NPB before arriving in America, putting him well beyond Pete Rose in all-time professional hits.

By the way, if you're a subscriber to The Athletic, you should be reading Joe Posnanski's series, "The Baseball 100". It's a well-written countdown of the 100 best players in history, one player a day until Opening Day. The series began with Ichiro at #100.

1993 Topps Gold #396 Rich Sauveur

The Eight Men Out list has allowed me to finally complete a six-card subset I've been chasing for a really long time. It's not truly a subset in the strictest sense of the word, but it's as good a term as any. As you may have realized, you've never seen a Topps Gold checklist from 1992-1994. That's because Topps replaced those with cards of players that had been snubbed from the main set. Six each in 1992 and 1993, and four in 1994. This card of Royals pitcher Rich Sauveur completes the 1993 subset. It was a real team effort over the years. I pulled two myself, two came from gcrl, and two from mom.

As best I can tell, this is absolutely the only Major League card that Rich Sauveur ever had. There are some minor league cards, and he spent a little time on big league rosters for several teams throughout the years, pitching a grand total of 46 innings, but no one besides Topps ever gave him a card. He gave it a valiant effort, appearing in his final MLB game at age 36, but his career sadly never panned out. He is currently a pitching coach in the Diamondbacks organization, and can be found on the short list of Strike-era "replacement players".

Next, on to 1994!

1992 Upper Deck #HH2 Ted Williams Hologram

Do you remember that shiny Hank Aaron Upper Deck card from a few months ago? The one that was entirely a hologram and basically a one-card insert set advertising Upper Deck Heroes of Baseball exhibition games? Well, turns out Upper Deck brought it back in 1992, unbeknownst to me. It's numbered "HH2", clearly in sequence with that Hank Aaron card, but from one year later. I still have no idea whether the Heroes of Baseball games ever actually happened.

The card back gives a quick overview of Ted Williams's great career, mentioning his two Triple Crowns, his .406 batting average in 1941 (the year two "unbreakable" records were set), and his 521st and final home run in 1960. He remains the all-time career leader in On-Base Percentage, with a staggering .482. That's as close to half as this game will ever see. Even Babe Ruth was a few points behind, at .474. One interesting note on that statistic is that eight of the top nine are lefties, as are most of the top 30.

Ted Williams will unquestionably be on The Baseball 100 list. Probably even in the top ten.

Kudos to mom for unearthing this gem. I might never have known it existed otherwise.

The First Update of the Decade (Part 2: Inserts)

When I was born, the 1984 Topps set was on shelves. It's famous for Rookie Cards of Don Mattingly and Darryl Strawberry. Topps brought it back for one of their Anniversary insert sets, which happens to coincide with with my age-35 year. The 1987 Anniversary cards have appeared around here with regularity, and the following year's 1983 Anniversary cards have a place, too. Topps kept the theme going for 2019, and in Update, I found a quasi-Rookie Card of Will Smith.

2019 Topps Update '84 Topps #84-37 Will Smith

Not that Will Smith, the one with an award-winning TV, film, and music career. Not the other Will Smith, either, the All-Star Giants closer. This is Will Smith, the young Dodgers catcher who already has Postseason experience under his belt and is a divisional rival of Closer Will Smith.

This Anniversary insert has the Rookie Card logo, but isn't considered by Beckett as a true RC. I really don't know what the rules are on the use of that logo. It does have a nice silver seal in the upper right, and it's consistent with Anniversary cards of the past few years. The card back is pretty accurate to the original 1984 design, just more vibrant since 1984 cards were still printed on cardboard. Just picture a Traded card and you'll get the idea. There is a "Dateline" paragraph, mentioning that Smith debuted on May 28th, 2019, and just a few days later hit a walk-off home run in Dodger Stadium.

Lots of players go their whole careers without a walk-off homer. Smith did it in his first week.

2019 Topps Update Gold #US252 Austin Riley RD /2019

Home runs are more a part of the game than ever, so it should be no surprise that the rookies emerging into the league are great at hitting them. Aaron Judge's rookie home run record didn't last but two years before Pete Alonso broke it. And Austin Riley of the Braves came pretty close to challenging Trevor Story's 2016 debut performance. Riley launched nine homers in the first eighteen games of his career, including a home run for his first big-league hit. His Rookie Card is one of many in the 2019 Update set, and you might notice this one is of the Gold variety.

For all I know, he's hitting one right in this photo.

2019 Topps Update 150th Anniversary #US16 Martin Maldonado

To go along with the "MLB 150" patch that I keep pointing out, Topps made a special parallel set to match. This one has gold foil instead of the usual silver, plus a "150 Years" logo inside a home plate shape. No serial number on this one, but it takes me back to the days of the original Topps Gold. Come to think of it, why hasn't Topps been using gold foil on the actual Gold cards these past several years? Austin Riley's card would be that much better, and in this era where the border is taking more and more of a back seat in Topps designs, it would go a long way in signifying what you're actually holding in your hands.

Martin Maldonado has been on a whirlwind journey since mid-2018, and Topps Update can't come close to keeping up. He was traded to the Astros in July 2018, just in time to help them to the Postseason. He signed with Kansas City during the offseason, giving us this Royals card. That didn't last long, as he was traded to the Cubs straight-up for Mike Montgomery. Just a couple weeks later, he found himself right back in Houston for another Postseason run as part of another 1-for-1 trade deadline deal.

If Topps had just given him an Astros card in 2019 Series 1, it would have ended up being correct. He re-upped with the Astros shortly before Christmas, so look for actual Astros cards of Maldonado in 2020.

2019 Topps Update Perennial All-Stars #PAS-43 Yadier Molina

Unlike Maldonado and many other of his Major League colleagues, Yadier Molina has stuck with the same team his whole career. He's profiled here in the 50-card Perennial All-Stars set, one of the most patriotic-looking sets ever to come out of Topps. He's been to nine Midsummer Classics, although was not picked in 2019. Not precisely "Perennial", but still a regular participant.

This particular photo is from his 8th All-Star Game (check the service star!), held in Miami. The colorful logo can be seen on Yadi's right sleeve, a Marlins-themed logo that already doesn't match their current color scheme just a couple years later.

2019 Topps Update Perennial All-Stars #PAS-40 Roy Halladay

The All-Star patch isn't visible enough on this card to tell which of Roy Halladay's eight All-Star selections this is from. He spent most of his career with Toronto, so it's clearly from one of his first six.

It's a nice set, and I always enjoy the All-Star Game, but it's quite soon after Halladay's tragic death to really enjoy this card.

2019 Topps Update 150 Years of Baseball #150-40 Thurman Munson

Not that a tragic death really ever becomes any less tragic; it just fades from memory as time passes. Like Halladay, Thurman Munson perished in an aircraft accident. It's a tragedy that's affected the Yankees organization multiple times, most recently with Cory Lidle.

I suppose this is also a good place to mention the passing of Don Larsen, the famous Yankee who pitched a perfect game in the 1956 World Series. He was 90. He and Roy Halladay stand as the only two players with a Postseason no-hitter, and Larsen the only one to do so in Perfect fashion. I expect the Yankees to honor him with a black armband that seems to so frequently accompany the pinstripes.

Returning to this insert card, it's in the same vein as the 150th Anniversary parallels, this one known as 150 Years of Baseball. Even though they've given us some enormous insert sets in recent years, Topps decided to cap this one at 100. Of all the 150-card insert sets they've produced, this one seems like it would be the best candidate.

Munson didn't appear in the Perennial All-Stars set, but he easily could have, as he was elected seven times in just eleven seasons.

Topps Update has existed as a de facto Series 3 for quite some time, but it still maintains its own identity to a degree. As each successive baseball season winds down, I may look for this brand more often than I have in past years. There are enough exciting rookies these days to warrant a regular look, and as much as I like Opening Day inserts, no one is ever going to call something from that set a true Rookie Card.

Thanks, as always, for reading, and Happy New Year!

The First Update of the Decade (Part 1: Base Cards)

2020 brings us to a new decade. The Roaring Twenties are back. But first, I have some 2019 Topps Update to review. I purchased a hanger box at Target last year, and while I was confident it hadn't been searched, the way it was packaged deprived me of the pleasure of opening individual packs. The whole stack of cards emerged from the box tightly wrapped in a single layer of clear plastic. In all honestly, that's marginally better from an environmental perspective, because I do find myself a bit horrified at the waste generated by a box of packs.

And if the new decade has anything to teach us, this is the decade where we need to rapidly figure that sort of thing out.

2019 Topps Update #US5 CC Sabathia HL CL

The horizontal cards in this set are a beauty, and they all came grouped together in that single brick, sort of how the factory sets are packaged. And for this checklist card of CC Sabathia's 3,000th career strikeout, we see him on the mound with the expanse of a big league ballpark before him. I spent far too long trying to determine which stadium this photo depicts, squinting at all the banners. I thought I made out an ad for Gila River Casino on the upper deck, placing this in one of the western stadiums like Arizona or Anaheim.

That was before I glanced down and saw the Diamondbacks logo painted on the back slope of the mound, staring me right in the face, plain as day.

Chase Field. There, I solved it.

That day back in April, Carsten Charles Sabathia became just the third lefty in baseball history to reach that illustrious milestone, fanning John Ryan Murphy of the Arizona Diamondbacks and earning a spot on the first checklist card of 2019 Topps Update. I didn't pull Vladimir Guererro, Jr's Rookie Card, but at least I pulled the checklist referencing it.

2019 Topps Update #US47 Pete Alonso AS

Topps Update has long been known for All-Star Game cards, and 2019 is no exception. One day after winning the Home Run Derby in Cleveland, Pete Alonso came to the plate in the actual game, much better protected against an errant pitch. You can even see his "Polar Bear" nickname on the upper segment of his elbow guard.

Alonso had two at-bats in the exhibition game, so it's unclear exactly when this was taken. He struck out his first time up, then hit a two-RBI single in the 8th inning, driving in David Dahl and bringing the National League to within one run. It wouldn't be quite enough, as the American League prevailed yet again, just as they've done in all but four of the last twenty-three. And that's counting that ridiculous tie in 2002.

2019 Topps Update #US128 Gio Urshela

CC Sabathia was on the road when he got his 3,000th strikeout, so here's a look at a Yankee in full pinstripes.

You know I have an eye for commemorative and memorial patches on uniforms, but the Yankees rarely play that game. Instead, they usually just wear a black band on their sleeve, this one in memory of Mel Stottlemyre.

There were a few Yankees in this pack, but I picked third baseman Gio Urshela for the blog. The Yankees hit a ton of home runs last year (well, most years), and I've become quite fond of announcer John Sterling's clever home run calls. "That Gary is scary!" "Like a good Gleyber, Torres is there!" And, perhaps my favorite of all, "Gio Urshela, the most happy fella!"

2019 Topps Update #US181 Scott Oberg

In just his second appearance on Infield Fly Rule, reliever Scott Oberg was the only Rockie in the box. His first card here was an early Bowman prospects card, but he now has plenty of Major League experience under his belt. He signed a three-year extension with the Rockies, pretty much the only significant move the team has made all offseason.

Please don't trade Nolan Arenado.

Update comes out so late in the season that Topps often has time to use a photo from the same year the set is released. CC Sabathia's card would be one example, from late April 2019. But judging ("All Rise! Here comes the Judge!" Ok I'll stop) by this photo, it's from 2018, as we can see the Rockies 25th Anniversary patch on Oberg's hat and a sliver of it on his right sleeve. On that same hand, Oberg is about to fire in a four-seamer through the thin Denver air.

2019 Topps Update #US33 Josh Harrison

More horizontal goodness comes to us with Josh Harrison's card, who's now a member of the Detroit Tigers. This is a Stadium-Club worthy card, showing Harrison sliding headfirst into home plate, framed between the legs of a Tiger teammate. It might even be Jordy Mercer, his former Pirates squadmate, who both signed as free agents with Detroit prior to the 2019 season.

I didn't know that off the top of my head. It's on the card back.

Whoever he is, he's doing his job of temporary home plate coach, guiding his trail runner what to do when he arrives at the plate. You don't see many headfirst slides, so I doubt there's a signal for that. I'm sure speedster Josh Harrison decided to do that all on his own.

2019 Topps Update #US22 Ian Kinsler

I wasn't overly amazed by this particular photo, although I can spot Petco Park somewhat easily now that I've visited it. I selected this card in honor of Ian Kinsler's career, the veteran second baseman who recently announced his retirement. He finished with four All-Star selections, two Gold Gloves, a World Series trophy with the 2018 Red Sox, one inning pitched, and 1,999 hits.

Congratulations to Ian Kinsler on a great career!

2019 Topps Update #US29 Tommy La Stella

Action shots aren't reserved for horizontal cards. Double-play cards lend themselves quite well to either orientation, with Walt Weiss's 1991 Topps card coming to mind. This time, it's an AL West showdown between Tommy La Stella and Marcus Semien of the Oakland A's. Semien played the full 162-game schedule last season, and led the AL with a whopping 747 plate appearances.

The card back says that La Stella made a tweak to his batting stance upon his arrival in Anaheim, and was quickly rewarded with a flurry of home runs, more than he'd hit in his career up to that point. That improvement led to his first All-Star selection.

2019 Topps Update #US245 Mike Yastrzemski (RC)

With longtime fan favorites like CC Sabathia and Ian Kinsler retiring, the literal next generation of baseball players are taking center stage. We saw a Carl Yastrzemski card a few months ago. Now here's Mike, his grandson. Mike was far behind Pete Alonso's record-breaking rookie home run count, but still swatted 21 in just 107 games last year. With Madison Bumgarner moving to the Arizona desert, Yaz could be the bright spot in the Giants lineup in 2020.

He's displaying good form running the bases, and that dirty uniform shows that he plays hard. The cleaner parts of his uniform show a pair of memorial patches, honoring #44 Willie McCovey and Peter McGowan, a former Giants executive. Add to that the MLB 150 logo, and the right sleeve of the Giants uniform was a crowded piece of real estate last season. Which is quite appropriate for San Francisco.

2019 Topps Update #US39 Cavan Biggio (RC)

With the demise of every other card company, Topps Update has become the place to go for rookie cards. Mike Trout's 2011 Update card commands exorbitant prices, and Charlie Blackmon's rookie card can be found in that set as well. 2013 gave us RCs of Nolan Arenado, Christian Yelich, Gerrit Cole, and Anthony Rendon. I believe I have all but Rendon. 2017 had Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger as the main attractions. Vlad Jr. is card #1 in this year's set, and Yaz and Cavan Biggio could also become coveted cards in the coming years.

Cavan, of course, is the son of Hall of Famer Craig Biggio, and along with Vlad, Jr. and Bo Bichette, is part of an exciting young Blue Jays team with plenty of familiar names. If their careers blossom the way their fathers' did, we're sure to see them follow up these Rookie Cards with plenty of All-Star Game cards in Update sets yet to come.