Another Year, Another Hanukkah

Sometimes I wonder how I used to have time to write forty posts a year. 2022 was by far my lowest post total since the inception of Infield Fly Rule, where I managed to get a mere nine posts done. I’m not even sure I can play the “quality over quantity” card, but I'll let you be the judge of that. It's not for lack of material, I assure you, as there are piles of cards continuing to grow, including a recent blaster of 2022 Stadium Club that had some nice parallels inside. 

I also see that Beckett has changed their site significantly since my last post.

In any case, I still have that Eight Men Out wishlist on my blog header, and it continues to pay dividends each holiday season, thanks to Mom. This year, she picked a couple going back to the very early days of the Colorado Rockies franchise.

1993 Triple Play #127 Mile High Stadium

When the Rockies joined Major League Baseball for the 1993 season, they didn't quite have a permanent home yet, though Coors Field was already under construction. They played their first two seasons at Mile High Stadium, home of the Denver Broncos, just a few exits down I-25. It has since been replaced by what is now known as Empower Field at Mile High, but while it was still standing, it saw millions and millions of fans filter through to see the first MLB team in the Mountain Time Zone.

Officially, 4,483,350 fans attended home Rockies games in the inaugural 1993 season, filling the cavernous Mile High Stadium to the brim. I counted for two of those. In fact, the team's per-game attendance was averaging even higher in 1994, but the strike had other ideas, cutting short our fan base's chance at beating its own record. The 1993 count still remains the single-season record across the big leagues.

Triple Play included a nighttime panorama shot of Mile High in the 1993 set, mentioning the stadium's past role as home to various Denver-area Minor League teams on the card back. The stadium was built in 1948, and the Denver Bears and later the Denver Zephyrs called it home.

I don't know the actual release date of 1993 Triple Play, but unless it was toward the end of the 1993 season, I would guess this photo is actually from a 1992 or earlier Zephyrs game. The individual player Rockies cards in this set used the old team logo, which tells me they produced it in the narrow window between the expansion draft and the start of the 1993 season.

Still, the place is pretty packed for a Minor League game. I did go to a couple Zephyrs games as a young child, and I don't remember it being so full. It might be that this is a fireworks game, as you can see the right field seats (also known as the "South Stands" in Broncos parlance) are empty, which was done for safety on the few fireworks nights the Rockies put on for their fans. I'm just guessing, though. There isn't enough detail in this print job to really tell.

In case you were curious, the Florida Marlins got a similar card in the 1993 Triple Play checklist, a very orange card of what was then called Joe Robbie Stadium. Though it has since been renamed many times over, the structure currently known as Hard Rock Stadium remains standing, and still plays host to Miami Dolphins home games.

Longtime Colorado residents still lament the loss of old Mile High, and the orange and blue seats that used to fill the stadium are now scattered across various basements and man caves throughout the Denver area. It's a bygone relic.

1998 Pacific Platinum Blue #425 John Flaherty /67

So, too, is the idea of pitchers running the bases. With the arrival of the Designated Hitter in both leagues, the opportunity for a pitcher to be involved in a play at the plate is now as rare as hen's teeth. That makes this 1998 Pacific card of Padres catcher John Flaherty all the more special, as Rockies starting pitcher Roger Bailey got a cameo while sliding into home. 

Even in 1998 when the DH was strictly an American League thing, that was a pretty rare play. Rare enough that it should be reasonably easy to pinpoint this card to an exact date.

In the 1997 season, Roger Bailey started two games in San Diego. That would have been at Qualcomm Stadium, as long as we're bringing up defunct ballparks. The first of those was on June 19th, 1997. After building a 5-3 lead, Bailey led off the 5th inning with a full-count walk. He advanced to second on an Eric Young sacrifice bunt, then tried to score on an Ellis Burks single. That's this play.

Out at the plate! Bailey was cut down by Greg Vaughn via an outfield assist, a four-time All-Star who concluded his career with a very short 22-game stint with the Colorado Rockies in 2003.

At first the result of this play struck me as an odd photo selection, then I remembered this is actually John Flaherty's card, not Bailey's. It's too bad he didn't stop at third, because the next batter was Hall of Famer Larry Walker, who easily drove in Burks with a double to right. In another universe, Pacific would have had to pick another photo for this card.

Roger Bailey's story is actually quite a sad one. He was a top prospect for the early Rockies, and appeared in many 1992 and 1993 Minor League sets as an amateur draftee. Most other card companies ignored him for a few years, but Topps put him in multiple sets as a Rockie during 1993. 

He debuted in 1995, appearing in the second-ever game at Coors Field. Over time, he worked his way into the rotation, and actually put up a respectable ERA in pre-humidor Coors. His 1997 season was his best yet, finishing with a 9-10 record, including two complete game shutouts. He was on track to be a key member of the Rockies rotation. 

Sadly, during spring training in 1998, Bailey was a riding in a car with fellow Rockies pitcher Mike Munoz when it was rear-ended. Just like that, his back was injured and he never recovered well enough to pitch again.

Pacific, ever the unappreciated innovator, was known for lots of colored foil parallels in their time. I have little idea which one is which, but there were lots of golds and silvers and blues and reds out there. In the 1998 base set, gold foil was the base variety, and then some of the parallels were silver. That seems backwards to me. But anyway, the foil on this one is a pale blue color, sort of the color of aquamarine.

I only had the base card on my list, which would have been fine. I knew upon first looking at this that the blue foil made this some kind of parallel, which is also fine, as my primary desire for this card was for the Roger Bailey cameo. But, not being an expert in 1998 Pacific, I had no idea until sitting down to write that this is actually the Platinum Blue variety, which had a stated print run of just 67 copies. 67! Way back in 1998!

There's no serial number on the card, so I had to find out about this by checking Beckett.

Yes, indeed it does make me wonder whether I have any other hidden gems in my few Pacific pages that are far more rare than I thought.

1998 was a weird year for cards.

It was also 25 years ago, which is deeply unsettling.

Happy New Year! 

Thrifted

I'm not sure how far you are from your nearest Local Card Shop, but odds are you aren't too far from a thrift store. There can be some real gems out there if you don't mind sorting through a whole bunch of overproduction-era cardboard. Sometimes it's 1992 Donruss, sometimes it's a random mix with the yellow beacon of 1991 Fleer peeking out, and sometimes it's a grab bag that's just a bit older than usual.

1984 Topps #676 Brian Giles

The way cards are often packaged at Arc Thrift Stores found throughout Colorado make it fairly easy to see what you're getting. They usually come in clear plastic bags, not great for maintaining good condition and sharp corners, but ideal if you want to ensure you're not simply adding to your duplicates pile. My collection of 1984 Topps is on the small side, and two large bags of cards my girlfriend found added to that count significantly, along with many other sets.

I'm pretty confident in my knowledge of baseball history, but if I look through a set produced on or before my birth year, I'm surrounded by common cards of players I've never heard of. I always knew there was a Brian Giles who played for the Pirates, Padres, and Indians. He had a cameo on a Mike Lansing card. He was even teammates with his brother Marcus in 2007.

So imagine my surprise when I saw the same name pop up in 1984 Topps. The senior Brian Giles manged to keep his big league career going until 1990, despite a several-year gap in his late twenties. Unfortunately for him, he was no longer a Met by the time they won the World Series in 1986. He actually didn't appear in the Majors at all in 1984, but I still like this photo of him with the classic cap-under-the-helmet look.

Sometimes I wonder if MLB has a safety-minded rule in place about that now, since I haven't seen anybody sport this look in years.

1984 Topps #138 Al Holland / Dan Quisenberry LL

You're least likely to find cards of relief pitchers in your typical baseball card set, but there's an exception for the all-important closer role. "Closer" is still an unofficial position, despite how frequently the term is used. I always thought the term "Fireman" was more of a casual phrase to refer to a closer, but here it is on a League Leader card from 1984. There's a whole points system on the back that counts more than just Saves; relief wins and relief losses are also part of the calculation. There was even an unofficial Sporting News award from 1960-2000, the Fireman of the Year award. It was briefly called the Reliever of the Year award before being discontinued in 2010.

MLB finally started recognizing this position with an official award in 2005, which has evolved into the current awards named after Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman.

Al Holland and his muttonchops took the NL Fireman award in 1983, and Dan Quisenberry took home the award in five out of six years in the early '80s, winning his final award in 1985, the same year the Royals won the World Series. Lots of other firemen can be found on the back, such as Rich "Goose" Gossage, Lee Smith, and Bruce Sutter.

1984 Topps #415 Tommy John

Tommy John earned a grand total of three saves in his 26-year career. He was a starter through and through, falling just 12 wins short of the magical 300-win mark. He was 41 years old in 1984 with several seasons yet to play. His tiny stats on the card back go all the way back to 1963, but it's the blank line that speaks to his biggest impact. Those many lines of statistics show a gap in 1975, simply noted with "On Disabled List".

1975, of course, was the year in which he recovered from the elbow surgery that now bears his name. It's a procedure that extended not only his career, but also the careers of hundreds of other Major Leaguers. It has even crossed over to position players, as Aaron Hicks of the Yankees is set to go under the knife any day now.

You just don't get that context with only five years of stats on the card back, as we saw with 1988 Donruss the last time Tommy John appeared on the blog. I'm glad Topps ended that little experiment for 2019.

1981 Topps #370 Dave Winfield

Drifting back a few more years into the Topps archives, we come to 1981, the year of the little ballcap in the lower left. It was also the final year of the old Topps logo, the one with the large arc under the T, which is visible only on the back. This card has a great bat rack shot in the background, but I'm not sure who's in the on-deck circle.

It goes without saying that I enjoy getting cards of Hall of Famers, especially from earlier in their careers. Even by 1981, Winfield was in the middle of a lengthy streak of consecutive All-Star selections, although he signed with the Yankees to begin the 1981 season. This print run was a bit behind, so collectors had to wait for the Traded set to see Winfield exchange his mustard-and-brown uniform for pinstripes.

Topps did a pretty good job replicating the team colors on the ballcap design element, even getting the yellow stripe on the front roughly accurate. The yellow area on the real cap was just a bit larger than pictured.

1984 Donruss #284 Tim Lollar

Of all the baseball uniforms, the early Padres jerseys are the ones that scream 1970s the most. Even the Pirates didn't fully adopt the strange color palette of that decade. You can expect the Padres to return to using brown in 2020. The 2016 Home Run Derby was just a taste.

Donruss gave us a good look at the Padres colors on this 1984 card, which shows how the hat design differs a little from the Topps ballcap. It's a thin card, but actually has some of the sharpest corners of the entire haul.

Obviously I know who Dave Winfield is, but as with the first Brian Giles, Tim Lollar is a name I am unfamiliar with. Sometimes I wonder about these older sets and who was kind of a nobody versus who was something of a minor star of the day. If I were following baseball then, would I know Tim Lollar's name as well as I remember, say, Morgan Ensberg?

1980 Topps #518 Nelson Norman (RC)

Nelson Norman is another unfamiliar player, but I couldn't resist showing this action shot from 1980 Topps. It looks like the Rangers shortstop is turning a double play, but the baserunner is diving headfirst into the base, making it look more like a steal. Interestingly, the Topps logo appears nowhere on this card, front or back. There's just the copyright notice below the cartoon.

1979 was Norman's best year, and he's another player who had a massive gap between seasons, wrapping up his career in 1987 without a home run to his name.

1980 Topps #285 Don Baylor

Fresh off his MVP award in 1979, Don Baylor joins his Kellogg's card from the same year in my collection. The photo Topps used overexposed his helmet a bit, but maybe they were trying to give him a halo of sorts to match the Angels. The card back mentions his three-homer game as an Oriole on July 2nd, 1975.

Little did he know that he'd one day be managing the Colorado Rockies. Little did he know that there would even be a baseball team called the Colorado Rockies. If he was following hockey, he'd know that there was briefly an NHL team called the Colorado Rockies during most of his tenure with the Angels, but I'm guessing that wasn't on his radar while he was leading the league in hit-by-pitches a whopping eight times.

1980 Topps #289 Bruce Bochy

Bruce Bochy, the most famous French-born baseball player, began his playing career with the Houston Astros. One of many catchers to eventually become a manager, he's been at the helm of either the Padres or the Giants for most of my baseball-watching life. He "retired" from his managerial position with the Giants this year, but is already talking about coming back in 2021 or later after taking some time off.

1979 Topps #82 New York Mets CL / Joe Torre MG

Our manager theme continues with Joe Torre as the skipper of the 1979 New York Mets. Clearly, there was a good mix of early-'80s and late-'70s cards in this thrifting adventure, but I have to admit that realizing Joe Torre's managerial career began in the '70s came as a surprise. He spent a bunch of years as a catcher, starting with the Milwaukee Braves in 1960. He acted as a player/manager in 1977 for the Mets, led the Yankees to four titles during their years of dominance, and managed the Dodgers as recently as 2010. He's still active in the MLB, currently serving as the Chief Baseball Officer.

If ever there were a job title I'd want on my business card, that would be it.

1979 Topps #136 Jim Kaat

I recently showed a Jim Kaat card from much earlier in his career, and by the time 1979 rolled around, he had plenty of service time to squeeze onto the card's green back, flanked by a trivia question about what happened on June 5th, 1911. On that day, "Smoky" Joe Wood of the Red Sox struck out three pinch hitters in the 9th inning, preserving a one-run lead and earning the win.

At the age of 40, Kaat still had two team changes left in his career, joining the Yankees later in 1979, then retiring with the Cardinals in 1983.

I haven't run across much 1979 Topps in my travels, but this design really appeals to me. I already mentioned the green back, they used the chevron/pennant banner as they did several other times in the '70s and early '80s, and that happy-looking Topps logo appears right on the front inside a little baseball. I'm sure the 1970s experts will disagree, but I think this is a great design.

1976 Topps #545 Sparky Lyle

1976 marked the deepest layer I was able to dig to in this batch of cards. The condition of this Sparky Lyle card left a bit to be desired, but it's certainly an upgrade over not having one at all. The 1976 design clearly influenced the 1979 set, carrying over the green back and two-banner design on the bottom. 1976 had just a bit more color, no Topps logo, and a little player graphic that varies with the player's position.

Lyle served his entire career out of the bullpen. He never started a game, not once. When this was printed, he was the all-time leader in saves, with 136. His career total of 238 is still enough to keep him in the Top-40 list. And speaking of The Sporting News Fireman award, he won it in 1972, according to the card back. He'd even win the Cy Young award a year after this card, just the second reliever to do so, and first in the American League.

1984 Fleer #566 Mickey Hatcher

That was about it for Topps, but you can't get a complete look at the early 1980s in card collecting without seeing more of the competing brands.

Come to think of it, you can't get a complete look at all when you run across cards miscut this badly. It makes the already poorly-cropped photo look even worse, and several things are cut off on the card back, including one numeral in the card number, the years of each stat line, and even part of the team name, though "dgers" is more than enough to go on. It was only because the years on the adjoining card's stat lines made it on to the card back that I knew what year this was from. I'm not that good with the early Fleer sets.

Mickey Hatcher bookended his time on the Minnesota Twins with the L.A. Dodgers, starting there in 1979 and retiring in 1990. His Dodgers card in 1991 Topps entered my collection early, and what an amazing set in which to have your sunset card!

1988 Donruss #546 Mike Devereaux (RC)

1991 was a bit too new to make it into these grab bags. 1988 Donruss was the newest set I found. I've yet to merge this stack with the rest in my collection, but I hope I'll finally be able to put a dent in that set that seems to resist completion more than any other.

In choosing a card for the blog, I had a large stack to pick from, but I selected Mike Devereaux, who had just begun his career with the Dodgers. Mickey Hatcher surely showed him the ropes for a couple years, and Devereaux followed in his old teammate's footsteps, as his career was also bookended by two stints on the Dodgers. His nine games in early '98 were his last.

I mentioned him a month or so ago in the context of Cal Ripken Jr.'s record-breaking game in September 1995, and I could have sworn up and down that Mike Devereaux was still an Oriole then.

He was not.

Mike Devereaux returned to the Orioles in 1996, but in late 1995, when I started 6th grade, he was an Atlanta Brave. That would mean my memory of my 6th grade teacher correcting a student's pronunciation of Devereaux's surname was off a bit. It couldn't have happened when multiple students brought a newspaper article of Ripken's feat, so it must have been a month or so later when he won his first and only World Series with the Braves. The Braves beat the Rockies in the NLDS that year, likely the correct explanation, meaning that nearly quarter-century-old memory has been shifted in my timeline ever since.

The baseball record does not lie, but memory is fallible. I was so sure about that memory that I'd have testified to it in court had the situation called for it, but the reality is that I would have been off by at least a month.

1987 Cubs David Berg #23 Ryne Sandberg

I even found a few oddballs in here. The Cubs cards had been pretty well picked over, but this slightly oversized Ryne Sandberg card survived long enough to make it to me. It's 4 1/4" x 2 7/8", certainly an odd size. The card back contains Ryno's Major and Minor League stats, a count of his Game-Winning RBI, a stat that is no longer tracked, and most importantly, a delicious-looking Chicago dog on a poppy seed bun, courtesy of David Berg Pure Beef Hot Dogs.

Beckett says this promo set was given out on July 29th, 1987. It's a 26-card set, one for each member of the roster, plus one more card for the coaching staff. Obviously that was a day game, as Wrigley Field was still a year away from being retrofitted with lights. Sadly, if that Beckett date is accurate, the Cubbies suffered an 11-3 blowout at the hands of the Montreal Expos.

1987 Topps #637 Bip Roberts (RC)

Frankly, it's impossible not to find 1987 Topps in an assortment of cards like this. There were hundreds, probably accounting for almost half of the entire haul. Bip Roberts's Topps Rookie Card, complete with a gum stain on the back, is a particularly good selection. We can see the evolution of the Padres uniform colors, as they finally abandoned the yellow by this time. He did have a Topps card in 1986 Topps Traded, but according to Beckett, this one gets the "RC" label.

This card reminds me of one of my favorite commercials, one where Roberts is in the dugout showing off his nondescript rookie card while Tony Gwynn sits nearby with a price guide. Bip mistakenly thinks his card is worth hundreds, when it turns out he's actually seeing a price for a Robin Roberts card. Tony corrects him, causing Bip to look at the camera in disbelief.

The actual card Bip is holding in the ad doesn't appear to be anything real, unless it's maybe some oddball or Minor League issue. But Tony got it right; this card is probably only worth about four cents. The gum stain on this one absolutely destroys the possibility of this being worth a dime.

The commercial as a whole is a great illustration of baseball card mania. Even during Bip's playing days, vintage cards commanded a pretty penny, but modern cards of regular guys weren't worth much of anything at all. Still, we all thought we'd be taking our 1987 Topps to the bank rather than the thrift store.

I referred to this '87 Topps as "collateral damage" a few weeks ago. There's a lot of it, but it's totally worth it if it means I get to add to my vintage collection for an extremely reasonable price. And what collector isn't up to their necks in 1987 Topps? Just about everyone except the ones who just dropped cards off at the thrift store.