Hostess Of The Week – 1979 Terry Whitfield: Jerseys, Japan, Johnson City

Terry Whitfield was an outfielder and pinch hitter who played for the Yankees, Giants and Dodgers, with a stint in the Japanese Pacific League sandwiched in the middle.

I’ll be honest, I’d mentioned Johnson City in the header mainly to keep the alliteration going… In 1971 Whitfield was a first-round draft pick (19th overall) of the Yankees, and started his professional career in Johnson City, where he was teammates with Louisiana Lightning himself, Ron Guidry.

Whitfield moved up through the Yankees farm system, but never established himself with the parent club after a couple of “cups of coffee” with the Yanks. He shares his 1975 rookie card with Fred Lynn, Ed Armbrister and Tom Poquette.

During spring training of 1977, Whitfield was traded to the Giants for Marty Perez (known on this blog as the Latin Davy Jones)…

…and much to the dismay of the airbrush artist who did this card for the 1977 O-Pee-Chee set, Perez played in one game for the Yankees before being shipped off to Oakland as part of a package for pitcher Mike Torrez.

Terry Whitfield established himself as a regular outfielder with the Giants with good offensive stats, although maybe not what may have been expected of him.

Whitfield is notable in that he may have been the first American player to spend his peak years playing in Japan; his contract was sold by the Giants to the Seibu Lions for the 1981 season, when Whitfield was 28 years old.

He’d play three years in Japan, helping the Lions win Japan Series titles in 1982 and 1983 while hitting 88 homers over the 3 years.

After Japan, Whitfield was signed to a three-year contract by the Dodgers, who must’ve figured that they signed a guy who’d sorted out his hitting issues while overseas, but it didn’t work out that way. Whitfield ended up as more of a pinch hitter than a regular and would hit just 7 homers in three years with the Dodgers.

OK, I’ve covered Japan and Johnson City… what about the Jersey?

The jersey Whitfield is wearing is fine in and of itself, but I view it as a mistake along the lines of the New York Rangers’ uniform change of the 1970′s…

You’ve already got a classic uniform, why would you change it?

…And the answer to that is, of course, it was the 1970′s.

Whaddaya Know… There Really Were 1987 Minis… Kinda… Sorta…

Last year, when Topps had the 1987 Mini inserts, a common theme among bloggers was that it ain’t any such… That the only minis in 1987 was the Topps Leaders set, and they only shared the general woodgrain theme and not the same design.

I was on board with that line of reasoning until I ran across these in the “accumulation” part of my collection:

I’ve had an empty 1987 Topps wax box since… well, probably since 1987. I don’t remember for sure, but I probably was in a store that had a couple of wax packs left in the box and I asked the friendly neighborhood storekeeper if I could take the box if I bought the remaining packs.

This box was one of my “attic finds”… is it a “find” if it’s in your own attic?… At one point I was going to write a post about this box along the lines of “Should I keep it as an intact box, should I cut out the one side of the box and leave it as a panel, should I cut it into individual cards?” But there was a major need for cleaning in my man cave, so the “box” is gone and now it’s just a panel.

After I scanned this panel, it occurred to me that these cards are smaller than standard. I took a 2012 Mini and compared them, and glory be, they’re the same size. The backs are different, but I’m not going to quibble with Topps about that…

So now we’re just left with the bogus 1972 minis… and to quote the preacher in Blazing Saddles, “Son, you’re on your own.”

I’ll Bet The Kids In 1968 Loved This Card…

I never experienced this card as a kid, but I’m pretty sure I would’ve thought it was cool… The fake action pose is pretty good, but what really sells the card is Mike Hegan staring right into the camera. Dude, he’s looking right at us!!!

Regardless of this awesome card, Mike Hegan would have a place in my collection solely because he played for the Seattle Pilots.  He must’ve been one of the earliest members of the Pilots, because baseball-reference.com lists him as having been sold to the Pilots in June, 1968… Close to a year before the Pilots would take the field.  He spent all of 1968 in AAA, so maybe that was part of the arrangement.

Here’s a 1969 Topps Scratch-Off I’ve previously featured…

Contrast And Compare: 1980 Topps & 1980 Burger King Ron Guidry

It’s been a long, tiring week for me, so I’m going to let the cards do most of the talking.

For sets like 1980 Burger King, I collect only those cards that have a photo different from the Topps card… but it’s not always easy to find out which cards are different.

As a public service, I’m going to show cards like this as I get them.

So here’s Ron Guidry’s 1980 Topps card…

…and here’s his Burger King card.

Have a good weekend, everybody!

Mystery Box Of 1970 Topps: Ladies And Gentleman, We Are Experiencing Some Turbulence…

I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.

Oh, by the way, this post is about the box of 1970 Topps I bought from the Semi-Local Card Shop… I’m taking cards out 10-15 at a time and treating them like packs.

Anyway, the last “pack” I shared two weeks ago put a nice dent in my needs, as I needed 8 out of the 12 cards, all Red Sox and Yankees (the box is sorted by team).  I foolishly shared my excitement online and apparently jinxed myself.

As I thumbed through the next pack, it was “Got him, got him, need him, got him, got him, got him… Oh, crap”.

The “Oh crap” came because after the remaining Yankees I hit Seattle Pilots.  The reason that’s “Oh, crap” is because I’m a Pilots collector and I already have the 1970 team set.  On the plus side, I’ve got a new Mike Herschberger card, and I know the one in my 1970 binder looks like it’d been subjected to bicycle spokes.

The end result was that out of those 12 cards, I only needed this one:

At least it’s a decent card, Bobby Murcer was one of the Yankees better players in the early 1970’s… not the “Next Mickey Mantle” that fans had been hoping for, but he was a good player.

Anyway, after 20 minutes or so I realized that I probably still had more Pilots to sort through, so I pulled out another 11 cards, got through another 7 Pilots (12 Pilots in total) and into the A’s.  Despite the added number of cards, I still ended up with only one more need… That’s 2 cards out of 23.  Yikes.

But at least the second need was a former Met… 

Tommie Reynolds appeared in 101 games for the 1967 Mets.  It’s funny, because I was just talking Rule 5 draft with a guy from work the other day, and I was saying that it doesn’t do what it was originally supposed to do, which was to “rescue” Major League-ready guys trapped in the minors.  In 1966, the Mets took Reynolds from the A’s in the Rule V draft, and two years later the A’s took him back in the Rule V draft.  In 1969 the A’s outfield consisted of Reynolds, Rick Monday and Reggie Jackson.

Here’s the best cartoon of the 23 cards, from a Chuck Dobson card I didn’t need:

Mystery Box Of 1970 Topps: Sawks And Yanks

Back in January I bought a box of 100+ 1970 Topps cards, and I’m going through them in “pack-sized” lots of 10-15 cards.

This latest “pack” had a mix of Red Sox and Yankees in it, and much to my delight I needed most of them.

Yo, check out dese bad boys:

Stick!

I associate Gene Michael so thoroughly with the Yankees that I forget that he came up with the Pirates and also played with the Dodgers and Tigers. Gene Michael played 7 years in pinstripes and was also the Yankees GM and manager. Although this is his fourth card, it’s the first one to show him in the uniform of the team he’s listed with… the prior three showed him in a Pirates uniform, but listed him with the Dodgers and Yanks.

Pity poor Joe Verbanic…

…he appeared on a Topps card from 1967 to 1970, and yet Topps used only two hatless photos between the four cards. This photo is the same one used on the 1967 Rookie Stars card he shared with Bill Robinson. His 1968 and 1969 cards shared what is apparently the only other known photo of Joe Verbanic in existence.

When I started collecting, Lindy McDaniel was with the Royals, wrapping his career…

…but he was one of the best relievers of the 1960′s, and he had a long career spanning 21 seasons and 5 teams. He would’ve lead the NL in saves three times had it been an official statistic before 1969.

Mike Andrews was an All-Star in 1969 and 1970 was his fourth season as the Red Sox’ starting second baseman.

I really like this card for reasons I cannot explain.

Mike Kekich was traded from the Dodgers to the Yankees late in 1968, and since he’s hatless and pinstripeless here, I’m guessing the photo is from before 1969.

The most interesting thing I found about Steve Hamilton is covered in the cartoon, which I’ll get to in a minute…

Tom Satriano has never been “Surfing With The Alien”, because that was Joe Satriani, not Tom Satriano.

Best Card  Rico Petrocelli All-Star:

Best Cartoon – Steve Hamilton:

Baseball-reference.com says that Hamilton played alongside Elgin Baylor… I know jack about basketball, but even I know of Elgin Baylor.

Eight cards added to my set! Freakin’ A! Now I have 446 with 274 to go (61.9%).

Hostess Card Of The Week: 1975 Elliott Maddox

On this date in 1977, Elliott Maddox and Rick Bladt were traded to the Orioles for Paul Blair; all of the players involved were center fielders.

I didn’t remember Elliott Maddox playing with the O’s, and I found out that it’s because his stint lasted just half a season.

More to the point, he never appeared on a card as an Oriole… Therefore, it never happened.

After the 1977 season, Maddox became a free agent and signed with the Mets, and it was as a Met that he appeared on his 1978 card.

Aside from the Yankees, Orioles and Mets, Maddox also played for the Tigers and Senators/Rangers. His best season was probably 1974 when he batted .303, hit 26 doubles, scored 75 runs, drove in 46 runs and lead all Major League center fielders with 18 assists.

As for Rick Bladt, I believe that this is the extent of his cardboard immortality:

(Wow, I didn’t remember this card was in such poor condition until I scanned it…)

If Bladt had come along 15-20 years later, he’d have at least a dozen rookie cards.

Rick Bladt played in 10 games with the 1969 Cubs, and 52 games with the 1975 Yankees… Those 52 games came as a result of an injury to starting center fielder Elliott Maddox. He played 9 seasons in AAA, including 7 for the Yankees AAA team in Syracuse. You’d have to think he became a fan-favorite in Syracuse.

Pointless Exercise: If Nicknames Were Always Done The Way They Are Today

T-Mun

1971 Topps #5 – Thurman Munson – Courtesy of COMC.com

HonWag

1976 Topps #344 – Honus Wagner ATG – Courtesy of COMC.com

Diz-D

1983 Donruss HOF Heroes #29 – Dizzy Dean – Courtesy of COMC.com

B-Maz

1958 Topps #238 – Bill Mazeroski – Courtesy of COMC.com

LooBoo

1949 Leaf #106 – Lou Boudreau MG RC (Rookie Card) – Courtesy of COMC.com

P-Riz

1951 Bowman #26 – Phil Rizzuto [Good to VG‑EX] – Courtesy of COMC.com

MelOtt

1941 Play Ball #8 – Mel Ott [Good to VG‑EX] – Courtesy of COMC.com

Oh, My (Black Friday) O-Pee-Chee!

One of my favorite sorta-set-specific blogs is the fairly-recently-concluded “O, My O-Pee-Chee”, which featured every O-Pee-Chee baseball card which differed from the Topps set.  I enjoyed checking out each day’s cards, and I still want to go see what today’s card is, but then I remember that the blog has run through them all.  Doesn’t matter, the blog is still fun to go through and an excellent resource.

I knew going in that 1977 OPC had significant differences, but I wasn’t aware of many of the other different cards. Every time an interesting card was featured, I added it to my wantlist.

While shopping on COMC on Black Friday, I decided that I’d see how many OPC’s I could knock off my wantlist.

I’ll start with the 1977′s… Bob Bailor’s OPC card features the same photo as his Topps card, only he gets the card to himself rather than sharing a rookie card with 3 other guys. It’s a pretty decent airbrushing job, if you overlook the blank jersey front. Bailor was the Blue Jays’ first pick in the expansion draft.

Dock Ellis appears with the Yankees in both the Topps and OPC sets, and yet OPC gave him a different photo. It doesn’t fall under the “1977 OPC as an update set” idea, but who cares. It’s got a different photo, I want it.

I got three cards from the 1971 OPC set, even though two of them don’t really fit into my collection. The uniqueness was just too much for me to handle (and they were cheap).

Claude Raymond had two different cards in 1971 O-Pee-Chee; one that matched his Topps card, and this one.

John Bateman fans also got a double-dip in 1971; this is the “bonus” card for die hard Exponistas.

Ron Hunt was the first Met to start an All-Star game, and he’s a player I collect in or out of at Mets uniform.  This is a different photo and different card # from the Topps version; unlike Claude Raymond & John Bateman, Ron Hunt had just the one card (I think).

1992 wasn’t quite as significant as 1977 in terms of variations, but there were more significantly-different cards than most years. OPC ditched the All-Star cards and replaced them with a very nice Gary Carter tribute (which I featured here) and a number of players who didn’t make it into the Topps set. This is one of those cards. I wasn’t yet an Orioles fan in 1992, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting this…

I’m pretty happy with this specific subset of my Black Friday haul…  As you can imagine, there’s more where this came from (hint:  I got a shipment of 177 cards… no, I won’t subject you to each and every one of them.)

OK, Which One Of You Guys Is “Fiscal Cliff”?

On the TV, on the radio, all I hear is “Fiscal Cliff”, “Fiscal Cliff”.

I wish someone would just tell me who Fiscal Cliff is.

I don’t think it’s Cliff Johnson, but you never know.

Cliff Lee makes a boatload of money, maybe he’s Fiscal Cliff.

Cliff Floyd? Could be… (I feel like I’m doing the opening credits to “Hong Kong Phooey”)

Cliff Pennington was recently part of a three-team trade involving a Marlins salary dump… Is that enough to make him Fiscal Cliff?

Cliff Mapes passed away 16 years ago, so I don’t think he’s Fiscal Cliff… but he was the last person to wear #3 for the Yankees (and you thought that was Babe Ruth, you silly person, you).

1951 Bowman #289 – Cliff Mapes – Courtesy of COMC.com