Throwback Thursday

 

Is there anything sweeter than Sweet Lou? How about Sweet Lou, presented by Coca-Cola? One can of Coke has 39 grams of sugar. That's pretty sweet!

This card is from 1981, and of course it has a pretty much identical design to 1981 Topps, save for the Coke logo in the corner. Of course, Coca-Cola and the Tigers have been linked to each other for a long time. The Georgia-based soda giant was one of Tiger great Ty Cobb's first big investments. 

At first glance, nothing too special about these early to mid 70's cards (maybe you notice that the position "Outfield" is missing from Jesus Alou's card), but flip them over and see... 

O-Pee-Chee! I don't really keep any kind of checklist for these, but I picked these up on eBay for a reasonable price. Everything in this post came my way in either November or December.

My brother pointed out this 1963 Fleer to me, and I sent one to him for Christmas. But I kept the saved search in eBay and eventually found this one to add to my own collection. The buy it now prices are out of control right now, but the auctions are the way to go if you can find one. 

Roberto Clemente - good at baseball.

Branch Rickey's Pittsburgh Pirates

One of the fun things about a completed set is deciding how you want to organize it. I have the 1956 Topps set in a binder, sorted by team, in the same order that the teams finished in the 1955 Standings. The Pittsburgh Pirates finished 8th in the National League in 1955 with a record of 60-94. 

The 1956 season ended slightly better with a 7th place finish, but the future was bright with a pair of future Hall of Famers getting their feet wet in the majors that would soon make the team perennial contenders. 

The 1956 Topps Set had fantastic team cards. The team photo on the front, and the back includes some relevant stats and a cool aerial view of the team's home ballpark.

The best player on the 1955 team was First Baseman Dale Long. Long had 16 homers to go along with 19 doubles and a league leading 13 triples.

Long was a career minor leaguer before coming to Pittsburgh in 1951 - as the cartoon above shows, he was a converted catcher. He followed up the 1955 season with an All-Star appearance and career highs in Homers and Runs Batted In. He set a then-record for consecutive games with a home run at 8 straight games.

Bob Friend was the team's best pitcher in 1955. He started 20 games and appeared in 24 more as a reliever. He finished the season with a team high 9 complete games and 2 shutouts. His 2.38 ERA was best in the National League.

Friend's age 24 season was stellar, and he would become the team's most reliable starter in the coming seasons. In 1956, he led the National League in games started and innings pitched, appearing in his first All-Star game. While he went 0-2 with a 13.50 ERA in the 1960 World Series, he helped the team get there.

The Pirates' only Hall of Famer in the 1956 Topps Set was Roberto Clemente. Clemente was the Pirates' choice in the 1954 Rule V draft, despite the Dodgers' efforts to disguise his talent in Montreal. The Pirates had a bit of inside information into the Dodgers' system, as the Pirates' General Manager was none other than Branch Rickey. Clemente was scouted by Clyde Sukeforth in the International League, the same scout that helped sign Jackie Robinson to the Dodgers.

Clemente, of course, could be covered in a series of posts all by himself. 1955 was his first full major league season, and the Pirates were required to have him on the Active roster for the entire season per the terms of the Rule V draft, or they would have to return him to the Dodgers. At 20 years old, Clemente still had 11 triples, and 23 doubles as a rookie. It would be several seasons before he would become the superstar that would lead the Pirates to the 1960 World Series. In 1956, however, he did something that had never been done before or since - a Walk-off Inside-the-park Grand Slam! This fantastic article by Martin Espada chronicles "The Greatest Forgotten Home Run of All Time"

In the binder, I have the first page of each team set with the position players that had the biggest impact in 1955 and 1956 in order - Catcher, First Base, Second, Short, Third, Left Field, Center, Right.

What's up with all the Pirates' hats? If you notice on the head shots, the Pirates have oddly rounded hats - but they are actually helmets. Branch Rickey had stock in a company that developed the head gear, and the Pirates became the team to experiment with the protective gear. Rickey required every player to have one. At first they wore the helmets in the field as well as at the plate, but they proved to be cumbersome to fielders so they only used them at the plate.The Pirates had a young rotation in 1955, only Max Sukront was over the age of 25. The growing pains of the mid 50s led to greater success throughout the 1960s.

Curt Roberts was the first African-American player to play for the Pirates, also signed by Branch Rickey. The Pirates had a poor record during Branch Rickey's tenure. In 1953, he traded away one of their greatest players, Ralph Kiner, who was asking for a raise. Rickey was reported as saying that if the Pirates could finish in last place with Kiner, they could finish in last place without him. While the team lost many games in his tenure- it was his moves that provided the foundation for their future success.

It's Not Bob, It's Roberto

Roberto Clemente left behind a legacy of excellence on the field, as well as the legacy of a man who worked tirelessly to provide aid and comfort to those less fortunate than himself.

He reached the big leagues at the right time - Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier and Minnie Minoso starred for the White Sox when Clemente was scouted by Brooklyn in his home of Puerto Rico. While he too would face discrimination for the color of his skin and for speaking English as a second language, the players that paved the way allowed Clemente to let his play on the field speak for him.

Clemente's MLB Career really took off in the 1960 season, his first of 15 All-Star appearances. He had struggled early in his career due to lingering back issues that stemmed from a car accident all the way back in 1955. He spent 6 months in the 1958 offseason in the U.S. Marine reserves, where daily conditioning and rigorous training alleviated some of the chronic back pain. By the start of the 1960 season, Clemente was fully healthy and ready to take his game to another level.

Clemente helped the Pirates to the 1960 World Series, which they won in 7 games. He hit .310 in the Series, and went on to win the batting title the following year.

Clemente would hit 200+ 4 times in the 1960s, winning the batting title in 3 of those seasons, and the league MVP award in the 4th. Defensively, Clemente was without equal. He won his first Gold Glove in 1961 - he would go on to be a Gold Glove winner for the rest of his career, 12 seasons in total.

By 1970, Topps finally corrected their convention of calling Clemente "Bob" instead of Roberto.

After his untimely death, Clemente continued to be featured on cards - especially in recent years.

Stadium Club in particular has produced some great cards of Clemente.

National Baseball Card Day (Observed)

I had a floating holiday since New Year's Day was on a Sunday - I decided to finally take it today, and of course I took the opportunity to head over to my local card shop. Finding Clemente above was worth the trip alone!

I missed National Baseball Card Day on Saturday, so I decided to celebrate today! The shop had a quarter box with 2017 Archives, Heritage, Stadium Club and Series 2.

I felt like I had purchased a lot of Archives already, but I still managed to find a decent stack of new to me cards.

Not a big Pedroia fan, but that's an instant classic. Series 2 had several fantastic shots as well.

I snuck in one more vintage card in there - this one had about 5 staples in it at some point, which made it very affordable for me!

My first Topps Silk parallel! There was a box of odds and ends with sigs, parallels and relics, ranging from 2 bucks all the way up to 20.

I found this Park pinstripe relic in the same box. Rumor has it that Park and the Twins might be working on a buyout, which would be understandable given his struggles.

I also purchased a pack of Topps Chrome, which netted me this bonus card, so I guess I didn't miss out on NBCD after all! Did anyone pull a Minnesota Twin in their packs? I think Sano was the only guy this year, maybe Joe Mauer was in the checklist too...

Saturday is the Day We Go to Card Shows

Oh boy.

 It has been since the Spring that I made it to the big monthly show in the Twin Cities. I made some vintage finds the main mission for the day, and I think I did pretty well!

I also re-connected with Jim from GCRL (now of Franken Dodger), and we made an in-person trade I'll feature later this week.

I am plugging along on my 1956 Topps set - and I found a nice batch of commons:

1955 World Series hero Johnny Podres might be the sharpest of the bunch. Then I decided to reach for the stars:

 Hall of Famer? Sure, why not? This guy had some worn corner issues and was a little uneven top to bottom. Advantage: Collector. Then I nearly lost my mind when I found this:

 Paper Loss, off center, rounded corners, but oh so gorgeous! I spent more $$ on 2016 Series one packs than it took to bring home this card, I'd call this a serious win.

 Bask.The vintage fun did not stop there, though. one of the vendors had a big box of damaged or otherwise misfit vintage cards and I picked up several.

The Nolan Ryan was an impulse buy - here's a closer look at the back to see how I was able to bring it home:

 A savvy youth investor pushed a pair of pins into each end of this card, and in doing so, passed the savings on to me! I think the card might also be trimmed a bit, it just a hair samller than the others in the stack. fine by me, though!

Of course I couldn't leave without picking up some Twins - these will fit nicely! All in all, a solid day at the card show!

Good to see you again Jim, hope to run into again at another show!

Card Show Finds

I found lots of fun things at last week's card show - including complete sets of 1996 Select Certified, 1996 Leaf Limited, and 1994 Fleer Update (minus the A-Rod rookie). All three had new to me Pucketts inside, and many of the cards will eventually find their way to new homes via trades - it's a win-win! If you know of cards in those three sets that you have been looking for, drop me a line.

the dimeboxes (here they tend to be quarter boxes or sometime 3 for $1 boxes) yielded plenty of PC guys like Jim Thome.

You would be forgiven for thinking I was a Cleveland fan based on some of the stack - it's a coincidence that some of my favorite players all passed through there at one point or another. The mid to late 90s had a lot of talent playing near the shores of Lake Erie, and not so many on the mighty Mississip...

See? Twins fan. Told ya so.

No vintage at this show, but I was able to find several old timers on new cardboard. Stadium Club again comes through with another great Clemente shot.

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Happy Roberto Clemente Day!

 Many have worn the jersey -

 Some better than others -

But there's only one Roberto Clemente.