Yeah, marvel at his reaction for a moment.

Despite this being a ridiculous looking photo, he was a budding star coming off his breakout season where he batted .328/.369/.479, and seemed to have a ton of potential greatness in his future.

That greatness would have to wait though, ’cause about half way through ’82, his season ended with an early July injury.

Up to that point though, he was struggling a bit anyway. Maybe he was playing through an injury for a while… which wouldn’t be surprising, considering the attitude he had. He was hardcore player, playing baseball with a football mentality.

He flashed his potential before the injury killed his year. One example is May 14th against the Twins. That day he went 5-for-6, including a walk off 2-run homer!

As if that wasn’t enough, on July 1st he lined a walk off double against the Red Sox. He was 3-for-5 that day, driving in 3 of the Tigers 5 runs.

On April 19th, he slammed a 2-run shot off Dan Quisenberry in the bottom of the 8th, giving the Tigers a 3-2 lead that they didn’t relinquish. To be fair, ’82 was a tough year for Quiz, he only managed a mere 159 ERA+. Yeah, Quiz was that good, and Gibson still rawwked him.

June 2nd, Kirk smacked another 8th inning 2-run blast to put his team up by 1 run.

It was games like these, that helped build the suspense when the 9th inning of game 1 for the 1988 World Series rolled around. Kirk was an exciting, never-give-up kind of player from day 1, and that potential greatness eventually spilled out all over baseball history. It was just bound to.

So it’s quite fitting, that the back of this baseball card, notes his first career walk-off home run…. which, came against the team that lost to the Dodgers in the 1981 Series.

Wow, now that’s a card. Two of the greatest base stealers of all-time, on the same baseball card. I absolutely loved this card when I was a kid, for that very reason. you can keep your home runs, steals and triples are far more exciting.

Neither Tim Raines nor Rickey Henderson had any real trouble leading their league in steals in ’81 In fact, Tim, had 50 steals by mid-June when the strike halted all the games. Oh yeah, 50 steals but he’d only been caught 6 times. 6 TIMES!

That amazing 89.2% success rate was really the only thing that separated the two during the first half of the season. Beyond that, they had the same amount of XHB (18) and the same OBP (.419).

Tim was in the midst of breaking rookie record for steals in a season, and had a shot at breaking the all-time single season record for steals in a season. The strike held him back from getting a chance to break that 2nd record.

Nobody in the NL ever challenged Raines that year for the lead in steals. When he reached 50, his nearest competition was at half that — 26. If he didn’t play another game all year, he would’ve led the league anyway, ’cause nobody else managed to steal more than 39 by the end.

I think people forget just how great Tim Raines was.

Over in the American League, things weren’t much different. Rickey Henderson was having a tougher year than he did in 1980, but still never really had trouble winning the AL Stolen Bases title in ’81.

The closest he came to letting it slip away, was at the end of August when Seattle’s Julio Cruz was just 3 steals behind Rickey. It was just too hard to catch Rickey though.

In hindsight, this card was a declaration of a new era. From 1981 – 1984, Rickey & Tim would be the stolen base leaders every year in their leagues. Gone were the days of Ron LeFlore, Willie Wilson, or Omar Moreno, leading the league.

Obviously, this is one of the coolest cards in the set when you’re an eight year old and I dubbed it “the card of five stars”. You’ve got 5 of the best players AND they’re the home run leaders!

It all starts with Mike Schmidt, who led the National League in homers for the fifth time in his career. His 31 HR’s might sound like an unimpressive number, but he did it in only 102 games played as the Phillies played just 106 that year.

Just doin’ a rough estimate, 31 HR’s in about 2/3 the usual amount of games, means Mike was on pace for about 45 homers. Even if he slumped a little, he probably would’ve reached 40 for the second straight year.

At the mid-season break though, he was stuck in a three way tie that included George Foster and Dave Kingman. Another dangerous slugger and fellow future Hall of Famer Andre Dawson, was just 1 homer shy of them.

Mike wedged out a little breathing room after the All-Star game, smacking 9 HR’s in late August. He had a 4 HR lead over Andre & Dave when September began.

As this card tells us, Dawson and Kingman faded in the end while Schmidt left them all in the dust the rest of the season.

The A.L. race for the home run lead was a much more rabid affair. Actually, it was kind of like the A.L. batting race, with a pair of sluggers coming from behind.

Stormin’ Gorman Thomas led the major leagues with 15 HR’s at the break. Only two behind him in the A.L., were Tony Armas, Dwight Evans, and Gary Gray.

Gary Gray? Yeah, that’s right. A uniquely named nobody was finally getting some playing time in Seattle and making a run at being noticed.

Well, Gary Gray returned to being Gary Gray after the break, and didn’t hit another homer all year.

Meanwhile, after the break, three stars named Bobby Grich, Eddie Murray, and Greg Luzinski were heating up. By September 35, Gorman and Tony were leading the A.L. with 21 HR’s a piece.

It was really anybody’s to have, but Gorman just kept staying one step ahead of the pack. At the time, many figured he was going to end up with the most HR’s in the league. After all, he did it just two years earlier with 45.

But just like in the A.L. batting race, which was Richie Zisk’s to lose, this was Gorman Thomas’s to lose — and he did. He didn’t hit another homer for the rest of the season. He wouldn’t hit another home run til game 5 of the playoffs (the division series against the Yankees).

Greg Luzinski would only smack a pair before the season finished, and that just wouldn’t be enough in this race.

Now, I really should mention how hot Bobby Grich was. From September 20 – October 2, he hit .409/.449/.727 with 4 HR’s. He was just on fire. The 4th homer in that hot stretch came on October 2, and made Bobby the first to reach the 22 homer plateau in ’81. Oh yeah, it was an exciting one too, being a 1st inning 3 run blast.

The next night in Kansas City, Tony Armas joined him at 22, with a 2-run homer in the 6th.

With a day left to the season after that, both Tony & Bobby must’ve been thinkin’ they could win the HR title. The last day of the season though, neither of them would sneak ahead.

That last day of the season, at about the same time of the afternoon, Eddie Murray joined them with a 3rd inning blast and Dwight Evans hit his 21st.

You’d think that would be the end of it, but no. Dwight hits another homer in the 8th inning of his game, to make a four way tie atop the leaderboard!

Thus, Dwight gave birth to the awesome “card of 5 stars”.

It’s such an odd mistake, that I’ve developed a theory behind it. I think Topps originally planned this to be George Foster’s regular card, but changed their minds at the last minute.

Which would be very odd considering George was a starter in the midsummer classic and Topps made All-Star cards for all the starters. So it wasn’t like they didn’t plan on making an All-Star card for Foster but planned on it for everybody else.

Although, the ’82 base set contains 66 more cards than any previous set Topps had marketed. It would make sense that this might’ve been their original plan for the regular George Foster card, before they decided to add a subset of All-Star cards. They never did subsets for All-Stars before this.

In fact, when you add up the subset of All-Star cards and the subset of “In Action” cards (which also never appeared in other sets), they total 60 cards. That’s so close to the number 66, that I have to think it’s more than coincidence.

So maybe Topps had a set partially planned out, before deciding to add 2 subsets of cards, and this one just slipped the cracks with a signature?

I don’t know, it’s all guesswork on my part, but I like my theory.

At this point you’re probably wondering when I’ll stop babbling and get to talkin’ about George Foster & the ’81 All-Star game.

Well, there’s not a lot to say about it. He went 0-for-2 and that was just a pair of infield groundouts.

From 1976-1981, George Foster was one of the premiere sluggers in the game… 198 HR’s, 671 RBI, .370 OBP, 151 OPS+, and though he didn’t steal much, he was successful in 71.1% of his attempts.

Besides that, the most interesting thing about how he made it to the midsummer classic in ’81, was a nine game hitting streak just before the strike rose its ugly head. In those games, George batted .400/.463/.829.

Oh yes, and there’s a 1983 Topps blog now! Woot! Go read it after reading this.

Breaking my hiatus means I have to go with a great card, right? And it should be a Dodger since today is the 20th anniversary of beating the Yankees in the World Series, right?

Then Ken Landreaux will do just fine.

Not only does he sport one of the great mustache’s of the ’82 card sets, but — it’s a great action shot. We also get a Dusty Baker cameo in the background. As if that wasn’t enough, this is the guy who caught the final out of the 1981 World Series to finish the 9-2 beat down of the Bronx Bombers in Yankee Stadium to clinch the Dodger championship.

He came to the Dodgers in a trade on March 30th, just before the season began, in a trade with the Twins. He didn’t have a great year at the plate for ‘em, but he tied for first among outfielders with a 1.000 fielding percentage in ’81.

His best years followed immediately, as he increased his OBP by 44 points and stole a career high 31 bases in ’82. They weren’t “empty” stats either. His best game was arguably on August 25th against the Cardinals. That’s the day the Dodgers took over first place from the clutches of the Hotlanta Braves. He sported a fine .287 WPA that day.

Although, you could certainly argue his 2 HR day against the Braves a few weeks earlier was better. Die-hard Dodger fans would probably cast a vote for his 4 hit day against the Giants though, which would make sense too.

In fact, he accumulated 2.7 WAR that season, which was his career high ’til 1983. After that, his skills faded. He had a great NLCS in ’85 though, hitting .389/.421/.556. The hot bat didn’t return in ’86 though and he retired after ’87… just missing being part of the next Dodger championship.

Whoever designed this card, had to be a perfectionist. Everybody’s facing the same direction like they’re some kind of singing group in the middle of a synchronized dance step, and their skin color gets darker from left to right. It’s like this card had to have some sort of orderliness. I used to think of it like one of those evolution charts. It’s like it shows us the stages of Jay Howell turning into a black guy with a mustache.

Anyway, the Cubs needed future stars when ’82 rolled around. They’d just spent the past two seasons being the worst team in the National League. Overall, only the Mariners were worse than the Cubbies in ’80, and only the Blue Jays in ’81. Both of them being expansion clubs, made the situation feel even worse. So Cubs fans needed new heroes.

Ty Waller

When you hit .268/.303/.451 in the majors, but hit .263/.307/.423 during the same season in AAA, it probably means you got “lucky” in the show during your 77 PA’s. Turns out, that’s exactly what it meant for Ty Waller. The Cubs didn’t realize that though, until about a month into the next season (1982) when they sent him back to AAA ’cause he just wasn’t hitting. He only got 9 more PA’s for the rest of his career. He wouldn’t make the majors again after ’82, ’til a brief stint with the Astros in ’87.

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]]> http://cards.devonyoung.com/cubs/chicago-cubs-future-stars/feed/ 0 http://cards.devonyoung.com/pirates/matt-alexander/ http://cards.devonyoung.com/pirates/matt-alexander/#comments Sat, 23 Apr 2011 05:30:27 +0000 Devon Young http://cards.devonyoung.com/?p=1964 The expression strikes me as someone thinking back and wishing he’d done something differently. I’d love to know just what Matt Alexander was thinking when this picture was taken.

I’m guessing that he probably regretted signing with the Pirates, even though he helped the team win it all in ’79. You see, from ’78-’80, he only had 16 plate appearances. Pittsburgh was so stacked with talent, that Matt’s main groove was being a pinch runner, pinch hitter, or a defensive substitute.

What’s interestingly odd about this though, is that the guy could hit. During his time in Pittsburgh, he hit .444, slugged .556, and posted an OPS+ of 172 in his mere 27 PA’s. You’d think hitting like that would move manager Chuck Tanner to give Matt more turns at the plate.

If you can hit when you do get the chance, you probably really really long for more playing time.

His final major league game came on October 2, 1981 when he entered the game as a pinch hitter in the 6th inning. He promptly went 2-for-2 with a run scored. Eat that Chuck!

No matter what he did, it never seemed to give him a shot at a chance for more in Pittsburgh. He wasn’t even on the roster when 1982′s spring training started, but he was invited to try out anyway. Within a few weeks, they sent him to their minor league camp before selling Matt to the Mexico City Tigres.

He didn’t give up hope though, being quoted in June as saying “I’m far away from home, but I’m still in the game of baseball with a chance of getting back for the stretch drive.”

His hope landed him back in the Pirates spring training camp to start the following year. Unfortunately it was almost the same deal for Matt as the last year. The Pirates returned him to Mexico City like a bowl of soup with a fly in it. They just didn’t want him anymore, and neither did any other team.

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]]> http://cards.devonyoung.com/pirates/matt-alexander/feed/ 0 http://cards.devonyoung.com/white-sox/chicago-white-sox-future-stars/ http://cards.devonyoung.com/white-sox/chicago-white-sox-future-stars/#comments Tue, 19 Apr 2011 07:02:27 +0000 Devon Young http://cards.devonyoung.com/?p=1926

The White Sox were lookin’ pretty good in first half of ’81, then pretty bad in the second half. Still, they were a rising power in the American League at this time, culminating in their ALCS appearance a couple years later. In ’82 they finished third, just 6 games back of the Angels, due to a fine mix of veterans like Tom Paciorek, Carlton Fisk, and Greg Luzinski, with a couple youngsters like Harold Baines and Rudy Law.

The organization didn’t really have many realistic future stars for Topps to pick from yet, so they chose….

Jay Loviglio

From 1979-1981, Jay was getting on base at nearly a .360 clip, stole 128 bases (82% success rate!!), scored over 250 runs, and walked more than he struck out …in AAA. The White Sox, and Topps, saw him as the future leadoff man for the 1980′s southsiders. Unfortunately he just couldn’t get on base in the majors. Over the course of 56 career plate appearances, he managed a mere .236 OBP and 5 steals (50% success rate).

Reggie Patterson

Reggie had a cup o’ coffee in ’81, and promptly allowed 11 ER’s in just 7 1/3 IP. He spent the entire ’82 season exiled in AAA Edmonton, where he led the team in wins (14) but was giving up 6 runs per 9 IP. Somehow he managed to make it back to the majors after being traded to the Cubs, appearing in games in ’83, ’84, and ’85. Oddly, he posts a decent ERA of 3.00 in ’85 and never pitches in the majors or minors again. He finally does good, and then he’s gone. There’s a head scratcher for ya.

Leo Sutherland

Here’s another ChiSox prospect that was groomed to leadoff. He stole 51 bases in ’81 in AAA Edmonton, but he posted a low OBP around never cracking the .340 mark his entire time in AAA. When the White Sox called him in ’80, he hit .258 but struck out about 10 times more than he walked. When they brought him back up in ’81, it took 16 PA’s for the team to realize he wasn’t the answer to anything.

Leo played his final major league game in the Twins @ White Sox game on October 4, 1981. All three players on this card were in that game.

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By the start of 1982, the Cincinnati Reds were not the same team that sported the best winning percentage (.611) in the majors the previous season. Their outfield of George Foster, Ken Griffey, and Dave Collins, were all starting the season playing for one of the New York clubs. Third baseman Ray Knight was now in Houston. Johnny Bench was still in Cincinnati, but he was aging.

So a Reds future stars card must’ve felt pretty good to every Reds fan at the time. The idea that your team might be starting to rebuild, is never a good one, but at least you have some hope. Unfortunately, history would show that two of the three on this card, had already finished their major league careers and they weren’t even in the Reds organization when the ’82 season began.

Scott Brown

Scott had shown some promise, pitching to the tune of a 2.77 ERA in a handful of innings for the team in ’81. He’d been called up from AAA at the end of the strike to fortify Cincinnati’s bullpen for the second half, after going 6-5 with a 2.28 ERA in the minors. He was traded to the Royals for Clint Hurdle in December ’81.

He managed to pitch strongly in spring training and win a spot in the Royals bullpen as a middle relief man, helping setup for Quisenberry. Unfortunately, he injured his elbow in the Royals final exhibition game, and never pitched in another major league game.

Geoff Combe

Geoff seems to have been one of those AAAA players. Appearing in 71 AAA games in ’80-’81, he posted an ERA of 2.15 while striking out 7.6 batters per 9 innings. He was a September callup in ’80 and gave up 8 ER in just 6 2/3 IP. He spent most of the ’81 season in Cincinnati, but barely pitched ’cause he still couldn’t get major league hitters out. His WHIP was 2.094.

So it’s no wonder the Reds sold him to the AAA Edmonton Trappers a couple weeks before the ’82 season began. He split the season between there and the Indians AAA team in Charleston, then disappeared from the minors.

Paul Householder

Paul brings this whole card some novelty. Not only are his initials PH (as in Pinch Hitter), but he was a pinch hitter on October 2, 1981, the same day that both Scott Brown and Geoff Combe pitched their last major league pitches. It was the only game that all three players on this card played in the same game.

He was a major league outfielder for most of the 1980′s, but his best season was already behind him when this card was being made. In ’81, his batting line was .275/.367/.420, which all turned out to be career highs despite appearing in just 23 games on the season. Cincinnati traded him to St Louis a couple years later in ’84, and then he bounced around the majors and minors of the Brewers and Astros before calling it a day. Easily the most successful player on this card.

The Reds Real Future

The team’s future hopes actually rested in the team’s draft picks of the period, not in the guys they almost ready for the majors. Or to put it another way, five everyday players from the Reds 1990 championship lineup and one pitcher, came in the Reds draft picks from ’80-’83.

It began when they chose Eric Davis (CF) in the 1980 draft. In 1981, they found Paul O’Neill (RF) in the 4th round. The next season, 1982′s draft, the team picked future Hall of Famer Barry Larkin (SS), and pitcher Tom Browning (SP). In 1983, they’d grab Chris Sabo (3B), Joe Oliver (C).

Barry Larkin didn’t sign out of high school in ’82, so the Reds picked him again in ’85. After that, the core was in place to lead the Reds back to the top.

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]]> http://cards.devonyoung.com/reds/cincinnati-reds-future-stars/feed/ 0 http://cards.devonyoung.com/reds/sam-mejias/ http://cards.devonyoung.com/reds/sam-mejias/#comments Sun, 20 Mar 2011 04:28:19 +0000 Devon Young http://cards.devonyoung.com/?p=1888 This card, is not like the others. In all of Sam Mejias’s other cards, he’s wearing a helmet. This time was different.

From his rookie card, right on through his 1981 card, the Topps photographer(s) always snap a some kind of headshot of Sam with a helmet on. Even after Fleer and Donruss joined the baseball universe, they did the same thing.

It’s like they were all trying to get every expression he could do, and forget he was a baseball player. He looks shellshocked in the ’82 Donruss, confused in ’79 Topps, and like he’s daydreaming on his rookie card.

He was never really a star player, so maybe the photographers were trying to make him look more interesting. Seriously. We’re talking about a guy who’s career slugging percentage is lower than Tony Gwynn’s batting average.

Whatever the case, there’s a story behind this particular photo. The batting helmet motif was bugging the poor guy by the time the Topps photographer came around in the spring of ’81. So Sam Mejias tapped the cameraman on the shoulder and asked, “Can I get one without my helmet? I’ve been on cards for four years now, but always in a helmet.”

A Sports Illustrated reporter was on the scene doin’ a story about baseball cards when this happened, and had been talking to the photographer. I’m guessing, that the person Sam’s talking to in this picture, is that reporter.

One thing I know for sure, is that it’s a good thing Sam asked, ’cause this would end up being his final year of playing. He was cut late in spring training on March 29, ’82, so this was his final baseball card. It’s probably his favorite too, ’cause he’s not wearing a helmet.

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