My First Cards

At the beginning of ’82, nobody viewed the Yankees as a team in need of talent. They either had it, or could buy it when they needed it. Of course, history tells us that ’82 was the start of the Yankees playoff drought and time for some rebuilding of the franchise during some dark years.

Probably the most glaring need at the time was the 1B position. After trading Chris Chambliss away in late ’79, they bought some time by signing verteran Bob Watson to fill the hole. This turned out to be a perfect strategy for the Yankees as Watson’s stats dropped dramatically in ’81, at about the same time Steve Balboni was ready for the major leagues.

Steve hit 26 HR’s in ’79 for the Ft Lauderdale Yankees in class A, and then spent 1980 in AA, hitting .301/.399/.553 with 34 HR’s and driving in a whopping 122 runs. That earned him a call up to AAA Columbus for 1981 where his batting average dropped but he still drove in 98 runs and whollopped 33 HR’s in just 125 games.

He made his major league debut on April 22, 1981, against the Tigers and then played against them a few days later before being sent back down to Columbus. At this point, the Yankees still had reason to think Bob Watson would have another good year and felt they could let Balboni develop a little more.

Probably because of his lowering batting average though, they left him in the minors for most of ’81 even while Bob stuggled. In AAA in ’82, Steve’s batting average and on base percentage bounced back up, while his slugging rose up to .632! Even though Steve got into 33 games as a New York Yankee that year, he still wasn’t the Yankees regular first baseman. The Yankees had traded for John Mayberry in May, to be their first baseman for the rest of the year.

By this time though, a young Don Mattingly was in AAA too and also got called up to New York in late ’82 for a few games. Donnie Baseball was playing more outfield than first base back then, but the Yankees must’ve started thinkin’ about Don as the future first baseman instead of Steve.

So in the offseason, the Yankees make one of the all-time horrible moves by throwing an 18 year old Fred McGriff away in a trade to Toronto. Fred just posted a .413 OBP in the Gulf Coast League as a first baseman in ’82. New York got Tom Dodd and Dale Murray in return. Dodd has a 16 plate appearance career in Baltimore in 1986, while the 33 year old Murray tosses an 80 ERA+ in just 121 more innings over the course of the next 3 seasons to finish his career.

So anyway, in ’83, Balboni and Mattingly were battling for the Yankees first base position, with Don Mattingly eventually winning the role and Steve Balboni being traded to the Royals. Steve might’ve gotten the better end of the deal though, as he was joining a Kansas City team that would win the World Series in his 2nd year with them. To this day, Steve Balboni’s 36 HR’s in that Royals Championship season of 1985, remains the Royals single season HR record.

The 2nd player on this card, Andy McGaffigan, made his major league debut on September 22, 1981 against the Indians, tossing 3 scoreless innings in relief of Dave Righetti. Andy would only appear in 2 games for the Yanks. He was traded to the Giants just before the ’82 season began, in exchange for Doyle Alexander.

He was a decent reliever for 11 seasons, posting s 38-33 record, 3.38 ERA, in 833 1/3 IP. That’s a lot of 3′s & 8′s. Anyway, his ERA+ was a fine 111. Andy finished his career with the Brewers but his final apparance in a game was with the Royals.

That brings us to the 3rd future star, Andre Robertson, who became a part time shortstop for 5 seasons in the Bronx. He went 2 for 3 against the Royals in his major league debut Sepember 3, ’81.

Andre was the reason the Yankees felt they could trade away a good 20 year old shortstop named Greg Gagne in April ’82 in part of a trade for Roy Smalley. The plan was to have Smalley, who was a better hitting shortstop than Bucky Dent, play shortstop until Andre developed into a major leaguer. This also freed up Bucky to be traded, which he was. Greg only went on to play solid defense for 15 seasons in the majors and help the Twins win their first 2 Championships.

Anyway, when I was a kid, I remember thinkin’ Andre was going to be a great player. The Yankees announcers talked him up a lot too. Then, Andre was in a bad car accident in August ’83 which broke his neck and separated his left shoulder. He was never the same after that. He finished his playing days in 1989 for Oklahoma City 89ers in the minors.

Meanwhile, the Yanks wouldn’t have a regular shortstop until Derek Jeter came along 13 years later.