The Greatest Card of All Time?

Any time a card captures a significant moment in baseball history, it deserves attention. Like this Lenny Randle card that Nick featured recently.

I found the glorious card I am featuring today in a dime box (!!!) at a local card shop a few months ago. I'll miss that shop and its dime boxes, as it closed a couple of months ago. The fact that I got this for 10 cents makes it even better. It depicts a classic and unforgettable scene from the early 90s. It's 1993. Nolan Ryan is on the mound in his final season at the ripe old age of 46. Robin Ventura is an up and coming star with the White Sox. The two teams had some bad blood boiling around this time, and Ventura took a stand when Ryan plunked him in the back an inning after Texas outfielder Juan Gonzalez took a beaning. Here's the visual:

Ryan pounding on Ventura's head while another Hall of Famer, Ivan Rodriguez, tries to keep the peace. The card captures that perfect moment where Nolan has Robin in an old school headlock. 

The card is one of 15,000 (Rare? I have no real point of reference. Most cards were being produced with like two million copies at this time, so let's call it rare.) In any event, the back of the card is dripping with a sarcastic, punny goodness that puts the finishing touches on a legendary card:

And you gotta love that upside down answer. 

So as I see it, the list of the greatest cards of all time might look something like this*:

1. Nolan Ryan beating on Robin Ventura (Issued by random company)
2. 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth (#144)
3. 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle RC (#311)
4. T206 Honus Wagner (Sweet Caporal)
5. 1953 Topps Satchel Paige (#220)

Something like that. But honestly, #1 is so far above the others that it really doesn't matter.

Finally, I will leave you with the obligatory link to the YouTube video showing the iconic scene so the glory can be relived yet again. If you haven't seen it yet, you're welcome. 

(*For the record, although the Nolan Ryan card is truly an awesome card, I don't believe it is the greatest of all time, so please don't argue with me in the comments. But do feel free to leave your choice for the best baseball card ever. I'm not totally sure what my #1 truly is. The others I listed are very iconic and I do enjoy them. Honestly, due to sentimental value, this other Nolan Ryan card might be my favorite card ever.)

More of the Same or Double the Fun? ... Plus Trading Updates

I have to start by saying thank you for clicking on this post despite the thumbnail for the post displaying a 1988 Donruss common. I hope you aren't disappointed. 

I have an odd fascination with duplicate cards. I'm not entirely sure why. Now before you say I'm nuts, I do have to provide context. First, I must say that when opening a pack of cards, NO ONE, including myself, wants to keep pulling ones like this:

1988 Donruss #514, Bob Walk

And that's how it happens when opening packs. Instead of duplicates of a player you like or a valuable card or even an interesting card, you get the same dud over and over. If I had kept every one of Mr. Walk's mustachioed face I ever owned, I could have created a wall mural for the Pittsburgh Municipal Library. Instead, they were purged long ago. At least I thought they were. I just found one. Like a weed in the garden. Just when you thought you got them all. 

Anyway, though I have yet to open a pack of 2020 cards (blasted quarantine), I believe I can still provide you with the equivalent card from this year's Topps base offering.

2020 Topps #116, Daniel Murphy

I don't want duplicates of that card. No one wants duplicates of that card.

But if it's a card I like, I say, bring on the duplicates!

In a bizarre sequence of events, I ended up with duplicates of a card I featured in a recent post just days after it was posted. The cards came from a USPS medium flat rate box full of cards I bought on eBay. I got about 2500 cards for $20 (including shipping). I've done this before when I just want some variety to look through and hope there is a gem or two graciously thrown in by the seller, who only makes a couple of bucks on the sale. I was pleasantly surprised to find 8 copies of this legendary card.

1988 Fleer #7, Steve Carlton (just 7 pictured - because one is in my Frankenset)

It's neat to have eight copies of a card when the first time you saw that card, you had trouble believing it even existed. I also enjoy seeing a player's long career spelled out in stats on the back of a card so that's another reason I enjoy this particular card. Speaking of a long statistical chronology, that reminds me of the card in this box with easily the biggest number of duplicates. Sometimes when you buy these boxes, you get several of the same card, though sellers try to limit this to a few or several of the same. So the most I found of any card before I got to the big stack was probably 10 or so. And then these came, all together.

1987 Topps #673 Don Sutton (x 45)

45 cards. As I flipped through them, it seemed like the never ending pile. And remember my liking of long statistical records? Here's the back of this card:

Nine shutouts in 1972. NINE!

These duplicates made my day. Weird, I know. 

These late-career duplicates of players with long careers seem to just find me (not in the same box referenced above, however). If you don't believe me, behold the greatness of the following:

More 1987 Topps! More Carltons! (x 11! Card #718)

Lefty strikes again! 1987 Fleer #490 (Base card x 5) and #635 (4,000 Strikeouts x 4)

The return of Tommy John (1989 Topps #359 x 20!)

Tom Terrific! 1987 Topps #425 (x 8!)

1990 Upper Deck Fred Lynn #771 (x 10)

You had to know Knucksie was coming! - 1986 Topps #790 (x 7)

 

These were easier to find because I keep a bunch of players' cards sorted for trades and such, but I knew these were there. Because they find me. And I keep them for some reason. But I would trade all of them away for duplicates of this next card. As a kid, I opened a fair amount of 1989 Donruss and developed an affinity for the set that continues today. Besides the Ken Griffey Jr. rookie card (of course) there was another card in the set that I was always thrilled to find in a pack. And unlike Bob Walk, I kept them. At some point I ran across a bigger stack of them, and so, at 58 cards, this is my favorite big stash:

1989 Donruss #105 Ryne Sandberg (x 58)

I will gladly accept an unreasonable number of this card in trades.

I have no use or need for all of these duplicate cards. Does anyone? Probably not. But card collecting is a hobby where not everything needs an explanation. We like what we like and sometimes can't even really explain why. And I think that's just fine.

Trading Updates!

Just finished a few trades and got some neat stuff. I'll highlight my favorite card from each trade. Besides these cards, I got some help with my 81 and 85 Topps sets.

Brian from Highly Subjective and Completely Arbitrary would have had no way of knowing one of the cards he sent was on my unofficial Sandberg wish list, but there it was! 

Great series and a great nickname. Thanks Brian!

Tom from The Angels, In Order sent me this sweet auto after we did our original trade. I owe him! 

Coste is from my hometown here in Fargo and I watched him growing up as he started his career with the independent minor league team in town, the Fargo-Moorhead Redhawks. He didn't make the major leagues until age 33, and he wrote a book about his journey, which I recommend. He's a nice guy and a class act.

Finally, Jay from Card Hemorrhage sent some nice Cubbie cards, but this one was my favorite (as a long-suffering fan, the reason is obvious).

Check these guys out. They do good work on their blogs and their trades! Thanks for welcoming me into the card blogging community!

Right Here Waiting (Not a Post About Richard Marx, So Please Keep Reading)

Warning: This post contains large pictures. You'll see why.

You may have had the same experience as me growing up. I became a baseball fan maybe around age eight or nine. When I entered my mid to late twenties, as certain players began to retire, I came to the realization that I had never known Major League Baseball without them. It was a weird feeling, and it kind of made me feel old. For my timeline, those players would include the likes of Jim Thome, Frank Thomas, and of course, Jamie Moyer, among others. When baseball season began, these guys were always right there waiting.

I've always been fascinated by players with long careers, and one reason for this was being able to see line after line of their stats on the back of a card. This was my earliest cherished baseball card, and remains to this day right up there on my list:

1994 Collector's Choice #249, Nolan Ryan

27 season of greatness from the Ryan Express. A simple picture and design on the front and 27 years worth of grit chronicled on the back. Years later, I think this card probably served as inspiration for one of my mini-collections. I was able to get a list of players with 15 or more years of service with the help Fred Worth at SABR (Society for American Baseball Research). He was able to mine the baseball-reference.com database and produce such a list. The best I could find was a list of the players with the longest service time, but that only went down to 18 years. At the time (about two years ago), the list of 15+ players amounted to 1,011.

My goal with this mini-collection is to find a card of each of the players on the list, but the card needs to list the statistical record for that player for at least 15 seasons of his career. To date, I have 364 cards in the collection. A recent boon to this collection was a lot of Conlon cards I found at a cheap price. So I thought I would showcase the cards I have of players who played 25 or more seasons in Major League Baseball. There are 10 players that fit that category.

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Can you name them? Quiz yourself if you'd like, or just scroll down.

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Here's the list:

1) Nolan Ryan - 27 seasons

2) Cap Anson - 27

3) Deacon McGuire - 26

4) Tommy John - 26

5) Rickey Henderson - 25

6) Jamie Moyer - 25

7) Jim Kaat - 25 

8) Charlie Hough - 25

9) Bobby Wallace - 25

10) Eddie Collins - 25

I have cards of seven of the players, including the Nolan Ryan card shown above. I probably could easily find one of Cap Anson, and cards of Deacon McGuire and Bobby Wallace probably exist, too, but this is a "passive" collection. That means I don't usually actively seek out cards to put into the binder. It's just as I come across them. Here's the gallery:

Tommy John - 26 seasons (1963 - 1989)

1989 Fleer #255, Tommy John

The career of Tommy John through 1988 is chronicled on the back of this card. Tommy lost a chance to tie Nolan Ryan and Cap Anson when he missed the 1975 season due to injury, but at least he got a surgery named after him as part of the deal. John first pitched during the Kennedy administration and finished his career during the George H. W. Bush administration (7 presidents). Let that sink in.

Rickey Henderson (1979 - 2003)

2000 UD MVP #118, Rickey Henderson

This card shows Rickey's stats through the 1999 season. Henderson first appeared during the Carter administration and finished his career during the George W. Bush administration (5 presidents).

Jamie Moyer (1986 - 2012)

2006 Topps #358, Jamie Moyer

Career spanned Reagan to Obama (5 presidents). Moyer's stats through 2005 are featured. He did not pitch in 2011 after having Tommy John (remember him) surgery in December 2010 at the age of 48. He came back and pitched one final season in 2012, topping out at something like 82 mph on his fastball. Insane.

Jim Kaat (1959 - 1983)

1980 Topps #250, Jim Kaat

 

Career spanned Eisenhower to Reagan (7 presidents). Hard to read the stats due to the horizontal arrangement. This card shows Kaat through the 1979 season, but I have a 1983 Fleer lying around somewhere...

Charlie Hough (1970 - 1994)

1994 Topps #625, Charlie Hough

A great card, though the alignment on the back is again horizontal. Gotta love the photo on the front. Old man Charlie gripping that knuckler and smirking like he knows how ridiculous it is that he's still throwing softballs up there in his mid-40s.  

Hough's career spanned Nixon to Clinton (6 presidents). He finished his career with two years pitching for the Florida Marlins in 1993/1994. Hough pitched the first game in Marlins history in 1993. He got the win, pitching six innings, allowing three hits and three runs against a lineup featuring Brett Butler, Darryl Strawberry, Eric Davis, Tim Wallach, Eric Karros, and Mike Piazza. He beat Orel Hershiser. He was 45 at the time. No biggie. 

Eddie Collins (1906 to 1930)

1991 Sporting News Conlon Collection #21, Eddie Collins

Career spanned the Teddy Roosevelt to Herbert Hoover administrations (6 presidents). Played only 12 games in his final two seasons under Connie Mack, with all appearances as a pinch hitter (as opposed to his usual 2nd base). 

Writing this makes me want Tommy John, Jamie Moyer, Jim Kaat, and Charlie Hough in the Hall of Fame because playing that long is unreal.