billy martin, frank thomas, and...eric karros?

i think most are familiar with billy martin's 1972 topps card and frank thomas' 1991 upper deck and 1994 topps stadium club cards in which they are subtly (or not so subtly) flipping the bird. but did you know about eric karros' 1999 topps gallery card?

i am not 100% sure that karros is intentionally flipping us off there, but the look on his face makes me think that he might have kept that finger extended after flipping the ball towards the mound on purpose. however, karros also looks a bit perturbed on this 1999 pacific aurora card

so maybe he was having a rough year. that aurora card, by the way, was at one time one of my 'nefarious 9' - my most wanted cards - that is listed on the sidebar of the web version of my blog. same goes for this 2004 upper deck vintage jason frasor card

and this 2019 topps archives sandy koufax card

all three, plus the gallery karros up top and the rest of the cards you will see in this post came my way via a few trade packages from night owl in 2020. there was another koufax card sent my way, this 2020 topps warriors of the diamond insert

koufax's 10.7 war season came in 1963 when he won the pitching triple crown, the cy young award, the mvp award, and the world series.  it was a good year.

another card greg sent was this 2018 sage sport kings card of koufax's brooklyn teammate don newcombe

newcombe is another guy who won the mvp and cy young awards in the same season (1956). clayton kershaw did it, too, meaning that the dodgers and tigers (denny mclain, willie hernandez, and justin verlander) are the only franchises to have three same season cy young/mvp winners to their credit.

here are a couple of cards of the dodger battery that closed out the 2020 world series - julio urias

on a 2017 topps stadium club beam team insert, and austin barnes

on a 2020 topps rainbow foil parallel. after the final out of game 6 was recorded, it seemed to me that it took a longer time for the celebration to begin. barnes walked out from behind the plate while urias stayed on the mound. only after barnes got a few steps in front of the plate and had tucked the ball in to his pocket, did he start to celebrate and jog towards the mound.

it's too bad that matt kemp missed out on a ring with the dodgers. night owl was kind enough to send a couple of parallel cards of my former favorite dodger - a 1995 bowman's best first year green parallel

and a 2012 topps heritage target red parallel

it sucks that the 2011 dodgers finished in third place, as i think that is the reason kemp did not win the nl mvp over ryan braun (whose brewers won the nl central) that year, despite kemp having better offensive numbers except for slight deficits in batting average and slugging percentage. shoot, braun didn't even lead his team in home runs or rbi (that was prince fielder).

here's a dodger who did win an mvp award - cody bellinger

on a 2018 bowman platinum card. looks like bellinger is channeling mark teixeira with the big exhale.

did you know that while guys go for looks, girls go for status? here's a 2018 panini chronicles status card of corey seager

i don't know if this is an insert or a normal card because who can understand panini chronicles.

i am guessing that most know night owl is in the newspaper business, so getting a 1961 nu-cards baseball scoops card is pretty cool

made even more so by it being a sal maglie card. not too many of those around.

perhaps my favorite card in all of the ones sent by greg is this 2003 fleer double header card

which rips off the 1955 topps double header card design. when you unfold this particular card, you find current cub manager david ross

and a watercolor crowd. note to self - finally acquire a 1955 topps double header jim gilliam card.

thanks greg!