what if...?

i don't mention it often, but i was a comic collector as well as a baseball card collector back in the 1980s. i would say from 1983 through 1988 i collected comics - mostly dc as my brother covered a few marvel titles. i collected the flash, superman (yes even though it was pretty bad before the john byrne reboot), the new teen titans, and a few more. i still have my titans collection which includes dc presents #26 through about 30 of the higher end issues. i also still have my crisis on infinite earths collection, including (i think) all of the crossovers.

anyway, i remember seeing marvel's "what if?" comics on the shelf at the lcs, and i thought it was a cool idea. i remember seeing back issues like "what if spiderman joined the fantastic four?" on the wall. i also remember seeing the "what if elektra had lived?" issue because daredevil was one of the series my brother bought.

the first time i saw this 2021 panini diamond kings sandy koufax card

it reminded me of those comics because i thought it represented a scenario of what if sandy koufax pitched for the royals? the colorized image uses a blue that is brighter than dodger blue, you see, and the lack of logos frees the mind to picture something that is really unthinkable. it's even more unthinkable since by the time the royals came in to existence in 1969, koufax had been retired for two seasons.

however, this issue of what if? would propose that dr. frank jobe developed a procedure (8 years earlier than he did in reality) that would become known as "sandy koufax surgery", and the royals decided to select the southpaw in the expansion draft. the dodgers had left him unprotected due to the uncertainty of his recovery, and the royals figured they would take a shot. 

in 1969, the 33-year old koufax became the dean of the royal staff, and built up his strength and feel for pitching to achieve a 10-10 record that year. he would improve the next year, and the royals would wind up trading the brooklyn born koufax back "home" to the mets in a package deal that netted them a young righthander named nolan ryan.

the ripple effects are endless if you only think what if?