the almost daily dodger - kevin brown

kevin brown took both the marlins (in 1997) and the padres (in 1998) to the world series so you understand why i was excited when he joined the dodgers for the 1999 season. of course, i would have preferred the dodgers had given the money they spent on brown to mike piazza instead, but there were two different regimes in charge of those transactions. kevin malone (the "new sheriff in town") was the one who signed brown to the hefty contract that included private jet privileges while the fox folks went behind the back of then gm fred claire to make the piazza trade.

anyway, i received this 2001 topps stadium club king of the hill pitchers mound dirt card

from sluggo a few months ago. i knew i already had the card, but the one that was sitting in my dodger binder has a protective film on it, so i've put this one alongside it. i don't think we've seen a card like this since, but it makes a nice companion to the film cannister i have of dodger stadium infield dirt that i collected when i was on the field for a concert back in the early 1990's.

the checklist for that insert set is small - pedro martinez, randy johnson, greg maddux, brown, and rick ankiel. remember what a hot pitching prospect ankiel was back in 2000?

here's one more of brown - 1999 fleer brilliants blue parallel

theses parallels are pretty sharp, and i am halfway (4 of 8) to having the complete dodger team set of them.

unfortunately, despite another stellar season, brown didn't come close to taking a third team to the world series in three years as the dodgers were eight games below .500 in 1999, 23 games behind the division champ diamondbacks. not much one starting pitcher can do on the days he doesn't pitch.

chronicling another classic trade

one of the most consistent trading partners i have in the blogosphere is madding from cards on cards. we began trading in 2009, and are still sending cards back and forth here in 2024. i've even had the pleasure of meeting kerry in person a few years ago, along with some other portland based bloggers. it was a good time and i would love to do it again.

anyway, there is always some good variety when i see this particular return address and this was no different.

2023 panini chronicles pee wee reese "classics"

this is panini's retro subset within chronicles, and it is certainly my favorite. there was also a 2022 mookie betts card

from that year's version. in 2023 panini went full retro for the dodgers and only included reese, jim gilliam, and duke snider. still need the snider...

also from 2022 chronicles, here is freddie freeman

on a rookies & stars card that sort of looks like a 2023 chronicles vertex card

of michael busch. there is only so much that can be done with background designs, i guess.

there were some 2023 topps stadium club needs, including jackie robinson's card

topps cut off rachel robinson (that's her mint dress) which is too bad. this was a car that was gifted to jackie at some point (i'm too lazy to look the photo up on getty images again). i scanned the back

because the text got me thinking of who the other dodger player is to have 1,500 hits and a batting average of at least .310. i knew it wasn't reese or steve garvey (he hit .301 as a dodger), but willie davis' name came to mind. then i realized it was probably zack wheat. turns out, wheat ticks both of those boxes while davis does not.

here's clayton kershaw's triumvirates card from that same set

i completed the dodger team set last year but haven't made any progress on that front this year. jackie robinson is part of a triumvirate group with hank aaron and willie mays, so there are four dodgers to collect instead of the normal three.

2024 topps hadn't been out too long when i received these cards, but kerry managed to provide the chrome version of betts' stars of mlb insert

along with freeman's home run challenge card

and a purple holofoil parallel of freeman as well

it's numbered to 799 which may well be the number of cards i've received from kerry over the last 15 years.

thanks kerry!

my retired number collection - 24/7

this is the 23rd post in a series that shares the cards i have in my retired number mini-collection. you can find the links to the previous posts down at the bottom of this post. if you're eager to learn more right now, you can check out the full list of retired numbers along with what this collection will entail over at my want list site.

without further ado, here are the seven people for whom number 24 has been retired, including one player who has been so honored by two teams:

willie mays (retired by the giants in 1972) 2020 topps heritage 20 giants seasons

mays had his number retired by the giants while he was still active, albeit with another team. on may 12, 1972, a day after the giants traded him to the mets, number 24 was retired in his honor - at least according to wikipedia. it makes sense - the mets were playing in san francisco on the 12th, and the giants would likely want to waste no time in acknowledging one of the greatest players in baseball history and ensure that no other giant would ever wear the number.

as a giant, mays hit 646 home runs and had 3,187 hits. he sits atop the franchise's leaderboard in most key offensive categories including hits, homers, runs, doubles, total bases and games played. he was a two-time mvp and won 12 gold gloves. a no-doubt hall of famer, mays was elected on the first ballot in 1979, and it is crazy that he got only 94.7% of the vote. there are a few cards that i have showing his number 24, but i like the 2020 topps heritage insert for this collection.

walt alston (retired by the dodgers in 1977) 1967 topps

alston is the only member of the los angeles dodgers to ever wear number 24, as he brought the number with him from brooklyn and it was retired by the team in the year after alston gave up his job as manager of the club. he retired during the final week of the 1976 season, and his number was retired on june 5 the following year during an old-timers game and ceremony. i sure wish i could find photos from the old-timers game i went to at dodger stadium. i don't think it would have been 1977, but i recall hank aaron playing right field for the visitors and jim campanis playing for the dodgers. maybe someday i will find the photos we took. speaking of photos, the 1967 topps card i chose for the collection show his number pretty well, which is somewhat rare for manager cards.

anyway, alston led the dodgers for 23 seasons, winning seven pennants and four world series titles, including the franchise's first championship in 1955. he won over 2,000 games as the dodgers' manager, becoming the only skipper to reach that milestone with a single franchise, and retired with the fifth most managerial wins all-time. he wasn't elected to the hall of fame until 1983, so the dodgers weren't quite as strict about their hall of fame policy as they became after retiring jim gilliam's number 19 in 1978. sadly, alston was too ill to travel to cooperstown, and passed away a couple of months after his induction. 

tony perez (retired by the reds in 2000) 1970 topps

tony perez is rocking the windbreaker under the jersey look on his 1970 topps card, and we can see his number 24 clearly thanks to his awkward looking swing follow through. perez helped the reds to four pennants during his first run with the club from 1964 through 1976, and was a two-time world champion as a result. overall, perez is second only to johnny bench on the franchise's all-time leader board for rbi, which was perez's calling card. he drove in 1,192 runs as a red in 7,630 plate apperances, and his career totals equate to an rbi/pa ratio equal to that of willie mays.

the only reds player to wear 24 after perez was traded to the expos in 1976 was dave van gorder back in 1982. when perez rejoined the club, he reclaimed 24 and no red has worn it since. the team retired the number on may 27, 2000 in recognition of his election to the hall of fame earlier that year. it was his 9th year on the ballot, and he made it in with 77.2% of the vote.

jim wynn (retired by the astros in 2005) 1971 topps

the toy cannon doesn't seem to have a card that shows his full number, but his 1971 topps card comes close, if you combine what you see on both sides of his jersey. wynn was drafted by the houston colt .45s after their inaugural 1962 season from the reds, and he debuted with the club the following year. in 1965 he became their starting centerfielder, and played for the club through the 1973 season amassing 223 home runs in that time. when he was traded, he was the franchise's all-time leader in most offensive categories, including home runs, rbi, and walks. he remained in the top spot in all three of those categories until the killer b's came along.

wynn had his number 24 retired by the astros on june 25, 2005. jason lane, who wore the number earlier in that season, switched to number 16 after it was retired. while not a national baseball hall of famer, wynn was inducted into the team's hall of fame on august 3, 2019 as part of its inaugural class. 

rickey henderson (retired by the a's in 2009) 1994 topps stadium club member's only box set

rickey henderson wore number 35 during the majority of his first stint with the a's. he switched to 24 when he joined the yankees in 1986 as phil niekro was wearing 35. when rickey returned to the a's in 1989, bob welch had 35 and rickey took 22 until he was able to come to an arrangement with ron hassey who was wearing number 24. one suit and set of golf clubs later, rickey was wearing 24, and wore that number for the remainder of his time in oakland across multiple stints.

i think the 1994 topps stadium club member's only box set card is a great one for this collection - it shows the number clearly and portrays rickey as a stealer of bases which is his primary claim to fame. elected to the hall of fame on his first ballot in 2009, rickey is the game's all-time leader in steals and runs scored, and was at one time first in walks until barry bonds passed him. he was the 1990 al mvp and a 10-time all-star who led his league in stolen bases 12 times, including a single season record of 130 swipes in 1982.

while he was an obvious hall of famer, the a's kept number 24 in circulation. kurt suzuki was the last a's player to wear the number, doing so during the 2008 season before the a's retired it on august 1, 2009.

whitey herzog (retired by the cardinals in 2010) 2022 topps allen & ginter

the cardinals were the fourth franchise for whom herzog managed (this includes a short stint in 1974 leading the angels), but he managed them longer than anyone not named schoendienst or larussa - two people who i've already covered in this series. i was happy to pull the 2023 topps allen & ginter card last year, as it was the best example i could find that showed herzog's number.

with the cardinals, herzog won three pennants and one world series title. he won 822 games during the regular season and 21 in those three postseasons. herzog was elected to the hall of fame as a manager by the veteran's committee in 2010, and the cardinals retired his number on july 31 of that same year, making rick ankiel in 2009 the last cardinal player to wear the number.

ken griffey jr (retired by the mariners in 2016) 1990 topps

not only did the mariners announce that they would retire ken griffey jr's number during a ceremony on august 16, 2016, they announced that number 24 would be retired across the entire organization. high recognition for the face of the franchise who was elected to the hall of fame on his first ballot that same year, prompting the announcement from the mariners. once griffey donned the number as a rookie in 1989, no other mariner ever wore 24. 

his 1990 topps card shows most of the number that griffey wore during both of his tenures in seattle (he wore 30 and 3 in cincinnati to honor his dad and kids, respectively, and 17 in chicago because 3 was retired and 30 was taken). i like that he reverted back to his original number when he rejoined the mariners to end his career. and what a career it was, with 417 of his 630 homers hit as a mariner, to go along with 10 consecutive gold glove awards and the 1997 al mvp that he earned during his time with the franchise.

willie mays (retired by the mets in 2022) 2022 topps heritage high numbers 1973 all-star game highlights

while willie mays only spent a season and a half with the mets, he was still willie mays! he helped the team win their second national league pennant in 1973, and was also named to the all-star team that year as the 2022 topps heritage high numbers card shows. he retired after the 1973 season, and the team's owner at the time, joan payson, promised to not reissue mays' number.

unfortunately, it was erroneously given to kevin torve in 1990. after that, rickey henderson wore it during his time with the mets, as did robinson cano up until his release early in the 2022 season. payson's promise was finally fulfilled when the mets formally retired the number on august 27, 2022 . 

i would expect the tigers to retire number 24 for miguel cabrera at some point in the near future, and it wouldn't surprise me at some point if the red sox retired it for dwight evans and manny ramirez, even though i understand why it hasn't happened yet.

i am tracking a few things as we go, even though the information is already available elsewhere.

retired numbers by team (through the 18 posts so far):

yankees - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 15, 16, 20, 21, 23

giants - 3, 4, 11, 20, 22, 24

pirates - 1, 4, 8, 9, 11, 20, 21

guardians - 3, 5, 14, 18, 19, 20, 21, 455

red sox - 1, 4, 6, 8, 9, 14

phillies - 1, 14, 15, 20

cardinals - 1, 2, 6, 9, 10, 14, 17, 20, 23, 24, 85

reds - 1, 5, 8, 10, 11, 13, 14, 18, 20, 24

braves - 3, 6, 10, 21

astros - 5, 7, 24

mets - 14, 16, 17, 18, 24

orioles - 4, 5, 8, 20, 22

dodgers - 1, 2, 4, 14, 19, 20, 24

twins - 3, 6, 7, 10, 14

white sox - 2, 3, 4, 9, 11, 14, 16, 19, 72

brewers - 1, 4, 19

tigers - 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 11, 16, 23

cubs - 10, 14, 23

royals - 5, 10, 20

padres - 6, 19

athletics - 9, 24

angels - 11

expos - 8, 10

rangers - 7, 10

major league baseball

rays - 12, 66

diamondbacks - 20

blue jays

rockies - 17

mariners - 11, 24

nationals - 11

marlins

retired number frequency:

1 - retired by 9 teams

2 - retired by 5 teams

3 - retired by 7 teams

4 - retired by 8 teams

5 - retired by 7 teams

6 - retired by 7 teams

7 - retired by 4 teams

8 - retired by 6 teams (retired by yankees for two players)

9 - retired by 6 teams

10 - retired by 9 teams (retired by expos for two players)

11 - retired by 8 teams

12 - retired by 1 team

13 - retired by 1 team

14 - retired by 10 teams (retired by mets and dodgers for same person)

15 - retired by 2 teams

16 - retired by 4 teams (includes mets who will formally retire the number in 2024)

17 - retired by 3 teams

18 - retired by 3 teams (includes mets who will formally retire the number in 2024) 

19 - retired by 5 teams

20 - retired by 11 teams (retired by orioles, reds, and guardians for same person)

21 - retired by 4 teams

22 - retired by 2 teams

23 - retired by 4 teams

24 - retired by 8 teams (retired by giants and mets for same person)

66 - retired by 1 team

72 - retired by 1 team

85 - retired by 1 team

455 - retired by 1 team

unnumbered players - 12 players recognized by 4 teams

running total of unique hall of famers (including those without numbers): 109

running total of non-hall of famers: 39

sliding in the rain

i came across orlando cabrera's 2003 bowman card

recently, and was intrigued by it enough to develop a post about it.

cabrera has some great airborne cards that live in my collection, but i hadn't seen this one before. it's not a double play turn like the others, but at one time i collected play at the plate cards, too, and this would have fit right in there.

what struck me at first about the photo was the fact that cabrera seemed so far away from phillies catcher mike lieberthal. lieberthal looks to be right behind the plate while awaiting the throw, so cabrera must be aiming for the right-hand batter's box to swipe home with his hand. next, the fact that cabrera is airborne with both legs tucked underneath him looks odd. i would think that at this point, one of the legs would be at least partially extended to prepare for the slide. and then there is the background. there are a number of umbrellas deployed which makes things interesting.

it's been awhile since i've tried to identify the game based on a card, so let's have a go with this one. we can assume it's from 2002 because it's a 2003 card, and there is some "2002" text on the banner behind cabrera. we know it's in philly because cabrera is wearing the away grays and lieberthal has the home pinstripes on. it's a night game based on the lighting of the play and seating. on to baseball reference!

the expos visited philadelphia three times during the season, and cabrera was involved in plays at the plate (and, in fact, scored on each of the plays) where lieberthal was catching on june 1, july 5, july 7, and august 28. all were night games, and baseball reference notes the weather as "cloudy", "sunny", and "cloudy" for the first three contests. the fourth, however, includes record of a "drizzle". i think we have the winnner! on the play in question, cabrera scored on a brad wilkerson single, with wilkerson advancing to second on the throw home. i found some espn highlights from the game, but this play wasn't included. still, i think it's a match to the cardboard!

it snowed and sleeted here earlier in the week but should be all gone by the time the twins open at home next thursday. i hope, anyway.

west are the champions

in my lifetime, the national league west champion has been the bearer of the pennant 16 times, assuming i did my analysis correctly starting with the 1971 postseason. this does not count wild card teams coming out of the west to win the pennant, nor does it count the 1981 los angeles dodgers who were winning the west at the time of the strike, but did not win the west overall.

one member of that team (which did win the pennant and the world series) was steve garvey, and i was finally able to acquire his 2005 playoff prestige national league west division champions parallel card earlier this month!

garvey himself was part of four national league west champion teams - the 1974, 1977, and 1978 dodgers, and the 1984 padres. each one of those teams went on to the world series. 

this card has been a bit of a white whale for me and my steve garvey collection for quite some time. i coveted it because it represents the division in which garvey played his entire career, and it has a print run of just 18!

as you may recall, this was a redemption card as explained in this post. finding this card posted for sale with a very low buy it now has been one of the highlights of my collecting year so far! and, with the regular season kicking off tomorrow for every team other than the two garvey played for, i am hopeful for another nl west title for the dodgers in 2024.

the joy of a completed (timeless) team set

i was able to delete a saved ebay search that i've had for at least a couple of years after seeing this card 

pop up with a very nice buy it now price. it's now in hand and i now have all of the dodger base (or "silver") autograph cards from 2004 upper deck legends timeless teams! 

there are 42 signed dodger cards at each level, and tommy john's card from the 1974 subset was the last one i needed. i still "need" two of the four steve garvey autos to have all 42 in my dodger binder (the garvey collection gets fed first and is home to all four of his signed cards, but i have two duplicates in the dodger binder). 

tommy john only signed 25 of these cards, so i am more surprised at finding one 20 years later than i am at having it take this long. here's the back

each of his autos in the set (he has four) are short printed, but the 25 print run is the lowest. the other three are 35, 50,  and 75, with the last two being yankee cards.

at the same time, i added three more autographs to the not at all serious set build. jim kaat

jesse orosco

and paul o'neill

get me to 171 unique autograph cards of the 300 in the set. these include other doubles of dodger autos and not the 40 in the dodger binder or the four in the garvey binder, although my autograph post at timeless teams does show all of the unique autos i own.  171 means 19 full 9-pocket pages which has a nice aesthetic. i am not looking to complete the set, but i do keep my eye out from time to time for more of these autograph cards. maybe someday i will push my collection to 20 sheets.

as for the non-autograph parallels, i still have a long way to go. this steve yeager bronze card

that i added recently only gets me to 19 of 42 bronze dodgers in the dodger collection. i am hopeful i can get halfway to a full team set - it's the thrill of the chase!

the almost daily dodger - paul loduca

it's been about 20 years since paul loduca played for the dodgers and i still think he is one of my least favorite dodgers. here's his 2002 upper deck sweet spot card

that is new-ish to my collection.

it's likely that my opinion was formed through no fault of loduca's, as i wasn't a fan of the mike piazza trade, and loduca was one of the catchers that the dodgers deployed in the months following that deal. he wound up putting together a couple of good seasons for the dodgers, but he still wasn't mike piazza, and that's not his fault. he wound up replacing piazza again, this time in new york when he joined the mets in 2006. that same year loduca helped the amazins beat the dodgers in the nlds which did nothing to change my opinion of him.

i really don't seek out his cards, but i like this set and was a couple away from completing the basic team set, so here we are. if you have kevin brown's 2002 ud sweet spot card available, please let me know!

brian brings bowman's best betts; backgrounds boggle

try saying that title five times fast.....

after i met up with brian from highly subjective and completely arbitrary at the monthly card show, he sent a few cards my way to add to what he had already given me in person. the cards included a 2023 bowman's best mookie betts card

and a freddie freeman refractor parallel

from the same set.

i also picked up the james outman and bobby miller base cards, along with a miller refractor 

from a dime box at the card show i wrote about earlier in the week.

the backgrounds on the cards made me think of a bee hive thanks to the honeycomb pattern. i also found it odd that the background was less defined on the refractor's scan.

there were some other card backgrounds that confused me as well. brian included the james outman

and miguel vargas

cards from 2023 bowman platinum. i already had a betts card

from that set, and appreciated the others so i could see if their backgrounds were as strange as the one on mookie's card. and they are, in fact, as strange. what is that? and why do we need it on a baseball card?

the backgrounds of the cards in 2023 topps cosmic chrome

are less confusing as to content but equally confusing as to why? still, they have a place in my dodger collection and i am happy to have them.

thanks brian!

rod rocks

rod from padrographs has been ripping a ton of packs over the last few months, and is now sharing the cards he pulled with many in the good ol' blogosphere. i received the cards he sent my way and was happy to find this 2023 topps heritage high numbers taylor motter card

among the bounty.  this was one of my most wanted non-dodger cards! always a good day when a card from the "nefarious 9" gets knocked off the list!

rod sent some other cards that fit my mini-collections, including this custom card of brandon dixon

that would fit with my tatooine cards. i decided to keep it with other custom cards that i've received from folks over the years. 

one of the boxes rod opened was 2023 topps stadium club, and he sent me the kodai senga card

for the "nob" collection, and the michael harris card

that would fit in either that same collection as the senga or the lurker collection. i put it in the lurker collection thanks to ronald acuna jr's presence.

most of what rod sent my way were twins cards from his breaks, and there were some good ones, like joe ryan's card from stadium club

the visitor side of target field gives a great view of part of downtown minneapolis through the plaza into the warehouse district and beyond. target center, the home of the timberwolves, is the building with the target mascot on it.

you don't see 1982 fleer too often these days, so i figured i'd show this jack o'connor card

and there you have it.

here are a couple of hall of famers - harmon killebrew on a 1991 sportflics kellogg's corn flakes baseball greats card

and jim thome on a 2021 topps allen & ginter historical hits card

torii hunter is hanging on the hall of fame ballot, but i don't see him being voted in by the writers. here's his 2022 topps stadium club chrome card

showing him doing what he did best - robbing home runs!

thanks to the variety that rod sent, i was easily able to compare a 1988 topps card of backup catcher tom nieto to a 1988 topps insert from 2023 topps update of twins stellar rookie edouardo julien side-by-side

that's pretty close, with the player name being the most notable difference

here are the backs

i think the twins are going to be fun to watch this year with julien and royce lewis playing together. here's another julien rookie card 

that's from the totally unnecessary 2023 topps cosmic chrome release.

speaking of unnecessary, here's a silver patterned foil parallel of christian vazquez

from last year's update release.

one of my favorite cards in the package was this 2023 topps holiday byron buxton card

it looks like buck in in the midst of a snowball fight, and he has just thrown a snowball out in the yard.

adding to the fun, rod also included a package of pop rocks

which i hadn't had since the late 1970's. now i'm off to eat them while drinking a diet coke just to see what happens.

thanks rod!