bobby grich is in my hall of famer collection

with dave parker and dick allen being elected to the hall of fame by the classic era committee, there should be some room on the ballot when that committee reconvenes in three years. i would expect to see tommy john, luis tiant, ken boyer, and steve garvey on the ballot again, and i am hopeful that bobby grich is added to that list. i've added him to my hall of famer collection with this card as his entry:

that's a 2004 topps retired signature autograph. here's the back:

adding grich to this collection is not something that i considered until a year or so ago when looking at second baseman stats at baseball reference. i had been a fan of grich from my days of growing up in southern california, and i followed his career pretty closely until he called it quits after the 1986 postseason. i have a grich model rawlings glove, and have an affinity towards second basemen and those who wore number 4.

grich was a four-time gold glove winner and a six-time all-star whose lack of counting stats (only 1,800 hits and fewer than 3,000 times on base) is counteracted by his defensive prowess. and, defensive prowess as a deciding factor can't be overlooked when bill mazeroski is a hall of famer. if you trust war, grich has a higher overall war (bwar) than ryne sandberg, roberto alomar, or craig biggio, and his peak war is higher than alomar or biggio as well. among his peers, only joe morgan and rod carew (who moved to first base halfway through his career) are in the hall of fame, and they are no-doubters. by "traditional" means, grich seems like a stretch for the hall, but we are in a new world now.

i saw grich play in person a couple of times, including august 19, 1979 when he went 3 for 4 with a homer and three rbi against the blue jays. i also saw him at the big a once after his retirement. i assume he was working with the team in some capacity, but i didn't ask. we walked out of the stadium at the same time and i could tell he was in a hurry so i didn't say anything to him.

i recently added some of his final tribute cards to my collection - 1987 topps

and 1987 donruss

i'll keep my eye out for an extra 1987 fleer card as well.

i also bought an oddball single to add to my "master" 1978 topps set

that card comes from a sga on bobby grich night at the big a in 1987. cards from his career were printed on a sheet, hence the perforations. the back is a different color than regular '78s

otherwise, it's the same. as the card mentions, grich played shortstop for the halos in 1977 but moved back to second base in 1978 after they traded jerry remy to the red sox.

a hall of fame claim for grich is definitely a "big hall" opinion, and it would add a few more names to the "if he's in then so and so should be in" discussion, but i think he has a solid case. we will see if the era committee agrees in three years time.

a (not so) biittner pill to swallow

sometime in early february, i sent out four ttm requests. they were the first ones i'd sent in quite a while, as my primary focus in the past had been to add dodgers or signed 1978 topps cards to my collection and i had pretty much exhausted the list of known signers who fell in to those categories.

every once in a while, however, i will look at recent successes on sportscardforum and see a player who has been added to the database with some successful returns that i had previously missed.  one such player was larry biittner.

biittner's card was one i found often in packs of 1978 topps that i opened that summer.  i was struck by his blue eyes (they are gil hodges-esque), as well as the spelling of his last name. at first, i thought that the dual vowels were an error, but my baseball handbook had his last name spelled the same way. now, dual vowels weren't all that strange - the 1978 set also had don aase in it - but the back-to-back dual letters were something i hadn't seen before.  

the other ttm requests i sent were to a couple of dodgers c/o their spring training facility at camelback ranch, and former dodger pitcher dennis powell. i thought i might see one or both of the spring training requests returned, but that has not been the case.  powell, however, came through with all three of his 1987 cards:

i don't really have any plans to send out any requests in the future (but never say never), so if biittner is the last ttm request i will see fulfilled, it will not be a bad one to go out on, as that card brings back some great memories of opening packs in the summer of 1978.

thanks larry and dennis!

is this heaven?

no. it's dodger stadium. and, since today was the dodgers' home opener, let's see some cards featuring dodger stadium.

chavez ravine hosted a stadium series hockey game between the ducks and the kings a couple of years ago, and i was able to track down some cards that show dodger stadium in the background.  unfortunately, they were all ducks cards.  i was a pretty big kings fan, even prior to the gretzky era, and attended several games (including the 1980 all-star game) at the fabulous forum in inglewood.  it would have been a trip to see hockey at dodger stadium.  anyway, here are the cards - a 2014-15 upper deck canvas cam fowler card

baseball, hockey, and soccer all represented.  also, seeing the fan in the number 11 kings sweater made me think of charlie simmer and mike donnelly.  i don't know who wears 11 for the kings these days.

here's jakob silfverberg on a 2014-15 upper deck card

i was about as young as his kid when i first visited dodger stadium.

finally, here's ryan getzlaf

walking with every level of seating visible behind him.

dodger stadium recently hosted the wbc semi-finals and finals, and i decided to pick up the topps now cards from those games, too.  i followed through with my decision, although there were a couple of cards i did not buy.  those won't make it to me for a while, so i'll show them later.  in the meantime, here are some more dodger stadium cards i've obtained recently.

1989 woolworth's rick honeycutt

the current dodger pitching coach is seen here throwing in game 2 of the 1988 world series.  he retired all three dodgers he faced, two by strikeout, but orel hershiser and the dodgers still won the game 6-0.  honeycutt picked up the win in game 3 in oakland (which is the reason he is featured in this set), but i'm glad topps used a photo from a game in dodger stadium.

i also picked up this 1993 cracker jack prize card featuring my favorite stadium

complete with team trivia and an appearance by the garv.

poor hank webb. they had to pick someone so obviously not in the hall of fame that they went with a guy who spent all but 5 games of his career with the mets.  still, webb was a member of the 1977 dodger team, and so he is a respected member of the franchise on my blogs.

oscar at all trade bait all the time also sent over some dodger stadium cards for my collection.

2000 upper deck angel pena

i miss the old light bulb field level scoreboards.

2012 bowman ted lilly

which is not as nice as his 2013 topps card (this being the target red parallel version)

nick punto's 2013 topps update card (also the target red parallel version)

includes a nice double play turn and the always welcome union 76 logo ball.

it doesn't snow in la, but there's snow on josh reddick's 2016 topps holiday card

this photo must be from early in the game as there are a lot of empty seats.

last but not least, here's a 1987 donruss ron darling card

with the left field pavilion and its distinctive awning nicely matching the mets' color scheme.

thanks oscar for being on the lookout for dodger stadium!