maybe they do exist

i am five, well, really six, cards short of a complete dodger team set of 2015 topps 1978 buybacks. while it wasn't the first time that topps included buybacks in packs of flagship, for some reason the foil stamp used on the 2015 version appealed to me and i went about trying to amass dodgers from every year.

from what i could find, topps included all flagship years from 1957 through 1980, except for 1964 and 1965. i assume those two years were omitted due to the need for buybacks in the then current and "on deck" heritage releases. another anomaly is that only the first 10 or so cards of the 1980 set were included in the buyback release. of course, manny mota had a record breaker card at the top of the set, so the dodgers were represented.

i did pretty well with this effort, with right around 200 of the 2015 buyback dodgers, ranging from a 1957 don bessent card 

to the aforementioned manny mota card 

from 1980.

as the hunt went on, i realized that i was close to a complete team set of my favorite release - 1978. and, while tcdb only lists 16 dodger cards as 2015 buybacks, i was able to track down 23 of the 29 cards that make up the dodger team set from that release. now, i am almost certain that topps did not include any of the 4-in-1 rookie cards in the buybacks released in 2015, so i am not counting lance rautzhan's card in my quest. however, i would find it difficult to dismiss the others that i am missing from existence.

one of them, elias sosa, i am certain exists because i saw it on ebay - after it had sold for a pittance. so, there is at least one of those. the other four i am missing i have never seen. those four are tommy john, dusty baker, terry forster and tom lasorda.

comc shows a record of these buybacks for john's 1973, 1974, and 1977 cards, and i have the 1973 and 1974 but not the '77.  i have also seen baker's cards show up from 1973 through 1976 (when he was a brave), and i own a buyback of his 1979 card, but i haven't seen the '77 or '78. topps did issue a buyback version of dusty's 1978 card in 2017, but i don't own it. and one more note on sosa - i haven't seen his 1977 card as a 2015 buyback either. his non-dodger cards seem to show up from time to time, however.

forster's pre-1978 cards, along with his 1979 card (which i have), all have shown up in 2015 buyback form, but i've never seen his 1978 card. topps did issue it in 2016 as a buyback, and i added the blue foil version to my collection

so at least there is that. i do have his 1979 card and 1975 league leader card as part of my collection, 

since he shares space with dodger mike marshall, but i would really like to find that missing '78.

as for lasorda, i have his 1978 card in 2014 topps buyback form

but not 2015. in fact, in addition to not ever seeing his 1978 card as a 2015 "original", i don't recall ever seeing the dodger team cards for 1977 or 1979 in 2015 buyback form. both of those cards identify lasorda as the dodger skipper. i do have the 1978 topps dodger team card with the 2015 foil stamp though. curious.

in related buyback news, i added a 2016 buyback of steve garvey a while back. it's the silver foil version of his 1982 card

which is one of the more abundant garvey as a dodger buyback cards around. topps held some of these cards to include in their archives signature series release that same year, and here's my copy

that the seller removed from the magnetic case for some reason. this card continues to show up in subsequent archives signature series releases in varying numbers.

baker and john have also been showing up in topps' archive signature releases, but i don't think topps is holding back a bunch of elias sosa or terry forster cards for future signed releases, so i am left to wonder what happened back in 2015. maybe those cards, along with the others, do exist in reasonable quantities and someday my diligence will be rewarded. maybe. and if not with the 2015 buybacks, then hopefully in 2027 when i will try to assemble the team set with heritage buybacks. stay tuned!

5 is a classic number

i've mentioned before that i am a numbers guy. that includes jersey numbers, and when i was a kid just starting to follow baseball, i tried to figure out who wore number 6 on every team thanks to steve garvey being my favorite player. i also paid attention to other numbers, like 5, that were worn by a number of stars of the day. i also was partial to number 5 because that was the first number i wore in little league (an older kid had claimed 6) as it was the number of jim lefebvre, my dad's favorite position player.

anyway, i am often taken with cards or sets that deal with uniform numbers (retired numbers in particular), and so was pleased to find a few cards tucked away in a monster box recently.  these three cards come from 2003 fleer flair greats, and picture johnny bench

george brett

and brooks robinson

all true greats of the game who wore number 5.

a few years ago, i wrote a post about how my thinking of number 5 was changing with the emergence of corey seager, but to be honest, i never really gave up lefebvre as the first 5 i thought of. with seager's departure, i am guessing that freddie freeman will take over number 5 for the dodgers. it was quite a coincidence, then, that i pulled this 2022 topps commemorative "relic"

from a pack on the day that he signed with the club. in terms of acquisitions, i see freeman as adrian gonzalez 2.0 which is not a bad thing. i would guess that this means max muncy can dh full time, and an infield of freeman, taylor, turner and turner is pretty decent.

of course, the first dodger number 5 that i knew of was the late johnny oates. he wore that number as a member of the 1977 and 1978 dodgers - the team of my youth - and so holds a special place in my fandom. speaking of oates, i found some more photos from camera day at dodger stadium in 1978. i had included a couple that we took in an earlier post about that day, but my dad had since sent a few more, including mr. oates:

also captured by my dad on film were bill russell:

steve yeager:

terry forster:

and dennis lewallyn:

lewallyn had pitched the day before in what turned out to be his only appearance of the 1978 season. i might have to update my 1978 topps update/bk dodgers card that should have been for lewallyn using this photo instead.

back to the main topic of this post - here's to another great number 5 on the dodgers!