1987 All Star Game Honorary Captains: Catfish Hunter & Billy Williams

Its been 3 years since I've made Honorary Captain cards for the All Star break.  Part of the reason is my extended break from blogging.  The other part is that I'm just not that into the design of the cards in these years.  The last card I did, 1986 Topps All Stars were really a mash-up of the base cards and the All Star cards because I disliked the 1986 All Star design so much.

The best of the group is the 1987 All Star Cards. Subjectively, it is also the best pair of Honorary Captains.  The 1987 All Star Game was played in Oakland and both Honorary Captains played for the A's and both entered the Hall of Fame in 1987.  Yet neither of these player's plaques featured caps with  A's logos.

Representing the AL is Jim "Catfish" Hunter.  Unable to choose between the A's and the Yankees, Hunter opted for no logo on his cap at all. The nickname we all know, and the fake story behind it all came from Charlie Finley.  Topps always referred to him as Jim Hunter.  It wasn't until long after his playing years that Topps finally used the nickname on the front of a card. It was the 2001 "American Pie" release.

The NL was represented by Billy Williams.  "Sweet Swinging" Billy was, of course, enshrined as a Cub. After 16 seasons in the "Friendly Confines", Williams finished out his career as a DH in Oakland.

Unlike my earlier Honorary Captain cards, these captains actually were featured on 1987 All Star cards.  They were on the Glossy All Star cards inserted into 1988 Topps rack packs.

These Glossy All Star cards were inserted into rack packs from 1984-1991. For the most part they were extremely similar year to year.  They really had no design similarities to the base cards of those series.

Other than the lack of the league logo in 1986 and he 40th anniversary badge on the 1991, there is virtually no difference between the sets.

A few more from Rating the Rookies

Over at my other blog, Rating the Rookies, I am still creating Cards That Never Were. Here a a few of my latest creations:

Dan Boitano, Willie Mueller, and Lenn Sakata shared a 1980 Topps Future Stars card while on the Brewers. You can see the whole story by clicking here.

In 1975 Marc Hill, Dan Meyer, and Leon Roberts shared a Topps rookie card with future Hall of Famer Gary Carter. The full post is available here.

2013 Topps Lollapalooza

These were too cool not to share. Packs of these cards were given out around Wrigleyville on April 8th, the Cubs' home opener. To check them all out click here.

There was even a chance to win 3 day passes to the sold out festival in the form of a 1990 Topps card.

1962 Topp Maury Wills All Star MVP

Going Horizontal

Most collectors are aware of the story of the missing Maury Wills Topps cards, Topps was told he would never make it, so didn't sign him to a contract. He ended up winning the MVP in 1962 but wouldn't appear on a Topps card until 1967. 

The reason I created this particular Maury Wills card is not to right some wrong in the 1962 set but as a way to create horizontal, action versions of Topps cards in sets that didn't have them previously. I decided to use the All Star Game MVPs for this purpose.

In 1959 the MLB experimented with 2 All Star Games each season. 1962 was the last season they would play 2 games. It was also the first time they would name a Most Valuable Player. At that time, the MVP was given the Arch Ward Memorial Award. Arch Ward was a sports writer and editor for the Chicago Tribune. In 1933 Ward created the first All Star game as part of the Century of Progress Exposition at the Worlds Fair in Chicago.

For the first All Star game in 1962,Wills was selected as a back-up shortstop. He pinch ran for 41 year old Stan Musial, stole second and scored the NLs 1st run on a single by Dick Groat in 6th. He remained in the game at short, then singled & scored the 3rd run 8th. NL won 3-1.

Wills was also featured on one of the earliest "Cards That Never Were" in 1975. Topps created a 1962 version of Wills to appear on their MVP sub-set.

Topps re-used that image in 1982 in its K-mart set, and in its1987 "Turn Back the Clock" sub-set.

1986 Topps Pete Rose Special 1986-1989

In 1986 Topps put out a series of Pete Rose cards similar to the 1974 Hank Aaron Specials. On the back they were referred to as "The Pete Rose Years", but on the their checklist Topps referred to them as "Rose Specials".

Of course the cards put out in 1986 do not include his entire career which ended as a player in 1986 but continued as a Manager until 1989. Rose was the last Player/Manager in the MLB in 1986. Before giving the job to Robin Ventura, Kenny Williams had considered making Paul Konerko a Player/Manager of the White Sox.

1987 Topps Mickey Mantle

 

Just saw this one online. Topps is releasing this as in insert in the 2012 set.  Since I've started taking on the missing Mantles, Topps has put out the 1975 version in the Lineage set this Fall and now the 1987 version is going to be part of the 2012 base set. Both of these cards are minis. In 1975 Topps tested out the mini version regionally. In 1987 Topps did  issue a 77 card Mini Leaders set that had the same woodgrain background but was not the same design as the 1987 regular issue. But apparently the mini '87 inserted in this set are the same design as the 1987 regular issue cards.

Sunday Shout-Out

This will be a regular feature of this blog. I have a number of sites that I like checking out. There are so many people making Cards That Never Were. I will try to link people who happened across my blog to these other sites. For my first "Shout-Out":

White Sox Cards:

This is one of my favorite blogs and one of the main reasons is because of his version of "Cards That Never Were". He includes many pre-rookie cards and star players on unfamiliar teams with a slant toward Chicago players and teams. 

  

He also created "WSC Birth Year Cards". These feature recent White Sox players on cards issued in their birth year.

Please click on the links above to check out all of his creations and be sure to check his blog for other cool cards plus White Sox game summaries.