1988 All Star Game Honorary Captains: Bobby Doerr & Willie Stargell

Continuing with my revived All Star Break Tradition, the Honorary Captains.  Spoiler alert: this is in no way as exciting as last night's duel between Guerrero and Pederson. 

In 1988 the game was played in Cincinnati. Often there's one or more players with ties to the host team.  If there's a connection here, I'm missing it. 

The AL Captain was Bobby Doerr. He spent his entire MLB career with the Red Sox. Missing only the 1945 season to serve in the Army, he played from 1937-1951.  Doerr was a 9 time All Star who played in the shadow of  Teddy Ballgame in his prime.  It took the Veteran's Committee to induct him in 1986.

In the NL was first-ballot 1988 inductee, Willie Stargell.  Pops was a seven time All Star. In 1979 he won the NL MVP, the NLCS MVP and the World Series MVP.

Again, the honorary captains appeared on the All Star Glossy inserts in 1989 Topps rack packs.

Another Batch of Cards from Rating the Rookies

It's crazy how these things add up. Here is a baker's dozen.  Thirteen Cards That Never Were from my other blog, Rating the Rookies. The first are a couple of one-and-done players. The only card either Bernie Smith or George Kopacz appeared on was a 1971 Brewers Rookie Stars card. So I made 1970 Topps cards of them.

The second batch also landed on 1970 Topps Cards That Never Were. George Lauzerique and Roberto Rodriguez originally shared a 1969 Topps Athletics Rookie Stars card.

The next two actually had solo rookie cards. Lee Stange had a solo rookie card in 1962. That was the first year Topps had multi-player rookie cards. But they also had quite a few solo rookie cards.  I gave Stange a 1963 Fleer Card That Never Was. 

Deron Johnson had three, count 'em three solo rookie cards. He appeared on solo rookie stars cards in 1959, 1960 and 1961 as a Yankee. And for all three cards Topps used the exact same photo. For his Card That Never Was, I put him on a 1975 Topps card showcasing his brief time with the White Sox. 

The next two appeared together on a 1965 Topps Red Sox Rookie Stars card. I gave Rico Petrocelli a 1968 All Star Card That Never Was in honor of his start in the 1967 All Star game.

 Jerry Stephenson got a 1969 Topps Card showing him as a member of the Seattle Pilots. 

Jim Woods went to High School just blocks from Wrigley. In the same year he graduated high school, he was a September call-up for the Cubs. They only used him a couple times, both times as a pinch runner. So for his Card That Never Was, I gave him the Herb Washington treatment, and put him on a 1957 Topps card with his position listed as pinch runner. He eventually appeared as a rookie on a 1961 Topps card but that was not his first card. He also had a card in the 1960 Leaf set.

Mike Cubbage, Doug DeCinces, Reggie Sanders and Manny Trillo shared a 1975 Rookie Infielders card. Cubbage was part of a multi-player trade that sent Bert Blyleven to the Texas Rangers. For his part, I gave him a 1976 Topps Traded Card That Never Was. 

After a solid career for the Orioles, Angels and (very briefly) Cardinals, DeCinces played in Japan for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows. For his Card That Never Was, I made a 1988 Topps style card of him on the Swallows.

This Reggie Sanders was drafted by the A's in the same year the other Reggie Sanders was born. His entire MLB playing career consisted of  26 games played in 1974. Despite that he had 2 rookie cards, one in 1974 and another in 1975. For his third rookie Card That Never Was, I teamed him up with another young Reggie on this 1968 card.

Manny Trillo also had rookie cards in '74 and '75. For his Card That Never Was, I gave him a Kellogg's cereal card for his first All Star season 1977.

1988 Topps Mickey Mantle

The 2012 Archives cards are out and I thought for sure that Topps would take the opportunity to create a Mantle card from 1971, 1980 or 1984. When I started this, there were exactly 25 Topps series with out a Mickey Mantle card. 1971-1995. Since then Topps created a 1975 Mini for last year's Lineage set and a 1987 Mini for this year's base set. The Archives set presented an opportunity to reduce the number to an even 20.  Instead they created another 1954 Mickey Mantle card. Go figure.

Can somebody please explain why Topps felt the need to change the team logo? This just looks wrong.

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.