Topps All-Star Misses: 1959 AL Outfield

In 1959 Topps' AL All Star outfield consisted of Mickey Mantle, Al Kaline and Roy Sievers. Of the three, only Mantle started in the 1958 ASG. Al Kaline was 9th inning defensive substitute for Ted Williams. The other two starting All Star outfielders were Bob Cerv of the Athletics and Jackie Jensen of the Red Sox.

In 1958 for Topps credited the All Star Selections to "Sport Magazine".  (They would repeat this in 1960.)  In 1959 the All Atar selections were supposedly from The Sporting News. This wasn't accurate either as Ted Williams was the only Sporting News All Star in 1958 to represent the American League outfield.  In 1959 the only AL outfielder selected was Minnie Minoso, who at that time was playing for the Cleveland Indians.

Who probably didn't merit inclusion in the 1959 Topps All-Star set, but was in it anyway?

Roy Sievers

He was not an All Star in 1958, but he finished 6th in MVP voting playing left field for the Senators. Sievers was primarily a first baseman in 1959. He was named a reserve in both All Star games that year, he only saw action in the first game as a pinch hitter. 

1962 Topps Jackie Jensen - 30 Tribute Card Project - Part 7

This part 7 of a continuing 30 tribute card project inspired by this article from Sports Collectors Daily. In previous posts I have shown 4 cards that Topps had produced and 15 cards that I have found on various blogs pages. Now I have my turn: 

The Jackie Jensen story is an interesting one. He began his MLB career in the Yankees outfield but became expendable with the arrival of Mickey Mantle. He was traded to Washington early in the 1952 season then to Boston in 1954. In 1958 he was the AL MVP and in 1959 he was a Gold Glove award winner, led the league in RBI's, hit 28 HRs and had 20 stolen bases. Yet seemingly at the top of his game, he retired from baseball due in part by his crippling fear of flying. After sitting out in 1960, he returned in 1961 but his production at the plate dropped dramatically causing him to retire for good at the end of the season.  

Not only was there not a tribute card of Jensen in 1962 after his retirement in 1961, Topps also neglected to make a tribute card of Jensen in 1960 after his initial retirement in 1959. Fortunately, Bob Lemke was recently able to right this wrong. Click here for the link to Bob's 1960 Jackie Jensen card.

 Here is the list so far. The Black X represents cards produced by Topps, The red X represents those made by other baseball card geeks, and the blue X represents the cards made by yours truly:

1.       1952 Joe DiMaggio X

2.       1956 Ralph Kiner X

3.       1957 Bob Feller X

4.       1957 Phil Rizzuto X

5.       1957 Jackie Robinson X

6.       1961 Ted Williams X

7.       1962 Jackie Jensen X

8.       1964 Stan Musial X

9.       1964 Early Wynn

10.   1965 Duke Snider

11.   1966 Yogi Berra X

12.   1966 Warren Spahn 

13.   1967 Sandy Koufax X

14.   1967 Robin Roberts X

15.   1968 Whitey Ford

16.   1969 Rocky Colavito X

17.   1969 Roger Maris 

18.   1969 Eddie Mathews

19.   1970 Don Drysdale X

20.   1972 Ernie Banks X

21.   1973 Maury Wills X

22.   1974 Willie Mays X 

23.   1977 Hank Aaron X

24.   1977 Frank Robinson X

25.   1978 Brooks Robinson X 

26.   1978 Jim Wynn

27.   1980 Lou Brock

28.   1980 Thuman Munson X

29.   1984 Johnny Bench X

30. 1984 Carl Yastrzemski X

To be Continued......