Joe2019

Did the title throw you? This is NOT about politics, it's about cards from Joe Shlabotnik. Nice ones, too.

But there is a president involved. JFK led off the thick manila envelope that arrived from Virginia this week. He appeared on a Topps and an Upper Deck card, both new to me. My presidential binder is going to have to be upgraded to a 4-inch model soon.

In this Topps Opening Day card, JFK is tossing out the first ball, not at an Opening Day but at the '62 All-Star game as LBJ watches.

Here is the UD from their 2012 Goodwin Champions set. These are really, really well-done cards.

Also in the package from the same set was this addition to my actress/actor stash, the beautiful Carole Lombard.

She was the queen of the 'screwball' comedy craze of the 1930s and was reportedly the highest-paid star in Hollywood. She was killed in a plane crash outside Las Vegas in 1942 while returning from an appearance to promote war bonds. She was 33 years old.

Of course, Joe included some Orioles cards, new to me, of players known and obscure. I like the design of this '94 UD Miggy Tejada more than anything being produced these days. But, then again, I'm an old fart and prefer the less flashy designs.

I grouped these Bowman/Topps/Paninis together but the scan came out smaller than I thought it would. If you can't tell there are a couple of Trey Mancini cards in there. I'm accumulating a lot of his cardboard. Odds are he gets dealt to a contender this week.

This GQ Palmer looks very familiar but I didn't see it in my quick look thru the binder where it should be so maybe it's new to me.

But the stars of the bunch were these terrific '57s! Joe knocked close to a dozen off my needs list.

Don Kaiser is the first of what is a Chicago-heavy group of cards from Joe. He was 6-15 over parts of three seasons with the Cubs and '57 was his last in the majors.

When I was a kid I often heard the 'Moooose' call at Yankee Stadium. I just love this card. Nice to get it as a gift so I can avoid paying the 'Yankee tax'.

He has a Chicago connection as he was a native of there. If you think 'deep dive' stats are a new thing, check out the blurb on the back of Moose's card.

Harry 'I'm NOT the guy from Night Court' Anderson in Connie Mack Stadium. '57 was his rookie year and he got some scattered MVP votes after hitting at a .268 clip.

Dick Donovan had a fine season in 1957 and finished second in the Cy Young voting to Warren Spahn. OK, Spahn got 15 of 16 votes and Donovan got the other one, but still.

Love this Felix Mantilla card shot in Ebbets Field.

Willard Nixon practicing his look to first. He was in his eighth of nine seasons in the bigs, all with the Red Sox. 

Ron Negray had fought his way up the steep Dodgers minor league system and then got dealt to the Phils. After a couple of years there ('55-'56) he was traded back to the Bums and was again in their system when this card was being pulled from packs.

Ray Jablonski looks and sounds like a tough Chicago dude. He also looks like a guy painted into a Cubs uni after being pictured as a Redleg with whom he'd spent the previous two seasons The thing is, he never played for the Cubs as they traded him to the Giants a day or two prior to Opening Day in '57.

Interestingly, his Baseball Reference thumbnail photo shows him in a Cubs cap.

Showing the back of his card here because I love the backs in this set.

Speaking of the Cubs...doesn't Jim King look like dozens of other players from the 50s? He also was on another team for the '57 season. The Cubs had dealt him to the Cardinals during the first week of the season. They had taken him from St. Louis in the Rule 5 draft two years prior.

And then there's Dixie Howell. He had begun his pro career in 1938 in the Cleveland organization and here we are, 19 years later,  and he's in his fifth big league season. He had done a LOT of pitching in the minors. He returned to the Sox in 1958 but saw action in only one game and spent that year and the next back in the minors. At the age of 40, in the Sox spring camp in March of 1960, he suffered a heart attack and passed at 40 years old.

There was another card in the bunch from Joe, a common, but one with an interesting quirk that I thought would make a good stand-alone post. That's coming soon.

Again, thanks Joe for a great envelope full of Orioles and '57 set chase cards. It's a much appreciated boost at a time I was shoving the hobby towards the back burner.

Moose and his friends

I always picture Moose Skowron in a Yankee uniform, sometimes as a White Sox but not ever as a Senator. But here he is on his '64 Topps Giants card. He just arrived with these four of his friends to bring my number of missing cards in this set to five.

Granted those five include four real stars, Clemente, Mantle, Mays and Aaron. Dick Stuart is the fifth of the group. But those cards are not really expensive. It's just a matter of me digging around the net to find acceptable examples at decent prices. I'll knock it off this summer.

Meanwhile here is the rest of the group fo short prints that came with the Moose.

Bucs' ace Bob Friend rocking what looks to be the rubber windbreaker under his jersey. Back then guys actually showed up at Spring Training needing to get in shape.

Elston Howard. He was likely my first in-person autograph. I told that story over on my 1959 Topps blog.

Wayne Causey was an Oriole signee and played parts of three seasons with them. He had a couple of pretty solid season with the Athletics in '63-'64.

Galen Cisco was coming off a 15 loss season when this '64 was issued and he went on to lose 19 that year. But his numbers show he pitched better than his record. He never won more than seven games in a season but he learned enough about the game to coach in the majors for 30 years. He has two sons and a grandson who played pro ball.

And yet another two 1958 All Star cards

This Nellie Fox has a creased corner which doesn't show up on the front in this scan to the same extent it does when viewed in person. OTOH the horizontal lines that cross the front in the scan are barely perceptible in person. I need to figure out my scanner's properties I think.

Anyway the back of the card, as on the rest of these terrific '58 All Stars, tells us that Nellie terrorized the Tigers in 1957. He went 40 for 93, a .430 clip. In addition he scored 22 runs, had 7 doubles, two homers and drove in 13 runs. Those are the best numbers he had against any one club. Of the 21 times he collected three or more hits in a game that year, eight of them came against the Tigers. He did it four times between August 9th and 17th against them. Then on August 18th he hit one of his five 1957 homers. I bet they got sick of him.

I like the Skowron card a lot because it's not a portrait. And because Moose has his trademark 'squint' on. And because he looks like John C. Riley. And because I just liked the Moose in general. Ignore the ragged left edge and soft corners, it's got a nice shine to it. Looks like my Orioles kept Moose in check fairly well in 1957. The three extra base hits they allowed him are the fewest of any club that year.

So this wraps up my '58 AS card eBay haul of last month. I'm pretty sure I'm going to try and collect the rest of this subset. May not be anytime real soon but I'll get to it.