10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#8)

These are five of the 1975 Topps cards that Steve from the 1975 Baseball Cards blog sent me recently.  Steve also tinkers with a blog that features athletes on phones and I flipped out when I found it. One of my first collections, when I re-entered the hobby in the late 80s, was of guys in all sports on the phone and with other electronic devices. I actually did a 'Guys On The Phone' post way back in 2012. When I saw Steve's blog I dug out the old pages I'd filled and sent him some of the cards (I've since found more and should send them his way, too).

Anyway, these colorful 1975 gems are most welcome. I'm down to less than two dozen needed for the set. I should do some damage to my want list at the TriStar show in February. My 1976 chase is winding down, too. Just about 40 needed there. I'm not sure how I got the bug that has sent me after the 70s sets. I followed baseball thru that decade (as best I could) but didn't collect much. I remember that I would buy a pack of cards just to see what Topps was doing.

I'm probably going to try to finish all the 70s sets at some point. My scorecard looks like this at the moment:

• 1970-done and in a binder
• 1971-I have a large box of 71s, well over 400, that I haven't even dug into. I need to sort 'em to see what I need.
• 1972, 1973, 1974- I have all the Orioles and various small amounts of others.
• 1975 & 1976-See above, bindered and almost completed
• 1977-Just the Orioles and a few stars
• 1978 & 1979- completed and in binders

Truth be told the 70s was sort of a 'lost' decade for me. I was in and out of college, held down numerous jobs to feed my habits, and wrecked some relationships and friendships. Not all of them, I did meet my wife during this time, but enough.

Phillip Roth's 1973 novel is just outstanding. I wasn't much of a fiction reader when I was in college but I read this on a recommendation and I've always been glad I did. I posted this on my1959 Topps blog in 2011.

I had tried to read one or two of Philip Roth's books prior to The Great American Novel. The key word being 'tried'. I never got very far. So I was pretty skeptical when a friend gave me his copy of this book and insisted I read it. Turns out to be the funniest, cleverest and most entertaining baseball novel I've ever read.

In it Roth chronicles the odyssey of the Ruppert Mundys, the only homeless franchise in the Patriot League. If you are not familiar with the Patriot League take heart, Word Smith, the book's narrator will explain the Communist plot and Capitalist scandals have conspired to wipe out it's rich history. It's enough to know that the Mundys have lost their stadium in Port Ruppert to the war effort (WWII) and have taken to the road more or less permanently.

The book is difficult to describe with murderous plots against umpires, wooden-legged catchers, games scheduled against teams from asylums and players named for mythological figures (Luke Gofannon, Gil Gamesh, etc).

The book slows in spots but will keep you laughing and wondering at the depth of Roth's imagination. Highly recommended.

One additional note...this is the only book I've ever bought after having read it.


Music in the 70s was something I clung to in stressful times and I will always consider it the best decade for music. I had access to lots of concerts through my jobs on the campus and through my job at the Houston Post.

The ticket is one I posted previously when I blogged about some of the shows I saw back then. I had pretty good seats for Traffic at the rickety old Sam Houston Coliseum back in '73. I loved this group and it's one of the concerts I remember attending (not always the case).

Want to hear my kind of rock? The music I still fall back to? Give Traffic's greatest song a listen,

10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#7)

I'm a sucker for old Johnny Unitas items and I found this on eBay. It's pretty fragile so I scanned it for posterity (I'll put it safely away now) and for this post. The Unitas pics are probably from the same photo session that produced the MacGregor Staff photo and related pics that I posted this past November.

As indicated by the cover, JU is the featured athlete and gets a two page spread in addition to a second photo.

Sonny Jurgenson waxes poetic on eating right, etc. It's hard to tell by the scans but this thing folds out so that the text and Jurgenson's photo are each one page.

Bart Starr did NOT explain the 'Lombardi Sweep' play that they ran down everyone's throats back in the day. Of course, I always think of the late, great Ray Scott doing Packer games on CBS. If you want to hear him at his best go to 1:05 of the clip below and give a listen to how a pro calls a TD.

"Starr.........he's throwing for Dale...................[crowd gets crazy].......Touchdown." Ray Scott was just the best.

A nice bonus is the appearance of one of my favorite players, Tommy McDonald, in the brochure. And he helps date the thing since he was a one season Cowboy (1964).

Mike Ditka looks very young in his photo, yes?

My favorite network broadcast show ever will always be Homicide: Life On The Streets. It portrayed the city of Baltimore through the eyes of it's Police Homicide Division. It ran for seven seasons, the first four or five of which are about as good as network TV could ever hope to be. It starred and was enriched by among others, Daniel Baldwin, Richard Belzer, Clark Johnson, Yaphet Kotto, Melissa Leo and especially Andre Braugher.

The show was inspired by this book: Homicide (A Year On The Killing Streets). The author had spent a year with the homicide cops of the Baltimore City Police and wrote a really great book as a result. I seem to remember getting it from a bookstore as soon as I discovered the show. Excellent look at the workings of a big city homicide squad, warts and all. No whitewashing anything.

To continue my Charm City theme, here is the remarkable Nina Simone and her cover of Randy Newman's Baltimore:

Bonus material...David Gray doing the same song live in Baltimore. I've probably seen Gray more than any other performing artist. He's the only musical act that, when I say "So-and-So's coming to Houston, wanna see him/her, again?" doesn't get a moment's hesitation from my wife. And he's coming back again in March. I'm looking forward to it.

10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#6)

This one was a long time coming. I've queued up T-3s, 1910-11 Turkey Red cabinet cards for purchasing several times over the years and never pulled the trigger. I always found they were too expensive for one in nice condition, or in terrible shape for a price I was willing to pay.

Meet Solly Hofman of the Cubs. Known as 'Circus Solly', he was a centerfielder and utilityman who played everywhere on the diamond except pitcher and catcher over the course of his career. His career covers all or part of 14 seasons and peaked in 1910. That year he hit .325 with 16 triples which were good for third in the NL in both categories.

In addition to his ten years with the Cubs, he had two brief tours in Pittsburgh, one with the Yankees and he also played for Brooklyn and Buffalo in the Federal League. He played in three World Series and hit .298 in them. His Cubs lost twice, in 1906 to the White Sox and in 1910 to the Athletics but in 1908 they got a title with a five-game Series win over the Tigers. They had beaten the Tigers in 1907 in five games but Hofman never got into a game. I'm assuming he was hurt at season's end because he was an everyday starter that year garnering 530+ plate appearances in 134 games.

BTW...there are two reasons given in his SABR bio for his nickname. One story attributes it to a cartoon character of the era while the other to Hofman's flashy centerfield skills. This little nugget was also on that page:

Before the 1908 World's Series, [manager Frank] Chance forbade Hofman's wedding to Miss Rae Looker and demanded "for the good of the team" that the ceremony be postponed until after the season. The Cubs won their second consecutive World Series in Detroit on October 14, 1908, and the Hofmans did not dally. They were married the next day in Chicago.

As for the card...well, it's a beauty for sure. I love the color and the background. The Net54 seller had several of these for about the same price and I zeroed in on this one. It had the best front by far. There is a crease in the upper right corner which is hard to see in the scan and barely visible even in hand. It shows up in the scan of the back but the back had other issues. That is if you let the marks made by a kid in 1911 become an issue. They don't phase me in the least.

The checklist shows that cards 51 thru 76 were boxers including the wonderfully named Knock-out Brown at #66. Card #80, Charles Bender, is one card I'd love to have. But I doubt I'll ever find one I could fit into my hobby budget.  You can look deeper into T3s on the Oldcardboard site.

I recently pulled Lawrence Ritter's The Glory Of Their Times down off the shelf again. It's one of the few books I've kept since I originally received my copy about five decades ago. I signed up for both a record club and book club through magazine ads when I was in high school. I stayed in both for a few years until I decided I could spend my money in other ways.

Ritter's book was my introduction to players from the early days of baseball. It's now considered a classic and for good reason. Ritter's interviews with baseball legends are timeless. When I skimmed it last week I remembered why I enjoyed it so much back in 1969. It's currently cued up for a re-read.

 I don't know how many people are familiar with Rodriguez, the Detroit native singer/songwriter who struggled mightily here at home but became the biggest music sensation in South Africa (and New Zealand) in the mid 70s. Ironically he had no idea of the fame and fandom he had garnered due to the oppressive South African government's tight lid on media and culture.

The 2012 documentary Searching for Sugarman tells the amazing story of his re-discovery in the 90s by a nation that had never seen him despite his fame and, in fact, had believed he had commited suicide decades before. Highly, highly reccommended.

This clip shows the opening of his first live performance in front of a South African audiance and it's pretty crazy.

His whole story is carzy atually. While he was a sensation overseas he was dropping out of the Detroit music scene, getting a degree at Wayne State University, dabbling in local politics and eeking out a living at various low paying jobs. He never saw a residual check and later decided not to pursue those who cheated him out of his wealth. The Rodriguez story truely is stranger than fiction.

My wife and I have seen his in concert a few times. He's now in his 70s and has almost no sight and the last show we saw was a bit rough around the edges. But he's still got that unique voice.

Even better than the movie clip is this segment from his David Letterman debut in 2012. Give it a listen:

Bonus content: Here's the video of the song he tries to play in that South African concert:

The Pause That Refreshes

Taking a quick break at the halfway mark of my 10 things posts. I finished off this page in my 1961 binder over the weekend when the Yogi card arrived. An interesting (to me) page. Lots of yellow/red name/team blocks here. With a bit of blue and an orange outlier thrown in. Also lots of star power here with Kaline and Maz in addition to Berra who is at Yankee Stadium as is Turk Lown.

Lown was nearing the end of an 11-year career, mostly as a reliever and it was one of his better ones. Dick Ellsworth had a handful of very good seasons in a rollercoaster career. This pic was used again for his 1962 card.

I had never really associated the Ray Barker in this set with the 'Buddy' Barker on the Yankees when I lived up there in the late 60s. Same guy. He had a long minor league career and had a short stint with the Orioles in 1960 before re-appearing with the Yanks later in the decade. My original copy was extremely miscut so I recently upgraded it to this one.

Looks like Maz was photographed in Wrigley. Stobbs as well (he was with the Cards in '58 so it's possible). Stobbs pitched 15 seasons, mostly for the Red Sox and Senators. Coot Veal's name was always worth a second look as a kid. His real name is Orville Inman Veal.


The Braves team card is in the spot it would have been had Topps not messed up and mis-numbered it. They gave it #426 on the checklist but the back has #463 as does Jack Fisher's card. Sticking it in the 'correct' slot was a simple solution for me.

Those team card backs with pitchers W-L versus the other teams provided me with hours of entertainment. I'd wonder why Spahn could have such good results against the league but go 1-5 against the Pirates. Bob Buhl beat the Bucs four times but the rest of the staff could only win five? Then I'd probably remember that the Pirates won the pennant and I'd go look at the rest of the NL team cards I had to see how they fared against the champs. A great time to be a kid with your cards.

10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#5)

See, I told you they wouldn't all be cards. What we have here is the latest addition to my modest Jennifer Beals collection. I have a serious crush on Ms. Beals and have for a long time. I first saw her in 1983's Flashdance which I watched when it opened because my friend, Robert Wuhl had a one-line, very brief, moment of screen time in one of the club scenes. I won't debate the quality of Flashdance but I came away with an appreciation for Ms. Beals. (And, yes, I know she had a double for much of the dancing) As attractive as I found her then, she is one of those women who has gotten even more beautiful with age.

That photo is a promotional piece for The Bride, which I have never seen despite Beals' role. It just looked unwatchable. But it did also star one of my favorite musical performers, Sting.  I don't have much in my Beals collection....a few movie stills, a weird French poster/card that I showed here way back when, and a commemorative Flashdance DVD that came packed in a 'leg warmer sleeve'. I kid you not. 


(BTW....the White Whale of my Jennifer Beals collection would be, well,  Jennifer Beals 💘)

I wrote about this book (which I read for at least the third time last summer) on my 1959 Topps blog when I did some 'suggested reading' posts. Here's what I said then:

The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop. by Robert Coover is the most unique book on my shelf. 

 

Coover's book centers around J. Henry Waugh, an accountant who in his spare time, has built a fictitious baseball league the schedule of which he plays out using a dice based baseball game he devised. That's a little like saying "Hoover Dam holds back water".... it doesn't begin to describe the real treasure that this dark story is.

Waugh's league has 59 years of history, generations of players, league politics, feuds and rivalries. All of which has been chronicled in meticulous detail by the ever more obsessed Henry Waugh. Little by little the league has consumed Waugh and taken over his life (and the narration of the book after awhile).

Coover tells a great story and though his works contain no other baseball related books he has an obvious knowledge of the game and it's nuances. This is quite a ride. I had wanted to read this one for quite awhile and finally grabbed a copy a couple of seasons ago. I played quite a bit of Strat-O-Matic baseball as a kid and I was expecting a story of a guy obsessed with dice baseball. It's obviously much more than that and had me hooked from the start.

I mentioned Sting above and the fact that he's one of my favorite performers. I've seen him many times in concert, both as a member of The Police and on his own. My wife and I saw his Houston show when he toured alongside Paul Simon a few years ago. I paid with blood to get seats in the second row and it was worth every dime. They sang together, singularly, sang their own stuff and each other's. A memorable night for sure. 

Desert Rose, from his Brand New Day LP, is among my favorite Sting songs. It features a guest appearance by Algerian singer Cheb Mami, a not-so-great guy with a remarkable voice.

10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#4)

I had just about given up on finding Batman sketch cards on eBay. I check once a week or so and the same old stuff was there, most of it not close to being worth the asking prices. Then a few weeks back I saw that Nathan Parrish had put up a bunch of his work at very low prices. I've picked up some of his 'cards' before. He uses several different tools in his sketches, pencil, colored markers, and so on. I also like how he portrays the different eras of the Dark Knight saga. The one above is my favorite of the latest batch.

As a really cool bonus, he wrapped them in a Japanese paper, similar to how I believe cards were traditionally distributed. Although the paper was likely not this beautiful. Here are a couple:

When my kids were very young we had them enrolled in the daycare facility at San Jacinto JC (yes, the place where Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte pitched). The program they had was top notch. They required that one of us be enrolled so I took night and/or Saturday classes each semester. I ended up with an IT certificate. But that's a long way to my point...I took one 'for fun' non-credit class, Intro to American Roots Music aka...Jazz Appreciation 101.

The instructor was a huge fan of tenor sax legend Dexter Gordon. From that class, I came away with an appreciation of him as well. I nabbed this book when it came out a few months ago and read it over the holidays. Gordon was a remarkable talent, grandson of a Medal of Honor winner and son of a doctor. He also had his share of trials and failings. But the sum total of his music is staggering. The book, written by his widow (actually she finished his autobiography), is very readable and insightful. I enjoyed it. It's too new to be out there at a discount though.

I could have picked any one of dozens of Gordon videos out on the net. If your life is spinning too fast try this: pour a drink (Makers 46 is my current choice), find a comfortable recliner, and crank up some Dexter Gordon.

10 Posts, 10 Cards, 10 Books, 10 Songs (#3)

My wife has been out of town most of the week so it was the perfect time for a crack party. Now hold on. It wasn't what you just thought. You see I've had about a dozen graded cards that need to be in my set binder kicking around my hobby room for months. Today I grabbed a pair of pliers, a flat screwdriver and those encased cards and went to town. The result? Filled binder holes and a few upgraded cards as well.

That Mike Schmidt was one of them. He had a place reserved in my '76 binder and since it was filling up fast I needed him in there with his friends. A '76 Ryan joined him.

Here is Schmidt before he was free to breathe.

The others who were paroled from plastic prisons were from Topps 1959 and 1962 sets (all upgrades) and several 1961s. Those were filling holes. And rest assured that the broken plastic pieces were properly disposed of. They went into the recycling bin. The best news is that I didn't damage a single card which shows that I'm improving my skills.

There are dozens of Muhammad Ali bios. Just search Amazon and you'll be overwhelmed. But of the few I've read David Remnick's King of the World is head and shoulders above the rest. It's nearly twenty years old but the story holds up. Great writer detailing a fascinating man. Reading about the Liston and Patterson fights, which I thought I knew quite a bit about, was eye-opening. Amazon has copies for under $2 plus shipping. 

I grew up listening to Top 40 A.M. radio during the time of the British Invasion. The Beatles, Dave Clark Five, the Kinks, etc. Mixed in was a lot of Beach Boys, Motown and Philly Soul. But when I got to high school my group of friends (and therefore the music I heard) changed quite a bit. 

One artist I discovered and came to love was King Curtis. Curtis Ousley was a terrific sax player, bandleader and composer. He died far too young. I absolutely wore out this album in the early seventies. Heavy rotation in my dorm suite alongside Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, and Miles Davis.

King Curtis live at the Fillmore West  Soul Serenade

Bonus content: I found this video looking for the above one. It's from the Montreux Jazz Festival. I had this whole thing on a reel-to-reel tape at one time. Never had a player so I had to date someone with one. Here 'tis: King Curtis & Champion Jack Dupree Live from Montreux 1971