I promise -- really, I do. Everyone's favorite Cleveland Browns collector -- likely because he is the only Cleveland Browns collector -- is Angus from Dawg Day Cards. Angus has been sending me cards regularly for nearly the past year now. I've sent him a few Cleveland Browns cards here and there, but it has been nowhere near an equal flow back to his post office box in New York. And yet, the guy keeps on giving. In the week between Christmas and New Year's Day, this card popped up in my mailbox:
You're right, Angus -- I know it wasn't that you were late. It's that you were thinking of me and cushioning the blow of another year on the odometer. To be fair, the cards that accompanied this card were well worth it. Angus knows my love of oddballs, so these cards hit the spot. Such as:
It's so yellow. It appears that this card from 1981 -- showcasing the veteran of 7 full major league seasons at the age of 25 going into that year -- shows Yount with a big ole wad of chaw in his cheek. That wouldn't surprise me -- a lot of guys in the early 1980s chewed tobacco. But, I don't know that I can recall any more than one or two other photos tops that had him with the massive wad in his cheek. He might have put a pinch between his cheek and gums, but not a huge slab of Red Man. Not usually. Angus also sent two oddballs from a few years earlier -- this excellent Gary Carter Hostess card from 1977:
Before this, I already owned the Twinkies version of this card -- stained by Twinkies 39 years ago. Now, I own a clean, not yellowed or greased up version. The other Hostess card is a nice condition upgrade over my previous copy of this card:
My previous copy was itself a condition upgrade, but it had a crease on it. This one is trimmed well and is in generally perfect condition. The final card, well, it's just a pretty piece of cardboard that I think was printed at some point in the mid-1950s:
A Del Crandall Exhibits card! Crandall today is barely remembered, but in his day he was considered one of the best catchers in the game. On his debut, he was the youngest starting catcher in baseball history -- see, SABR said that is true so it must be -- when he caught for the Boston Braves in 1949 at the age of 19 years and 3+ months. He was the runner up in the 1949 Rookie of the Year race behind Don Newcombe...but let's be honest: the three votes that Crandall got were probably from some racist sportswriters because Crandall played in only 67 games that season and hit .263/.291/.368 with 4 HRs, 2 SB, and just 9 BB in 239 plate appearances. Crandall lost his age 21 and 22 seasons to his service in the military during the Korean War, likely depriving him of two additional excellent seasons. He was an 11-time All-Star and a 4-time Gold Glove winner who then was traded by the Braves after the 1963 season because Crandall had been supplanted by Joe Torre. Crandall went on to become a manager, taking over as the manager of the Milwaukee Brewers from 1972 through 1975. Perhaps it was his own experience as a 19-year-old rookie that led him to agree in 1974 to start the season with an 18-year-old barely out of A-ball named Robin Yount at shortstop. Angus, thank you for the birthday cheers once more!
I have a Christmastime birthday. As anyone else who is similarly situated can tell you, those of us born at the "most wonderful time of the year" often feel a little short-changed when it comes to our birthdays. One of my law partners was born on Christmas Day and turned 50 this year; he said he could count on one hand the number of birthday-only parties he had had in his life. I'd have to agree with that from my perspective. My birthday is tomorrow. Growing up, I had a ninth birthday party in third grade when we went bowling. After that, I had a thirtieth birthday party thrown by the woman I was dating at that time and a fortieth birthday party thrown by my wife. I'm not crying about it, to be fair. As much as I dislike this old saw, well, it is what it is.
Note: I am not a Liverpool fan. In fact, I really wish that Manchester United had Jurgen Klopp instead of the Scousers. If you've ever met a Scouser, you'd know -- their version of "English" might as well be Dutch -- it's damn near incomprehensible. I went to a match at White Hart Lane (Tottenham Hotspur, if you're not up on your English stadiums) against Liverpool, and the Londoners around me were taking the piss out of the Liverpudlians -- saying things like, "you've got no education" and "you shag your mum" and other such ditties. But Klopp singing happy birthday is still class.
Anyway, someone else in the card blogging world who can understand this conundrum is Adam from Cardboard Clubhouse. Adam's birthday is 8 days before mine, and he posted his birthday meal as a post last week to celebrate. My wife and I are celebrating my birthday tonight with dinner at one of our favorite hangouts in Dunwoody, so maybe I'll have dinner posted later tonight as well. Enough birthday talk. Adam sent me a nice handful of cards that I'd like to highlight today:
Odd -- the Stadium Club insert photo would not have been out of place on the logoless Donruss. And, if you don't start humming crappy Cyndi Lauper songs when you see that insert, well, you're clearly not a child of the 1980s.
God I hated that song. Kind of like how some trades were easily hated for me as a Brewers fan both at the time the trade was made and in retrospect. Such as trading Dante Bichette for Kevin Reimer:
Or Nelson Cruz AND Carlos Lee for Francisco Cordero, Kevin Mench, and Laynce Nix and a minor leaguer. Basically, trading two twenty-dollar bills for a five and four quarters.
Happier times were enjoyed by John Jaha. In 1996, he hit 34 home runs for the Brewers. At the time, that was tied with Larry Hisle as being the sixth-most homers in a season for the club. Since that time, the Brewers have added nine seasons in which players hit more than 34 home runs -- no surprise there, to be fair. Still, injuries and weight problems led to Jaha's downfall as a major leaguer.
One of the players to add a couple of those seasons with more than 34 homers was Richie Sexson. He never really got attached to Milwaukee, and, as a result, the Brewers didn't get too attached to him and traded him away too.
Let's close with three cards from 2015. One of these guys was traded away to bring tons of quality to the minor league system, one guy is likely to be traded in the next 8 months in a similar-type trade, and the final one is likely to be one of the building blocks going forward.
Being all up to date means needing to get a song here that is all up to date. Here's a recent favorite of mine:
Many thanks to Adam for all of these great cards -- the return envelope is being put together nearly contemporaneously herewith, to put it in lawyer-speak.
