Sunday, July 17, 2016

Five Random Cubs Cards

I've got 14,343 Cubs cards from 108 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades.




1900s - 1970s: 1966 Topps #204 Cubs Team The 1966 Cubs were the first to be managed by Leo Durocher.  He said after being hired that his team wasn't an eighth place team.  He was right.  The 1966 Cubs finished tenth...last place




1980s: 1989 Score #532 Al Nipper  The Cubs gave Nipper his unconditional release at the end of spring training, 1989.  As far as I can tell he didn't play for anyone during the 1989 season, big leagues or minors.  He did return to play in 1990.



1990s: 1994 Donruss #507 Jose Guzman This would be Guzman's swan song.  He pitched in four games for the Cubs, went 2-2 with and enormous ERA of 8.15.  On April 22 he was placed on the DL with shoulder tendinitis.  He never played big league ball again.



2000s: 2003 Upper Deck #414 Alex Gonzalez Here is a card of the real goat of the 2003 playoffs.  If he didn't make an error in the 8th inning of game six against the Marlins and instead turned a double play, the Cubs could have gone to the world series and Steve Bartman would be forgotten.



2010s: 2012 Archives #205 Bill Buckner A classic look, with Billy Buck in the white pinstripes.  I never noticed this before, but Topps used a weird looking signature on this card.  It's not the one they used on his actual 1982 card.



You can read the signature on this one.


2 comments:

  1. RE: Buckner

    Proof positive that it's been some Topps lackey signing these cards!

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    Replies
    1. I once read a story about how the "Walt Disney" script logo was not based on Walt Disney's signature, so after enough people got upset with Walt that he wasn't signing his name "right", he had to learn to sign his name the way it appeared in the movies and TV shows.

      ...Which is a long-winded way of saying that I suspect that some athletes and celebrities have a legal signature and then they have an "autograph signature". If this is true of Buckner, then I would guess that one card shows his signature and the other his autograph.

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