Sunday, July 28, 2013

Five Random Cubs Cards

I've got 11,732 Cubs cards from 83 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades. 

Last time the RNG picked only big name Cubs stars.  This week...not so much.



1950s / 1960s: 1954 Bowman #125 Warren Hacker  My educated guess is that the picture for this card was taken at Ebbets Field.  Hacker was coming off of a league leading 19 losses in 1953, so the '54 season had to be better, right.  Well, he only lost 13 games.  Unfortunately, those losses were paired with just six wins.  A 6-13 record is a worse winning percentage than his 12-19 the year before.



1970s: 1971 Dell Today's Cubs Juan Pizzaro  Nothing says a Cubs card like a Red Sox uniform, right?  These Dell sticker books used several pictures of players in the uniform of another team.  Pizarro was a decent starter for the White Sox in the mid-Sixties.  When the Cubs picked him up in the early Seventies, he was a mostly a journeyman reliever.  He started the '71 season in AAA and was leading the PCL in strikeouts when the Cubs recalled him.  He was used mostly as a spot starter and made 14 starts.  He posted a 7-6 record.  The highlight of the year for him was a 1-0 win over Tom Seaver and the Mets on September 16.  The lone run of the game came on an eighth inning home run hit by.....Juan Pizarro!



1980s: 1982 Fleer #607 Ty Waller  Waller came to the from the Cardinals as part of the Bruce Sutter trade.  He spent most of the '82 season in the minors, playing in just 17 games for the Cubs.  After the season he was traded to the White Sox.



1990s: 1994 Score #346 Steve Buechele Buechele was the Cubs starting 3rd baseman in 1994.  His average dropped 30 points for the previous year, though, and his career was in free-fall.  The next season he hit only .177 for the Cubs and the Rangers, ending his time in the majors.



2000s: 2011 Topps Next 60 Autograph SC Starlin Castro Most of the autograph and relic cards from the 2011 set were blue-bordered.  The exception would be the Next 60 set, seen here in red.  Though not numbered, these are somewhat scarce.  There's one on Ebay right now with a BIN of $139.  Of course, another sold by auction for only $14.35, so who knows just how valuable the card is!


1 comment:

  1. Starlin's signature looks a bit like SUCK which he pretty much did in May and June. Fortunatley it looks like he's turned it around hitting .326 in July.

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