Steve at White Sox Cards wrote yesterday about the difficulty in keeping up with all of the baseball card blogs that are out there now. The number just keeps growing, which is a good thing, but that also means its becoming harder to keep up with all the blogs. Steve uses his blogroll, which lists the blogs by most recent post, and just works his way down the list.
Right now I have 120 blogs listed on my blogroll. And I read, or at least browse, each new post. But I also haven't been to many of the actual websites in months. Instead, I use Google Reader to follow the blogs. I have subscriptions of all 120 of the blogs in my blogroll. I'll just check in with Google Reader three or four times a day, and it gives me all of the blog entries posted since the last time I checked in. I'll read the posts, and if I want to leave a comment then I go to the actual blog. Otherwise, I just keep scrolling down.
Using Google Reader means I don't see your headers or layouts. It also means that I'm not included in any site meter you may have. But I am reading your blog. So feel free to add seven more hits a week to your count.
So how do you keep up with the blogs? Are you physically here at Wrigley Wax or do you use a RSS reader like Google Reader? I'm interested in hearing what you do.
Pardon me if I've been a little 1972-heavy lately, but I found another interesting pair of cards, one famous (or infamous), the other not so much.
In 1972, Billy Martin was managing the Detroit Tigers. After a successful but tumultuous 1969 season with the Twins, Martin was fired. The Tigers hired him in 1971, which is when this notorious picture was taken. I guess the photographer caught Billy on a bad day, so classless Martin flips him (and kids across America) the bird.
Most of you have probably seen the Martin bird card already. But here is a very similar card of another Tiger.
Al Kaline strikes almost the exact same pose as his manager. But that is where the similarities end. Kaline was an icon in Detroit, and still is today. He's a classy Hall of Famer.
And he keeps his fingers where they belong!
There was some hoopla yesterday with it being the 25th anniversary of Pete Rose breaking Ty Cobb's career hit record.
The Reds are celebrating the event today, a day late, because Pete Rose had a commitment yesterday at........... a casino. Yes, you read that right. You can't make up stuff this good!
A little more than 25 years ago, on the opening Sunday of the NFL season (just like today....Go Bears!!), Pete Rose and the Reds were at Wrigley Field.
I was at Wrigley Field, too. I wrote a post about that game back in January, 2009. I thought it would be appropriate to rerun it today.
Baby, Bears, and Base Hits
Others who bought these Pete Rose cards from Chris of Project 62 have showed off their cards. Now it is my turn.
From the 120 card Topps Pete Rose Baseball Card set, a Pete Rose autographed card - very cool.
The picture on this card below was taken at Wrigley Field on September 8, 1985. It shows Pete Rose rapping out career hit #4190 to tie Ty Cobb as the all-time hit leader.
I was there. This is my story:
Sunday, September 8, 1985. My wife and I were given tickets to this game, Cubs vs. Reds. They were front row, upper deck seats along the first base line. This would also be my baby son's first trip to Wrigley Field-- well sort of. My wife was 8 1/2 months pregnant, so my son didn't get as good a view of the game as we did, but I'm sure he heard what was going on. He was born two weeks later, on September 22.
September 8 was also opening day for the NFL and the Bears were hosting Tampa Bay. The message board at Wrigley posted regular updates of the score. Early on, it was not good news as the Bears were behind 28 - 17 at halftime. But they ran off 21 unanswered points in the second half (and the Wrigley crowd cheered each time the score was updated) and they won 38-28. This got the '85 Bears off on the right track as they steamrolled their way to a 15-1 regular season and an eventual Super Bowl victory.
But the big news of the day was Pete Rose. He came into Sunday two hits behind Ty Cobb on the all time hit list. Player-manager Rose decided he wouldn't play Sunday because the Cubs were starting lefty Steve Trout. He also wanted to tie and set the record in front of his hometown fans in Cincinnati.
On the El on the way to the ballpark, we overheard someone saying that Trout was hurt and wouldn't pitch and that Rose would play. When we got to Wrigley, we found out that this was true! Flaky Steve Trout injured himself riding a bike and was out. Pete Rose was in!
He didn't waste any time, either. In his first at bat, he hit the first pitch he saw for a clean base hit. He trailed Cobb by one! Four innings later, he lined a base hit over Ryne Sandberg's head to tie Ty. Wrigley Field erupted. We were all on our feet, giving Rose a long standing ovation.
Now that he had tied the record, Rose faced a dilemma. His whole persona was Charlie Hustle, play and win at all costs. Charlie Hustle does not come out of a game. But staying in the game means he could set the record in Chicago instead of at home, which would make Reds management very angry. What would he do?
Charlie Hustle stayed in the game! He batted two more times, with the crowd roaring each time he came to the plate, hoping to see hit #4191. But there were no more heroics as he grounded out to short and struck out.
The game actually ended in a 5-5 tie. Rain came and in pre-lights Wrigley, the game was called because of darkness.
It was an exciting day that I will never forget. Official attendance was 28,269 (plus one soon to be born baby) and my wife and I are proud to say were part of that crowd.
Here are a few more of the cards from the set with Cubs connections:
Pete at the 1970 All Star Game plowing over Ray Fosse and scoring the winning run. Cubs manager Leo Durocher, who was the third base coach, is in the background. It was Cub Jim Hickman who had the hit that brought Rose in.
Pete at Wrigley Field, 1970 or 1971
Pete at Wrigley Field, mid '80's. It looks like the ball girl in the background is Marla Collins, who was fired by the Cubs after she posed in Playboy. And yes, I do have that issue (it was given to me by my brother-in-law -- I didn't buy it), because it is Cubs related. Maybe that is material for another post!
Yesterday my T206 Cubs team set arrived, and today you get to take a look at them.
I like the fact that Topps went with hatless pictures of the players. They said it was to pay tribute to the original set that featured hatless players. Whatever the reason, it shows some creativity and give the set a distinctive feature. That being said, I'm not sure that there should be too many more years of this. It doesn't have the buzz of Allen and Ginter, and frankly, it's starting to bore me.
There were a total of 13 Cubs cards in the set. I'll start with the three players from the past.
It looks like Johnny Evers is wearing a hat. I thought the players in the original set were hatless??
They are all Hall of Famers from the Cubs last World Series winner. But where is Tinker? How can we get a Chance and Evers without a Tinker?
Next up are the current Cubs....well, mostly current Cubs, since the dearly departed Ted Lilly and Derrek Lee are included. Starlin Castro's first card as a major leaguer is also in the set.
And finally, there was one SP with hat Cub, everyone's favorite psycho, Carlos Zambrano.
