It took a little while, but it has arrived....
This is the Ernie Banks Diamond Die Cut card. It features a picture of Ernie Banks in the 1957 road uniform. That was the first year the Cubs wore a hat with a rounded C instead of a wishbone C. The '57 cap also featured white piping, which disappeared after one season.
I bought it about a month ago, but the seller didn't have the card in hand.He first had to order it off the Topps site, and then send it to me. I was a little nervous because I didn't know how long it would take. But my fears were unfounded and the card is now in my bulging Topps binder.
There is still one more Cubs Diamond Die Cut on my checklist, the Ryne Sandberg card that Topps added via their fan vote. As far as I know, the card hasn't been released yet. And when it is, I'm thinking it will be fairly limited and fairly expensive.
One final Hostess post...
The Hostess cards were produced by Topps. Today I thought it would be interesting to see it Topps "borrowed" any of the work for their flagship set and reused it with Hostess.
In looking over the 29 Hostess Cubs that I've got, I couldn't find a single instance of the same picture ending up on both a Topps and Hostess card. But, there were a bunch of cards that seem as if they share pictures from the same photo shoot.
I'll look at these player by player
Jose Cardenal, Hostess 1976 and Topps 1974....the big fro and Candlestick Park
Rick Monday, Hostess and Topps 1976; a couple spring training shots
Jerry Morales, both the 1976 and 1977 Hostess and Topps cards. The '76 cards are both at spring training; the '77s are at Shea, both taken in 1976 (the sleeve patches are the NL Centennial and Cubs Centennial patches)
Bobby Murcer, the two 1979 cards. This is one of the tougher ones. Both pictures are from spring training and it looks like he's got the same t-shirt under his jersey.
Rick Reuschel was the big repeat winner. He was the only Cubs player in all five Hostess sets and it looks like four of the five had photo shoot sharing. The only card not shared was the 1979 card.
Bruce Sutter The top two, and Candlestick in a jacket are pretty obvious. The bottom ones were a little tougher to spot. The Hostess card is from 1979, the Topps from 1977. It does seem like he has the little mustache and stubble in both.
Manny Trillo, 1978 Hostess and Topps, on the road in Candlestick, taken in 1977. The black band on the left sleeve is the marker on these, which the Cubs wore after team owner P.K. Wrigley died in April of 1977.
And with that, I'm done with Hostess....until I find a 1975 Rick Monday card!
Note: I wrote this Sunday afternoon, before the Cubs played the Mets later that evening. I watched the 9/11 ceremony the Mets had prior to the game and it was awesome.
When I first started following the Cubs, they had a pretty heated rivalry with the Mets. It was 1969, and the upstart Mets overtook the veteran, but fading Cubs to win the first NL East title. I was crushed and I also developed an intense dislike of the Mets.
If I had gotten this card in 1970 I probably would have torn it to pieces.
Things like a stupid black cat...
....and a blown call at the plate....
...made a picture like this one bring a warped smile to my face.
By the late '70s, both the Cubs and the Mets were both pretty bad teams, and the rivalry cooled. But in the mid-80's it got intense again. When the Cubs won the division in 1984, it was the Mets who were the main rival. There were some great games between the two team. A four game Cubs sweep of the Mets in early August is what really set the Cubs on their way to the division crown.
When division play began in 1969, the schedule was set up so that each team played their division rivals 18 times, nine at home and nine away. Usually, the games played in the first month of the season were with only division opponents. Then you alternated until September, when, again, all the games were within your division. It made for some exciting title races because teams knew that they would play their rivals six more times at the end of the season.
As far as the other division teams go, you would play them twelve times, split between home and the road. And for East division teams like the Cubs, that meant two nine game road trips to the West Coast, and lots of games with starting times past my bedtime.
Sadly, the schedule today is nothing at all like that. It's not unusual to be finished with division teams before Labor Day. But worse, you play teams outside your division only a handful of times. And that has killed the Cubs Mets rivalry. Now that they are in different divisions, the Mets are just another team you barely see.
The Cubs came to New York their one and only time this season over the weekend. It just seems so messed up to me that it took until early September for the Cubs to visit the Mets. Both teams and their high payrolls are going nowhere and the games had no impact on any division race. They are just a couple teams playing out the string.
Time moves on I suppose. Shea is a parking lot and the Cubs only play the Mets six times. I suppose I shouldn't care at all about the Mets any more. I bet most younger Cubs fans don't.
But I'm older, and still carrying scars from 1969. And it kills me that the Cubs couldn't sweep the Mets this past weekend....but I'll take 2 out of 3!
Sammy could do the right thing every now and then.
Fifth in a series looking at all of the Hostess Cubs
Today we've reached the end of the Hostess line, 1979. Hostess got out of the baseball card business after this release. The 1979 Cubs set featured only one change in the lineup; otherwise you'll see five familiar faces.
Ivan DeJesus was the only new Cub in the set. He replaced Manny Trillo, who was traded to the Phillies. DeJesus had been with the Cubs since coming from the Dodgers along with Bill Buckner in 1977. He was a durable shortstop, playing in almost every game for the past two seasons. In 1979 he missed only two games. The season was probably his peak year, as he hit a career hit .283 and led the team with 180 hits.
And the repeats....
Bill Buckner...the good news: he increased hit power, going from 5 to 14 homers...the bad news....it was at the expense of his average, which dropped from .323 to .284
Dave Kingman had the best season of his career in 1979. He led the NL in homers with 48 and drove in 115 runs. He also hit a career-high .288, which was over 50 points higher than his career average. The Chicago baseball writers voted him Chicago's Player of the Year.
Bobby Murcer was going in the opposite direction of Dave Kingman. The decline that started in 1978 continued in 1979 and in June, Murcer was traded to the Yankees.
Rick Reuschel led the 1979 staff in starts (36), wins (18) and innings pitched (239). He was also the NL Pitcher of the Month in August, going 7-0 with a 1.45 ERA.
Bruce Sutter was the NL Cy Young Award winner for 1979, tying the NL saves mark with 37. He had an ERA of 2.23 and struck out 110 hitters in 101 innings. He was also the winning pitcher in the All Star game for the second consecutive season. After the season, Sutter took the Cubs to salary arbitration was won, getting a salary of $700,000 (the Cubs offered $350,000). It was an unheard of sum for a relief pitcher, and after the 1980 season, the Cubs were not interested in paying Sutter anything close to that. Instead, they traded him to the Cardinals.
Fourth in a series looking at all of the Hostess Cubs
The 1978 Hostess Cubs set has the biggest turnover of the five. Only two players from the 1977 set were included in the '78 version.
Bill Buckner played in only 117 games, but was the Cubs leading hitter, posting a .323 average. He also led the team in doubles and was second in RBIs. He was the Chicago baseball writers Player of the Year.
Rick Reuschel was unable to follow up his 20-win 1977 season with another 20. He fell to 14-15, but was still the winningest pitcher on the team.
And the players new to the Cubs Hostess roster:
You can read more about the Kingman card here
Dave Kingman came to the Cubs as a free agent, and was the Cubs first big name free agent signing. A local boy, Kingman went to high school in Mt. Prospect at Prospect High, the same school that was later attended by Mike Quade. It seemed like Kingman was always hitting homers against the Cubs at Wrigley, so his signing was greeted with a lot of enthusiasm by Cubs fans. A severe hamstring pull kept Kingman out of 43 games, but he still led the team with 28 HRs and 79 RBIs. The highlight of the season was on May 14 when he blasted three homers against the Dodgers in LA. That led to an infamous outburst by Dodger skipper Tom Lasorda after the game.
Bobby Murcer lost his power in 1978. He went from 27 homers in 1977 to only 9 in 1978. He was supposed to form a 1-2 power punch with Kingman, but that didn't happen. This was also his last season as an everyday player .
Bruce Sutter was a breakout star in 1977, so it makes sense that he made the 1978 set. He saved 27 games in 1978, but also had 14 blown saves.
Manny Trillo was in his fourth and final season with the Cubs in 1978. Always a slick fielder, Trillo was an all star in 1977. His 1978 season was a typical Trillo season; ok hitting (.261 average) and good with the glove. He led NL second basemen in assists and was second in putouts.
Third in a series looking at all of the Hostess CubsAs with all of the Hostess Cubs sets, the 1977 set has six Cubs. Five of the six players were in the'76 set, meaning only one new player. I'll begin with him.Bill Buckner! Yea, Billy Buck! One of my all-time favorite Cubs came to the team in an off-season trade with the Dodgers. His card replaced Rick Monday's, the player he was traded for. You can see that the Topps air-brush artists worked their magic on this card, changing his Dodger cap to a Cubs cap. Buckner was injured at the start of the season and didn't play his first game until April 19. He set career highs in homers (11) and RBIs (60). Here are the five repeats: Ray Burris was an innings eater, starting 39 games. He was 14-16, but his ERA jumped a run and a half, to a scary 4.72Jose Cardenal, fro still big, but career in decline. He played in only 100 games and his average dropped 60 points from his .299 in '76. He was traded to the Phillies after the season.Bill Madlock didn't even play for the 1977 Cubs. He was looking for a big payraise after leading the NL in batting the last two seasons. Owner PK Wrigley didn't want to pay and there were some racial vibes to the dispute. Madlock was traded to the Giants in February for Bobby Murcer. I wasn't happy at all about the trade, and was even more ticked when the Cubs gave Murcer more money than Madlock was looking for.Jerry Morales got off to a hot start in 1977 and made the All Star team for the only time in his career. At the break he was hitting .331 with 7 HRs and 52 RBIs. He cooled off the rest of the season, ending up with a .290 average, 11 HRs and 68 RBIs. Rick Reuschel had a career year in 1977, winning 20 games for the only time in his career. He was 20-10, made the All Star team, and finished third in the Cy Young balloting.
