Tim Raines baseball cards spent most of their lives chasing the the cardboard version of that other all-time leadoff man who plied his trade during the 1980s and 1990s, and who shall remain nameless (for a few paragraphs, at least).

In many ways, the cards mirrored the men themselves.

But …

Tim Raines was a giant killer, and that was never more evident than at the 1987 Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Oakland

That summer, Andre Dawson was playing for peanuts in Wrigley Field, trying to prove himself after being shunned on the free agent market. He was smashing baseballs like no one since George Foster had 10 years earlier.

In the American League, strapping young Mark McGwire was a rookie first baseman for the hometown A’s. On the heels of teammate Jose Canseco‘s monster rookie season in 1986, McGwire took up the Bash Brother mantle and matched Dawson homer-for-homer throughout the season.

But on that sweltering July 14th night in the Coliseum, two of the most potent lineups in recent memory battled to a 0-0 tie after nine innings. And after 10 innings. And after 11 innings.

And after 12 innings.

Finally, in the top of the 13th, NL catcher Ozzie Virgil led off with a single against Jay Howell. Lee Smith struck out, Hubie Brooks singled, and Willie McGee lined out.

The number-5 hitter in the inning thus strode to the plate with two outs and runners on first and second.

There is more than a little irony in the fact that that hitter was Tim Raines, the Montreal Expos’ speed burner who normally slotted into the leadoff position. On this occasion, though, it was up to Raines to bring home the bacon — and he delivered by smacking a two-run triple that gave the National League a 2-0 lead.

It didn’t matter that Juan Samuel — another burner — lined out to end the inning, because Sid Fernandez set down the AL in order after allowing a leadoff walk to Kevin Seitzer.

For the game, Raines went 3-for-3 and was an easy pick for MVP, besting all the sluggers and lockdown pitchers who had pushed the contest deep into the night.

It was a stellar performance by a superstar at the peak of his game, but it was soon forgotten as baseballs continued to fly out of stadiums faster than Donruss and Fleer wax packs flew off store shelves that year. By October, Raines had amassed 50 stolen bases, 123 runs, and batted .330. He was one of the very best players on the planet but finished a distant seventh in MVP voting, far, far behind Dawson, who won the NL award.

That season was a microcosm of Raines’ career: consistent superlative play with frequent flashes of otherworldly talent.

But he was always overshadowed.

For most of his time in the Majors, it was Rickey Henderson who relegated Raines to an afterthought in the conversation about the best leadoff men in baseball.

Even when Rickey had a rare down season, Raines was mired in the obscurity of Montreal.

And when the Expos finally let him go, four years after Dawson’s escape, Raines landed with the Chicago White Sox and was immediately eclipsed by “Big Hurt” Frank Thomas.

As the speed began to erode, Raines moved to the New York Yankees, where he won titles in 1996 and 1998. Stints in Oakland, Montreal (again), Baltimore, and Florida left the speedster with 2605 hits, 808 stolen bases (against just 146 times caught stealing), and a lifetime batting average of .294.

It was all great stuff, but by that time, Barry Bonds and others were swatting home runs like they were fleas, and the public was hungry for bigger numbers, more gawd, more flash. Raines slid into retirement as an interesting footnote to the pre-Millennium era in baseball.

It was little surprise, then, that he languished on the Hall of Fame ballot for most of his eligibility. It took him six ballots to crack the 50% barrier, and, even in 2015, he languished well below 60%.

But with the backlog of huge all-time names clearing out in recent years and an increased overall appreciation of analytics, Raines took a big leap forward in 2016, being chosen by 69.8%  of voters.

And then finally, in 2017, The Rock got The Call.

After a career that saw him slug .425, get on base at a .385 clip, and score 1571 runs, Tim Raines goes into the Hall of Fame as the eighth greatest left fielder of all time (according to the JAWS metric at Baseball Reference).

What better way to celebrate Rock’s election than with a little vintage cardboard? In that spirit, here are 30 of the best Tim Raines baseball cards ever issued.

Why 30?

Take a look at that uniform number flying around the bases in your diamond memories.

(This is part of a series of posts about the 2017 Hall of Fame inductions. Read them all here.)

1979 TCMA Memphis Chicks (#20)

There’s not much to this card other than the fact that it features a minor leaguer named Tim Raines two year before he’d appear on a “real” baseball card and almost 40 before he’d be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Seems worthy of your consideration, no?

1981 Donruss (#538)

Sure, Fleer may have been the company that ended Topps’ monopoly by winning a famous $1 antitrust lawsuit in 1980, but it was Donruss who really surprised collectors in 1981. After nearly three decades of pumping out non-sports cards, Donruss reached across the collecting aisle with a rush-job baseball set to go head-to-head with the other two giants.

While the cardstock was as flimsy as toilet paper and the photos were generally dark and blurry, Donruss scored a coup as the only manufacturer to issue a single-player Tim Raines rookie card in its base set.

1981 Topps (#479)

Of course, Topps was still king to most collectors in 1981, and their version of Raines’ rookie card has been the standard-bearer since it was issued. Never mind the fact that he has to share his debut with a pair of immortals: Roberto Ramos and Bobby Pate.

1981 Topps Traded (#816)

Topps used their first full, dedicated Traded set, at least in part, to ameliorate their whiff on featuring Raines on a solo pasteboard in their base set. His #816 is arguably one of his best-looking early issues and sees healthy continued activity on eBay.

1982 Kellogg’s (#53)

You can’t really run down the cards of any even moderately popular player from the late 1970s or early 1980s without breaking out that novelty of novelties — the 3-D card. In Raines’ 1982 Kellogg’s issue, he appears to be searching for lost keys, but it’s still a fun card.

1982 Topps Stolen Base Leaders (’81) — and Rickey Henderson (#164)

Rickey Henderson and Tim Raines appeared together on a slew of these League Leader cards in the 1980s, but this is the only one where Raines actually bested his AL counterpart, 71 to 56 swipes in the strike-shortened 1981 season. Perhaps that failing spurred Rickey on to his record 180 thefts in 1982.

1982 Zellers (#3)

One of my favorite parts about collecting in the 1980s were all of the oddball and regional issues that would wink at me from the pages of Sports Collectors Digest and occasionally make an appearance at a local card show. In the US, the 1982 Zellers Montreal Expos set was a real delicacy since it was issued in Canada. It didn’t hurt any that the Expos were loaded with young talent, and Raines was right there alongside Andre Dawson, Gary Carter, and all the rest.

1982 Perma-Graphics Super Star

The oddball parade continues with Raines’ 1982 Perma-Graphics Super Star issue. Each of these cards was rendered on hard plastic stock which, coupled with its smaller-than-normal size, earned the set the sobriquet of “credit cards.” These were another card-show favorite and a great impulse buy that was nearly impossible to resist.

1983 Topps All-Star (#403)

With its blue star, this card immediately brings to mind that hot summer night in 1987 when Raines bested all of the sluggers to take home the All-Star MVP award. He doesn’t look too happy here, but things would get better.

1983 Topps (#595)

Raines looks like he’s standing in the middle of a meadow, but you just know he’s getting ready to turn on the burners and make some poor pitcher pay for being too slow to the plate. Great design, and a nice full-body shot of the Expos home whites.

1984 Donruss (#299)

The 1984 Donruss set was a landmark in the hobby, combining vastly improved card quality with perceived scarcity. This shot of a peaking Raines is a perfect fit.

1984 Topps (#370)

The design is not quite as strong as the 1983 Topps or 1984 Donruss set, but the visuals for this underrated Tim Raines card are better than its counterpart in those other more ballyhooed sets. Great card that you can find for next to nothing most days.

1984 Topps Nestlè Dream Team (#17)

Topps made two Nestlè sets in 1984 — one 792-card parallel that the chocolate maker released in sheet-only form, and a special “Dream Team” set that was issued in small, cellophane-wrapped groups in the company’s chocolate candy bars. The former is fairly scarce, but this Raines card is a sweet example of the latter and a wonderful period piece for nostalgia lovers.

1987 Fleer (#328)

This was the year that all three major companies unleashed innovative designs, and the 1987 Topps set remains a classic that evokes the essence of the era. It was the other two sets, though, and especially the 1987 Fleer set, that set the hobby abuzz. Early-season scarcity sent collectors scrambling to soak up any product they could locate, and prices spiraled out of control. It may have been the first true new-product frenzy, and if you dared to open a pack, you could have pulled this cherry Raines card.

 1987 Fleer Juan Samuel and — Doubles & Triples (#642)

During the 1980s, Fleer revived a concept that Topps had used to great effect two and three decades earlier — the multi-player “candid” card. By 1987, Juan Samuel had joined Raines and Henderson among the list of legitimate burners, and he added a healthy dose of power to the mix. No wonder he took top billing on this card, but he seems out of place next to a HOFer all these years later.

1988 Donruss Diamond Kings (#2)

This is Raines’ only Diamond Kings card, and it came the year after Andre Dawson left Montreal for the Chicago Cubs. It also came as part of the first set that was perceived as massively overproduced almost the second the first cases came off the truck. No matter though, because it’s still a beautiful combination of colors and baseball.

1989 Topps Rock Raines (#560)

“Rock” looks every bit as powerful as his nickname would suggest as he prepares for his time at-bat on the front of this 1989 Topps card. There are those who would suggest that Topps was taking a dig at Raines for his “extracurricular” activities by using his sobriquet here, but we’ll leave that for the card truthers.

 1990 Baseball Cards Magazine 1969 Topps Replica (#24)

Back when it was still thrilling to go the actual mailbox every day and every envelope might contain an adventure of one sort or another, the best day of each month was the day my copy of Baseball Cards Magazine arrived. The writing was like nothing else going, and the articles were innovative and fun. I felt like I’d found my brethren. Maybe best of all was that the rag came with actual cards, inserted in the middle and featuring then-current players on classic Topps designs. It was heaven, just like this Raines insert.

 1991 Topps Desert Shield (#360)

In early 1991, the US plunged into the first Gulf War. Before we unleashed Desert Storm, though, we tried the more diplomatic Desert Shield. Though that sentiment soon escalated to full-on military offensives, it did give Topps the chance to issue a special run of their 40th-anniversary cards to be sent to our military men and women in the Middle East. Of course, where there was something new in the hobby, there was a way for someone to make money, so the cards quickly found their way to the stateside market. Here, Rock Raines is in full-swing glory beneath the Desert Shield shield.

1991 Upper Deck (#773)

After the 1990 season, Raines bid adieu to Montreal and landed with the Chicago White Sox. While base sets that year still pictured him in Expos togs, the updates caught him in his ChiSox uniform. As a first card with his new team, it’s hard to beat this 1991 Upper Deck high number offering, featuring a clean design and a crisp action shot.

 1992 Topps (#426)

After years of almost outright begging by collectors, Topps finally capitulated and ditched their long-standing love of soft, drab brown card stock in 1992. The new white stock complemented the crisp new design, and this Raines action shot is a perfect example of a card done right.

 1993 Stadium Club White Sox (#5)

Topps Stadium Club was one of a handful of super premium sets that lit the hobby on fire during the early 1990s. It was the darling of 1991 that had lost a bit of luster by ’93. In an attempt to regain some of that sheen, Topps issued 16 team-specific, factory-sealed sets, each containing 30 cards. This Raines offering is typical of the artsy photography and glitzy design elements of the era.

 1994 Donruss Triple Play (#268)

Full-bleed images, garish product logos, and a set name that makes it impossible to distinguish from 20 other issues of the same time period? Yeah, 1994 Donruss Triple Play checks all those boxes for being a poster boy of the overproduction era, but this Tim Raines card looks pretty darn good anyway.

1995 Topps (#77)

This must have been what opposing pitchers saw in their nightmares as they prepared to face Raines — Rock waving goodbye on his way to second base. Topps designs and quality came a long way between 1990 and 1995, huh?

1996 Pacific (#284)

There were just so many sets from so many manufacturers in the 1990s — does anyone even remember Pacific? We do, right here, right now, with this solid action shot of Raines coming out of the batter’s box.

1997 Topps (#334)

Any pinstripes card from the mid-1990s just looks regal, and especially if it’s coupled with a solid Topps design. Add in Tim Raines, and you have a triple-whammy that stands out in any commons bin.

1999 Plumbers Union (#30)

Thanks to the Plumbers Steamfitters Refrigeration Local Union 342, we get this team-color-coded card of a tough-looking Raines, ready to hack a baseball or maybe cut down a tree (yes, I know that’s not in the typical job description for steamfitters).

Cool oddball all the way around

2001 Fleer Platinum (#308)

Fleer may have missed out on issuing a Raines rookie card in their first set in 1981, but they got their chance to make up for that with their 2001 Platinum edition. Great to see an old design upgraded with better print quality and image crispness.

2002 Fleer Tradition (#87)

Tim Raines on a modern-day Goudey card? No way this one could have missed the list, even if Raines in Orioles gear looks almost as strange as Eric Davis would have.

Oh.

Right.

2003 Donruss (#285)

If you had told me that Tim Raines finished his career with the Florida Marlins, I wouldn’t have believed it. But this Donruss pasteboard proves me wrong and serves as a capper card that shows his entire MLB record. Still looks strange, but it is, indeed, a wrap.

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It has been well documented that the 1988 Score baseball cards set has no soul. That’s especially disappointing when you consider that the issue was supposed to save the hobby, from being great, I suppose.

Because the hobby was already great.

But 1988 Score was going to …

• Bring revolutionary, tamper-proof packs — though Topps did that in 1983.
• Wow us with full-color photos on card backs — though Sportflics did that in 1986.
• Include Magic Motion technology — though Kellogg’s and Sportflics already did that, in the 1970s and in 1986.
• Tantalize our senses with borders colored by the rainbow —  though Topps did that in 1975.

It seems there was nothing new under wax, or plastic, as it were. That didn’t stop Score from cranking out 74.12 million of each card, though.

Now, taken on a case-by-case basis, there actually are come nice looking cards in the 1988 Score set, and the photos are generally solid.

Some of the best cards include:

• Nolan Ryan bringing his Texas heat for the Houston Astros.
• Jose Canseco going all Paul Bunyan in the batter’s box.
• Eddie Murray powering through the strike zone.
• Vince Coleman scorching the basepath.
• Gregg Jefferies being an iconic rookie card as he throws to first base.

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But for this series of posts, where I’m picking the best card for each base set in the 1980s, there can really be only one choice …

Card #180, of Bo Jackson.

Awhile back, when I picked the best baseball card from each year, the 1988 Topps Bo Jackson took the Olympic-year gold.

But that card was off-limits for this series because I’d already written about it, so Shawn Hillegas took 1988 Topps honors.

And that leads us back here, where we can make ourselves whole again with the 1988 Score Bo Jackson.

It’s not quite the stunner that the 1988 Topps Bo is, but it’s not far off.

Bo is in his home white Kansas City Royals uniform, his powerful arms fully extended, his soon-to-be-troublesome hips ready to snap into the swing. Bo’s head is down and his eyes are locked on the ball, maybe a curve just dropping into the zone.

Will Bo make contact? Smack a home run? Generate a gale-force whiff?

The next split second would tell us, if we could only unpause the frame. But then … the moment would be gone, and we’d have to rely on our memory to recall it.

As it is, this card will live forever in its bath of Royals blue, on the borders and on Jackson‘s uniform.

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On this card, Bo will always be young and healthy and like no one else we’ve ever seen in Major League spikes.

And he’ll always have the best card from the 1988 Score set, no matter how much hope you still hold for a Gregg Jefferies comeback.

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(This is the 25th in our series of posts about the best baseball cards from the 1980s. Check out the rest of those posts here.)

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Choosing the best baseball card from 1988 is like picking your favorite sip of water.

I mean, there are millions of each to consider and they’re all about as exciting as — well, as a sip of water.

Consider the base sets …

There was Donruss, who followed up what we thought was a fairly scarce 1987 issue (it wasn’t) by trying to take their product world-wide. Rumor has it that they produced one set for every resident of China but then just issued the cards stateside when they found out how much shipping costs would run.

The gyrating red-blue-black-white borders, blurry photos, and thin card stock may have seemed like selling points in the planning room but somehow failed to connect with most hobbyists.

Then there was Fleer, whose red, white, and blue slanted design looked like something you might pull out of a box of Little Debbies. The Fleer cards were interesting, sort of, because of that fade-in thing at the top of each card where the player’s head jutted into the clouds and gave the whole thing a vague 3-D effect.

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But there was just too much busy white space and not enough meat — player photo real estate in this case.

Score debuted with a lot of fanfare because they were premiumer than the other base sets …

• Score had photos on card fronts and card backs, and the photos were pretty darn good.
• Score cards were also very colorful, with card borders coming in a variety of hues and card backs featuring lots of different colored sections and type
• And, they were the first normal card (Sportflics didn’t count) to not be sold in wax packs, opting for little plastic pouches instead.
• For a few montths, Score also had the hottest rookie card of the hottest rookie on the planet, Gregg Jefferies.

But somehow, Score fell flat.

After awhile, all the colors seemed like a gimmick, and they took up too much room on card fronts, just like the white borders of Fleer. And it didn’t take us too long to figure out that Score had made billions and trillions of their debut cards, just like all the other manufacturers.

Then there was Sportflics … no.

And finally, there was good old Topps.

Boring. Classic.

Now, Topps has been accused of being unimaginative for decades, and I’ve heard that complaint specifically about the 1988 set many times. But if you look at the design objectively, you can see it harkens back to some of the classic issues of the past.

Namely, Topps picked up some of the best elements of their 1957, 1966, and 1967 sets and plopped them onto the front of their 1988 issue.

Unimaginative? Maybe, but you have to use everything at your disposal to win in business, and no company has a deeper, um, Heritage than Topps.

And they do know how to make a timeless, attractive baseball card.

The 1988s are no exception, and given the general dreck issued that year, there’s really no place else to look for the best card of the pasteboard season.

But which one takes the crown?

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You Know … Don’t You?

Well, there are 792 cards from which to choose, plus another 132 with the same design in the 1988 Topps Traded set, but a few stand out.

Pittsburgh Pirates cards, with their black and gold color scheme, look good, so the second-year Barry Bonds is a candidate.

Nolan Ryan makes a solid mid-stride appearance, complete with dirt on his knee.

And the Al Leiter error-corrected combo makes for an interesting story.

But there was no more compelling athlete on the planet in 1988 than Oakland Raiders running back and Kansas City Royals outfielder Bo Jackson.

Topps did a masterful job of turning his #750 in their baseball set into a miniature power-swing poster swimming in Royal and powder blue.

Would Bo choose baseball or football? Or both? Or neither?

In the end, a hip injury chose for him and limited Jackson to the diamond, and even that career was too short to satisfy any fan.

But in 1988, Bo had the world by the tail and could do anything he wanted.

And that included appearing on the best baseball card of the year.

Bo knows it’s true, and so do you.

(Read all about this 30-day challenge — and jump in on the fun — right here.)

(You might also like our complete rundown of Bo Jackson rookie cards.)

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But beneath all that sparkling newness, there is always a swirling undercurrent of finality trying to sweep men away into that vast darkness of a post-playing-career world. It’s here that stories of struggle and frailty and determination and grit and, ultimately for everyone, acceptance grow.

Because Spring Training is for the rookies and the young, yes, but it’s also for the game’s old men trying to put together one last run, break camp and head north with the Big Team one last time.

Today, on Day 41 of my 2019 Spring Training Baseball Card Challenge, I’m celebrating those guys who are fighting one last time against the pulls of time … in cardboard.

And, while he may not have gone to Spring Training in my lifetime (though he may have … not sure) no one was better at looking old on baseball cards — on some of my baseball cards — than Minnie Minoso.

Sure, Phil Niekro and Gaylord Perry looked like grandpas on the mound forever, and Harmon Killebrew was famously white-haired on his 1975 Topps issue, but none of them brought the weight of time to their baseball cards like Minoso did on his 1977 Topps Record Breaker card.

Those lines on his brow speak of a lifetime’s worth of stress, not surprising considering he was 50 years old when the photo was snapped, and 51 when the card came out.

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Those heavy eyes, gazing off into the distance at a world that’s maybe better than ours, tell of the struggles he has seen in his life and career. As a black man who came to the Major Leagues with the Cleveland Indians just two years after Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby broke the color barrier, his path had to have been a rough one.

The hunched shoulders speak of a physical burden born of years on the road, chasing his baseball dreams, and catching most of them … and of the years he’s been away from the game, settling into an uneasy retirement as best he could.

And, yes, I realize that this card exists only because of a publicity stunt perpetrated by the Chicago White Sox and Minoso himself. He would play in four different decades, and then five, the first man to do it!

And he would do it as a member of the Southsiders, by golly.

Retirement couldn’t stop him, either.

See, Minoso hung up his spikes in 1964 at the age of 38, but Bill Veeck brought him back for three games in 1976 at 50 to make him a four-decade guy.

Four years later, as the 1980s dawned, Minnie was back for yet another go — two games, two at-bats, two outs.

Ten years after that, Minoso was scheduled to make a minor league appearance with the Miami Miracle to become a six-decade professional, but Major League Baseball kiboshed the idea, robbing us of the chance to see a 64-year-old man on a baseball card as an active player.

It was an opportunity lost for all of us, because Minnie Minoso carried the torch for all us old men who thought — think — that if things break just right, maybe … just maybe … there’s still a chance.

Check out the entire series of 2019 Spring Training Challenge posts here.

“When life sucks, pull a chair up on the porch, put the ballgame on the radio, and kick back with a cold glass of lemonade.”

Pretty sure that’s how it goes.

Just be aware that the sun won’t always cooperate with your cool-shade plans and might peek at you from under the eave of your porch. Especially during those late afternoon games, or the first half of a twinight doubleheader.

You’ll be sitting there sipping your cool beverage, feet up on the cat, listening to Don Baylor trying to coax Ron Guidry into hitting him in the rump when *bam* … you’re squinting.

That’s why you need to have a pair of sunglasses with you there as part of your setup, just in case. And if you need some fashion tips on shades, you might want to check out the Major League players in Spring Training.

Those dudes have winter-soft eyes and need protection at every turn, so they’re always flipping dark lenses, changing glasses, shading their eyes.

It’s a rite of spring, which is why I’m looking at dudes on cardboard here on Day 37 of my 2019 Spring Training Baseball Card Challenge.

Luckily, there is no paucity of guys who are willing to flash their fly eyes under dark cover on the cards that have graced our collections forever. Plenty of choices … tough choices … so I just had to pick one and go with it.

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Since I’m a child of the 70s, I’m going with Henry Cruz on his 1976 SSPC card.

Because … dude was fly, what with those curling sideburns, thick mustache, and stylin’ sunglasses.

OK, technically, they’re just glasses since he needed them to see and didn’t like contacts. But they’re dark and have big, black plastic rims. They’re awesome.

And ten years later, I’d have a pair almost just like them, but by that point they weren’t considered awesome anymore. They were “dorky” or some such nonsense. I still have them in a drawer somewhere, and I’ll slip them on every once in awhile in a pinch. My wife calls them my Birth Control Glasses.

For Henry Cruz in the middle 1970s, though, those were the glasses he used to play real live Major League Baseball with the freaking Los Angeles Dodgers. And later on, with the just slightly less freaking Chicago White Sox.

All told, Cruz played in the Majors for four years — two for each of the two teams — and saw action in 171 games. His batting line included eight home runs, 34 RBI, and a .229 lifetime average. Not the stuff of legend, to be sure, but still better than you or I ever did in baseball.

And you know what was the stuff of legend?

That dark-eyed, dark rimmed, pure fly guy look he sported on that SSPC pure card.

And if, for some reason you’re not enamored of that particular pasteboard, you can find Cruz on the small as one of four rookies on card #551 in 1976 Topps, right beside Chet Lemon, and right above Ellis Valentine.

Or if you’re a ChiSox sort of person, that 1978 Topps Cruz card is unbeatable.

So grab a Henry Cruz, a Country Time, and the cat, and get ready for some front porch baseball.

Check out the entire series of 2019 Spring Training Challenge posts here.

And I’ve been convinced for decades that winter is longer and harder for die-hard baseball fans than for just about anyone else on the planet. Our game belongs to the summer, after all, where hot temperatures bubble our blood and moisten our brows. Where green outfields make you feel like the world is just fine and always will be, even if “always” turns out to be just a few hours.

Winter is also disjointing — we go to sleep in early October (or early November if you’re the @#*A!!@#%!!!!!!!!%! Boston Red Sox) with our teams looking and feeling one way, and then they show up at Spring Training four months later as something else entirely.

It’s all OK, though, because we’ll learn to love whatever rendition takes the field this year, won’t we? I mean, sure, we’ll gripe about player moves and second-guess the manager and even turn up our little noses when certain players fail to hustle, but we’ll love them all through the whole hot, grimy season to come.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate what has come before. You know, get the guys from last year together one last time and thank them for a job well done. Or a job done, at least.

One way that baseball card collectors used to be able to do just that was through the Topps team cards that started to find their way into our hands just as the new versions of our teams were taking shape. It’s a tradition that’s been killed by “advances” in the hobby and folks wanting their cards to be “worth something,” but it’s still one we can roll back to each spring and remember the good old days (yep, I’m officially getting long in the tooth).

Of course, even in those good old days, many of us dreaded actually pulling a team card because it was wasted cardboard — I mean, why couldn’t I have another Wayne Krenchicki card instead of one that shows 50 (or however many) tiny faces?

Now? I love them.

I love them so much that I knew I had to include a team card here in Day 21 of my 2019 Spring Training Baseball Card Challenge, so that’s what I’m doing now.

Problem is, there are just so many to choose from over the 25 years or so that Topps made team cards, how do I pick just one?

I could have gone with one of the first ones, from the 1956 Topps set.

Or I could have gone with the epic 1959 Topps New York Yankees team card.

Or I could have gone with one of the colorful choices from the mid-1960s.

Or one of the expansion teams, like the Montreal Expos, in the 1970s.

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In the end, though, I landed on one card that really does give us a snapshot, not only of the team depicted, but of the era in which they played …

For most American, the summer of 1976 will always be remembered as the Bicentennial Summer. But for baseball fans, and especially for fans of the Chicago White Sox, the summer of 1976 was just another summer in the saga of Bill Veeck.

By the time that Olympic year rolled around, Veeck was renowned as a showman who introduced the world to jerseys with player names on the back, but also as a forward-moving dude who signed Larry Doby as the first black player in the American League history when Veeck owned the Cleveland Indians.

In 1976, though, Veeck was busy trying to get fans to come out and see a wreck (rhymes with Veeck) of a team that went 64-97 to finish sixth in the old American League West. A master of promotion and gimmickry, Veeck came up with something that was perfect for the sticky Chicago summer — shorts.

As in, he replaced his players’ pants with shorts. And they wore them during games.

And … well, Topps managed to gather the guys — in their shorts — and snap a team picture, you know, for posterity’s sake. Or maybe for ridicule’s sake.

Because, like many Veeck schemes, the shorts trick has been panned mercilessly over the years. And if you take the time to dig up some pictures of the players wearing the shorts, or some quotes from the players wearing the shorts, you’ll see just how much they enjoyed wearing the shorts.

Sorta like a Randy Johnson fastball to the nethers.

But none of that matters for us, because the 1977 Topps Chicago White Sox team card shows an entire Major League Baseball team mugging for the camera while wearing their cute little shorts.

And it’s just precious.

Check out the entire series of 2019 Spring Training Challenge posts here.

By its very cobbled-together nature, a new team is unlikely to have much success right off the bat, and its players are unlikely to make huge impacts. But someone has to play everyday, and those guys imprint their names on team history.

So it was for the Seattle Mariners.

When the Mariners took the field for the first time in 1977, they brought Big League ball back to Seattle after a seven-year hiatus that came after a single season of the 1969 expansion Seattle Pilots. In case you don’t remember, Bud Selig bought that team and turned them into the Milwaukee Brewers.

In between, Seattle was granted an American League West franchise and set about building the team, where they ran into Mr. Bill Stein.

Stain had been drafted by the Baltimore Orioles in the 33rd round in 1968, then in the fourth round by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1969. He spent the next three seasons in the minors before appearing in 14 games for the Cards in 1972. After another 32 Big League contests in 1973, the Cardinals traded Stein to the California Angels in September for Jarry DaVanon. Before he could ever suit up for the Halos, though, Stein was on the move again, to the Chicago White Sox, who sent Steve Blateric to the Angels (later on).

Stein spent a couple of seasons trying to find his way with the ChiSox, appearing in 13 and 76 games before settling in to more regular work — 117 games — split between second and third base in 1976. In that “breakout” season, Stein hit .268 with four home runs and 36 RBI.

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That was enough for the Mariners to make him the 5th overall pick in the expansion draft that November, and he was off to Seattle.

With such a lofty draft slot, expectations were that Stein would become one of the Mariners’ first regulars, and he didn’t disappoint on that front. Starting 146 games at third and seeing action in 151 contests overall, Stein established career highs with 13 homers and 67 ribbies to go along with his .259 average.

With a  few Major League seasons under his belt, Stein had already seen his rookie card come and go, a 1976 Topps card that showed him in his White Sox uniform. Becoming a bona fide starter opened up a few new avenues for Stein’s cardboard aspirations in 1977, though, and he took advantage with his first Topps Mariners card … and a 1977 Hostess card.

Of course, Topps didn’t have real photos of these expansion team guys in their real expansion team uniforms, so it was off to the airbrush lab to make due. And, since Topps were the folks behind the Hostess cards, too, there was more airbrushing there.

And we’re left with a 1977 Hostess card of Bill Stein in his White Sox jumpsuit/overalls that makes it look like he walked right off the factory floor, slapped on a gaudy painted Mariners batting helmet, and headed to the ballpark.

High art?

Nope, but a great representative piece of the times, and of the year, and more than worthy as our entry here in Day 8 of the 2019 Spring Training Baseball Card Challenge.

I mean, what else could you want from a baseball card of an expansion team in their expansion year?

Check out the entire series of 2019 Spring Training Challenge posts here.

You know … like he had and OLD uniform at some point and then got a NEW one. Preferably accompanied by a new team for this exercise.

Now, if there was one thing that was tough for Topps and Fleer and Donruss and every other company to pull off in the 1990s and before, it was delivering cards of players in their new togs in a timely fashion.

I mean, if you were traded early in the summer, you might make it into the Topps Traded or Fleer Update set that came out in November or so. If you were traded as the pennant races heated up, though, there might not have been enough time to get you into your new uniform before the following spring.

Before 1981 — and the first Topps Traded set — you were definitely waiting until the next season.

And if you were traded in the off-season? Well, you might get an airbrushed job the following spring if you were lucky (but that’s a topic for another piece in this series).

All of that is a long-winded way to say that I wanted a card for this entry that captured a dude in his new uniform at an early stage of his new-team-hood.

And I kind of wanted it to be a base card, as opposed to a Traded or Update.

And I wanted it to be a star(ish) player.

Yep, I’m being picky, but I’m old and feel like I’ve sort of earned that right.

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Fortunately for me, another old dude pretty much fit my bill to a “T” — a Texas Rangers “T”, that is.

All through the 80s, I knew Charlie Hough as the ancient knuckleballer who was able to keep trotting out to the mound in Arlington precisely because he didthrowa knuckleball. Low velocity, easy on the body, hard to hit. You know the drill, right?

But there were a couple of things I didn’t much appreciate about Hough at the time.

First, he wasn’t all that old — younger than my dad, in fact, and Dad didn’t seem old then and doesn’t really seem old now. Probably never will to me.

And second, Hough pitched for the Los Angeles Dodgers for ten years before he found his way to the Rangers. He was a decent minor leaguer for five years before — the story goes — he discovered the knuckleball while working with Tommy Lasorda and Goldie Holt before the 1970 season.

After making the change, Hough got to the Bigs almost right away, appearing in eight games for L.A. in 1970. It took another three years of part-time relief work, but Hough finally splashed down as an integral part of the Dodgers’ bullpen in 1973 at age 25.

Three years after that, he moved into the closer role and helped The Blue to some postseason glory.

By 1980, though, young hotshot Steve Howe was installed at the back of the ‘pen, and Hough became expendable.

On July 11 that summer, Dodgers GM Al Campanis outright sold Hough to the Rangers. Lots of folks probably thought Hough was done that point, especially since he was a ripe old 32 years of age and without a huge track record of success.

Topps was OK with it all, though, and they plopped Hough into their 1981 set at #371. The kicker is, the card showed Hough in his new Rangers uniform, complete with warmup jacket and white towel draped around his neck.

It was … a card of a player in his new uniform.

And, as it turned out, that white towel was not a white flag in any way, as the Rangers inserted Hough into their 1982 rotation. He stayed there through 1990, then wound down with two years each for the Chicago White Sox and the expansion Florida Marlins.

Hough finally retired at age 46 in 1994 with an even 216-216 record, supported by a 3.75 ERA.

And, of course, a place in our Spring Training Challenge.

Check out the entire series of 2019 Spring Training Challenge posts here.

(Check out our rundown of the most valuable 1981 Topps baseball cards.)

For most of his career,, catcher Vic Correll found his time at the plate much more challenging than his time behind the plate … but that all changed as he rounded third on his Major League tenure, and Topps made a big deal out of it.

Well, sort of, at least.

Let’s start at the beginning …

Correll was selected by the Cleveland Indians in the ninth round of the 1967 MLB June Draft, and spent six seasons working his way through the minor leagues. After all those bus rides and questionable meals, not to mention hopping to the Chicago White Sox and then the Boston Red Sox, Correll finally found his way into a game at Tiger Stadium on October 4, 1972.

The good news was, he started that game for the Sox against the Tigers, and he went 2-for-4 with a run and an RBI. The bad news was … well, he was back in the minors for all of 1973, and then Boston traded him to the Atlanta Braves for Chuck Goggin at the end of Spring Training in 1974.

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That was a sweet move for Correll, as it turned out, because he found some playing time with the Braves during Hank Aaron‘s crowning season. At age 28, Correll racked up 231 plate appearances and hit .238 with four home runs. He also performed well enough as a signal-caller for Atlanta to not only keep him around for 1975 but to bump up his playing time — in 375 PAs, Correll smacked 11 homers and drove in 39.

He also hit .215.

Not surprisingly for a 30-year-old coming off a Mendosa-esque campaign, Correll saw his opportunities start to dwindle. By the end of 1977, he was a 50-game player, a .200 hitter on the verge of free agency.

Also not surprisingly, it took Correll awhile to find work. So long, in fact, that the new season was already two days old when he signed with the Cincinnati Reds on April 8, 1978. He continued to “hit” like a defensive specialist in Cincy, clocking averages of .238 in ’78 and .233 in 1979.

Then, after staging a sort of mini-holdout in the spring of 1980, Correll tore his Achilles tendon in March. Surgery and the subsequent recovery sidelined him until August, when he began a rehab stint with Single-A Tampa.

It’s not the sort of thing that any player wants to go through, but something about the situation must have worked in Correll’s favor, because he played like a man possessed when he stormed back to the Riverfront in September.

OK, maybe not possessed, but at least bothered.

In ten games through the end of the season, Correll collected eight hits in 19 at-bats for a coll .421 batting average. Sure, his on-base percentage was also .421 and his slugging average was just .471, but still.

Topps must have thought, “but still,” too, because they took Correll’s outburst as a sign that he was coming back better than ever in 1981 and slotted him at #628 in their “great hats” set.

Problem was, the Reds released Correll in late October, and no other team picked him up.

And thus, Vic Correll and his lifetime .229 batting average and 29 home runs has a career-capper card, a distinction that eluded even greats like Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, and Johnny Bench.

But , hey … none of them finished as strong as Vic Correll did!

(Check out our other player card posts here.)

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In 1953, the Philadelphia Phillies gave pitching phenom Tom Qualters a $40,000 contract, immediately making him their highest paid player, eclipsing the combined salaries of his Hall of Fame teammates Richie Ashburn and Robin Roberts. The fresh-faced right-hander quickly earned the nickname “Moneybags” and became the poster boy for the bonus rule, which required teams to keep a player on the active roster if his bonus exceeded $4,000.

“It was somebody — a newspaper guy — who started that,” Qualters told the author about the nickname’s origin during a 2008 interview from his home.

Some teams struck gold with their “bonus baby” signings, producing Hall of Fame talents such as Sandy Koufax and Al Kaline. However, others turned a cold shoulder to players like Qualters. He pitched just one game on the mound during the two years the Phillies were required to keep him on the roster.

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“That was about the worst rule they could have ever done,” he said. “You had to stay there two years. I was there 1953–54 and a little bit of 1955. … Basically, I was a batting practice pitcher. That was a sad thing. A lot of guys were in the same situation.”

The Phillies front office had different plans for Qualters. They shielded him from major league competition until he finished his mandated service time. For two years Qualters suffered on the bench while teammates resented him for holding a valued roster spot hostage.

“For some reason, the management in Philadelphia had this theory that if I went out there and got beat up, that it would ruin me,” he said. “What a bunch of bulls–t that was. It was the most frustrating period in my life. I hated being there. Some [players] were really good to me, and others ignored me altogether.

“I didn’t belong there. All I was doing was taking up space for someone who was a major league player. Imagine how that made me feel; I’m hurting the team, not helping them. I’m not even getting a chance to go out there and learn the game. It was two years out of my life that was totally a waste. You can sit there, talk and listen to guys — sure I got an education about the game, but it’s not like being on the field and playing it. You can’t learn to play the game by sitting on the bench. I could have bought a ticket. It was just a horrible thing.”

Not all of the players, however, turned their backs on Qualters. He made it a point to acknowledge those who looked out for him.

“There were some guys who were very kind,” he said. “Robin Roberts and Curt Simmons were super guys. Jim Konstanty was [also] nice. There were other guys who didn’t want anything to do with me. As time wore on it got better and it wasn’t a personal thing anymore.”

Qualters was relieved when the Phillies sent him to their Reidsville, North Carolina, Class B team. From there he was promoted to their Triple A team in Miami. With the Marlins, he linked up with Satchel Paige and thrived under the Hall of Famer’s tutelage.

After a shaky Triple A debut, Qualters showed up to the ballpark still doubting his abilities. The ageless Paige knew something was off about his new teammate.

“I’m sitting down in the bullpen, Satch sits down beside me and asked, ‘What’s wrong?’” Qualters recalled. “He recognized there was something wrong with me by the way I was acting. I did not know what to do so I just flat out told him that I did not have the courage to play the game and that I shook all over, etc. He called me Climber. He said, ‘Imma tell ya, Climber, them sons of bit–es can beat ya, but they can’t eat ya!’”.

Paige’s words were just the right recipe to help Qualters get through tough times on the mound. It was the push he needed to move forward with his career.

“Another tight game and I get called up there and I just get the shakes again,” he recalled. “I said to myself, ‘You sons of bit–es, you can beat me but you can’t eat me!’ It was all over from then on; I couldn’t wait to get out there.”

Qualters eventually made it back to the Phillies briefly in 1957 before resurfacing with the Chicago White Sox in 1958. His time in Chicago led to the 1959 Topps card featured in this article. Even though he pitched only 43 innings, he said that didn’t make a difference to the baseball card manufacturer.

“They didn’t care what you did or didn’t do, as long as you were on the team [you had a card],” he said.

Fifty years later, the amount of fan mail he received after being on the team for only one season still amazed him. Topps even had him sign 300 cards for their 2008 Topps Heritage set.

“It’s been crazy the last 4–5 years,” he said. “I probably get 3–4 of them per week. I have a card from 1959 when they went to the World Series. I didn’t even play [for the White Sox] in 1959, that’s when I hurt my arm. A guy came here with 300 cards I had to autograph and [Topps] paid me money for it.”

Nick Diunte runs the Baseball Happenings website, which details current baseball events and features interviews with a multitude of baseball veterans. Check it out here.

(Check out our other player card posts here.)