The Infield Dirt with T.S. O'Connell - Thursday, July 23, 2009

   I read something online the other day that gave me a bit of pause because it emphasized once again the dependency that people often have in refusing to use their common sense and instead insist on having heavily structured environments that are so laden with rules that no actual thought is needed.

   I apologize for the long-winded intro. While quite properly noting the incredible season that Albert Pujols is having, the writer felt compelled to point out that the St. Louis star ought not be referred to as a Hall of Famer because he hasn’t put in 10 seasons yet. Really?

   Obviously, there are a number of tragic events that could conceivably take place that might prevent him from hitting the mandatory 10-seasons threshold, but they are pretty uniformly unlikely or nearly impossible, and for the vast majority of them it wouldn’t mean that Prince Albert wouldn’t get a plaque.

   Without pondering the specifics of any ghastly scenarios, if something happened that prevented him from reaching 10 seasons that wasn’t connected to any malfeasance on his part, our friends at the Hall of Fame would promptly issue a waiver of that requirement and the matter is solved. So the short answer is that Pujols is already a Hall of Famer, awaiting only the formalities of the passage of time and the induction procedures.

   In nine seasons (OK, 83/4), he’s had nine HOF-caliber years. That’s a Hall of Famer. There are lots of guys with plaques who didn’t have nine HOF-caliber seasons. And just as in Albert’s case, Ichiro Suzuki is a Hall of Famer, too. He has also had nine HOF-caliber seasons, and pretty much all the things I said about Pujols apply to him as well. Plus, I understand he had a handsome career in his native Japan prior to his MLB sojourn.

   At a time when HallofFameOphiles like myself are worried about how the great institution is going to reconcile its voting procedures with the stigma of the steroid era, it’s reassuring to have two first-ballot locks already in place, with very little on the horizon that could upset that happy ending.

   Almost nothing, really.

Thursday, July 23, 2009 3:36:14 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Can you picture Manny at Speaker's grave? ...
Posted by T.S.

   Ichiro Suzuki visited the grave of Hall of Famer George Sisler during an All-Star Weekend, paying his respects to a man whose name is so often linked with the Seattle superstar. With all the folderol and fluff that accompanies the game, this was a nice aside and a reminder that for all of our American magnificence, there are things in other cultures that we would do well to emulate.

   Ichiro surpassed Sisler’s MLB single-season record of 257 hits five years ago, and the Hall of Famer’s descendants – including his 81-year-old daughter, traveled to Seattle to be on hand for the historic moment. With that context, Ichiro decided to take time in the middle of his ninth All-Star weekend to respond to that gesture, according to a report on ESPN.com.

   “I wanted to do that for a grand upperclassman of the baseball world,” Ichiro told MLB.com. “I think it’s only natural for someone to want to do that, to express my feelings in that way.”

   Ichiro, along with his wife and several friends, laid flowers at Sisler’s grave at Des Peres Presbyterian Church Cemetery.

   The report also noted that though Ichiro had been an All-Star each year of his nine-year major league career, this visit to St. Louis was probably a bit more noteworthy because he got to meet President Barack Obama, who threw out the first pitch. Prior to the game, the President visited the clubhouses and signed a ball for Ichiro, who reportedly gave a slight bow upon meeting the President and appeared as giddy and excited as a kid.

   One presumes that meeting the President was similarly thrilling for most of the players, but I gotta admit that this is the first time I ever heard of a modern player placing flowers at the grave of one of the legendary figures who came before him.

   And I like it a whole bunch, if you’ll forgive the lame pun.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009 4:05:52 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Willie and Sy have excellent Cooperstown adventure ...
Posted by T.S.

   Some time tomorrow afternoon, a limousine is going to swing by Sy Berger’s home in suburban New York City. Sy, one of the great names in the card-collecting history of the last six decades, is going to jump into the car and head off to the wilds of Upstate New York and the tiny village of Cooperstown to take part in the various festivites that surround the annual induction ceremonies. And he’s going to do all this with his pal, Willie Mays, just as the duo has done for many years.

   One of the many joys of my job is that Sy calls me from time to time to reminisce a bit, and he almost always mentions his enduring friendship with Willie. Berger’s characterization of Mays as a sweetheart of a guy may conflict a bit with a lot of conventional hobby wisdom about the Hall of Famer, but I don’t doubt for a minute the sincerity of his affection. They go back a very long way.

(Willie is pictured in an incredible painting by yet another well-known hobby figure, Mike Schacht.)

   “Back in 1951, Willie was just a kid and I met him in the Giants locker room,” Berger told me in a 2000 interview for SCD. Sy is now 86 and Willie is all of 78, and they share a lifetime of memories that trace their lineage all the way back to the Polo Grounds that year.

   “Willie was just a nervous kid, and since it was my first trip to a big-league locker room, I was nervous, too. As Willie says, he was scared and looking for a friendly face, and I walked in. I am probably one of his best and oldest friends.”

   Sy befriended literally hundreds of ballplayers over the years as he waved those exclusive Topps contracts around major league dugouts and helped conceive and design some of the most beloved – and valuable – postwar baseball card sets ever created. His stories of wrasslin’ with Willie over just about every aspect of Mays’ cards are priceless, and it must have paid off because the great center fielder ended up nearly two dozen classics. They obviously would have been valuable just because they were his cards, but it’s pretty neat that they also were pretty uniformly wonderful pasteboards.

   Just the thought of those two icons palling around for four days in that bucolic shrine to the greatest game on Earth is enough to bring a smile to my face. Also a nice reminder that there are baseball immortals who don’t end up on a bronze plaque but nonetheless have an unshakable claim to a role in the game’s lore and legend.

   Have a nice weekend, guys.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009 4:08:00 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Monday, July 20, 2009

Here is where the T206 Wagner mythology started ...
Posted by T.S.

   SCD reader Tom Sims sent me a photocopied newspaper article from 65 years ago that would seem to be a strong suspect in determining where the overheated lore and legend surrounding the Honus Wagner T206 card might have got its foothold.

   According to the article in the Sunday, March 23, 1944, Philadelphia Record, “Cigarette sports cards are collector’s items now,” the old cards that would be unknown to the current generation “are a much-sought collector’s item today.”

   In the bylined story that also pictured 16 early tobacco cards – the Wagner and mostly T206s and T205s – the writer states without any attribution that there are only two known cigarette cards of the bowlegged Hans now in existence, adding that each is worth about $20 to $25.

   The article goes on to state that Charles Bray of East Bangor, Pa., owns one, with the other belonging to John Wagner (no relation), of Harrisburg, Pa. That Wagner was actually quoted in the article, telling the writer that Hans had come to Harrisburg for an exhibition game many years ago.

   “I asked him why his picture did not appear on the cigarette cards,” the non-immortal Wagner was quoted as saying. “He told me that he did not believe an athlete should use tobacco and for that reason turned down all offers made to him by the cigarette companies for the use of his picture.”

   The article also quoted Jeff Burdick of Syracuse, N.Y., but not specifically about the T206 Wagner but about collecting cigarette cards in general.

   Of such humble beginnings does grand mythology get its start. Never mind that Wagner is shown a few years later on his 1949 Leaf in the process of stuffing a big wad of chewing tobacco into his mouth (shown above), or that the timing of his famous withdrawal of the card from the 1909-11 White Border Series just happened to conincide with a period in American jurisprudence when litigation and legal thought was evolving about compensation for public figures for commerical use of their likenesses.

   I just wish that the Philadelphia Record reporter had made one more phone call. Honus Wagner was a mere 70 years old at the time and would live another 11 years before dying in December of 1955 in Carnegie, Pa.

   What the hell, it’s more fun with all of the confusion and mythology.

Monday, July 20, 2009 5:16:25 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Thursday, July 16, 2009

It is fun having a mission at the National Convention ...
Posted by T.S.

   Let’s face it, the National Convention would be a cool idea no matter where the show was held. Just like the great early shows in the hobby’s history, it’s the dealers who make the show something special, and that group remains largely intact every year except for the sad attrition that comes with a hobby so thoroughly populated by old geezers.

   I know in recent years, say the last 15 or so, the autograph lineup has assumed a much greater role in bringing folks through the front door, but that’s a solution without a terribly happy ending, in part because it becomes more expensive every year to keep the same big names on the signing roster. Meanwhile, the dealers quite correctly remain the focus of the famed show, now celebrating its 30th anniversary.

   When I go to the National I try to have at least a general idea of what I’m looking for, if for no other reason than to give myself a sense of direction in chasing down various dealers. It’s too bad that I have to be selective, but given all my duties at the National as editor of SCD, there’s only a limited amount of time I can spend off the books, so to speak.

   So this year, along with just generally looking for interesting stuff for the magazine, I am in search of an unopened pack, wax or cello, of 1959 Topps Baseball. I realize how challenging that can be, having passed – perhaps unfortunately – on a neat 1959 cello last year from Baseball Card Exchange.

   That cello had Wes Covington showing, but that’s not particularly vital to me, since I would be buying it to open it up. As some readers may recall, I opened a 1960 Topps cello on my 50th birthday in 2000 (and chronicled the results in SCD), so now I would like to open a 1959 pack for my 60th, which should come along in about a year.

   My other fun search is for boxes of that goofy 1994 Upper Deck All-Time Heroes issue of black-and-white cards of old-timers. The set isn’t particularly valuable (maybe $20 or less), but the boxes do have the two 1954 Topps Ted Williams cards that weren’t in the Topps reprint issue that year, along with an ersatz Mickey Mantle card. All three might set you back $200 if you bought them from a dealer. I think it’s one of the toughest unopened boxes from the last 20 years, largely because I figure most of the boxes were quite savagely opened up in search of those three inserts.

   I’ll let you know if I spot any boxes in Cleveland, and you’ll also be the first to know if I pull the trigger – or even find – a 1959 Topps pack for next year’s loosely planned festivities.

Thursday, July 16, 2009 3:07:23 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Wednesday, July 15, 2009

MLB pushes the irony threshold in lying to Pete Rose ...
Posted by T.S.

   There was a four-paragraph Associated Press story the other day that essentially said that the status quo remains unchanged in MLB’s two-decade kabuki dance with Pete Rose.

   ST. LOUIS – Pete Rose’s application for reinstatement remains under review – 12 years after he submitted it.
   The career hits leader agreed to a lifetime ban from baseball in 1989 after an investigation concluded he bet on the Cincinnati Reds to win while he was manager of the team.
   Baseball commissioner Bud Selig said Tuesday he still is examining it and did not provide a timetable for a decision.
   Rose met with Selig in November 2002. His effort to gain reinstatement appeared to falter after he admitted in his 2004 autobiography, “Pete Rose: My Prison Without Bars,” that his previous gambling denials were false.

   I don’t know about you, but the idea that Selig is still “examining” Pete’s petition for reinstatement looks more like an Onion headline than anything else. If the truth is really that Pete will not be reinstated as long as Bud Selig holds the gavel, then it would makes us all feel more like adults if somebody actually indicated as much.

   Though I am sure it was unintended, I also got a chuckle out of the last paragraph that noted his “effort to gain reinstatement” faltered after it turned out that Rose had actually been, gasp!, lying about the betting on baseball thing for 15 years. Do we really suppose there was anyone in the Commissioner’s office startled by Pete’s admittedly long-ovedue admission?

   I am sure it’s hardly good form to suggest such a thing, but it says here that lying repeatedly to Pete Rose is only slightly less disagreeable than having Pete Rose lying repeatedly to the entire Western Hemisphere.

   I always figured it was the lying part that aggravated the average fan the most about the Pete Rose case, so it’s more than a little ironic to punish his transgression with more lying from another direction.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009 4:06:03 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Monday, July 13, 2009

Stark works his magic with Pujols & Co. ...
Posted by T.S.

   Speaking of art, one of the top sports artists around, Ron Stark, has provided his talents to Upper Deck for a promotional effort that’s part of the All-Star FanFest currently underway in St. Louis.

   Stark, son of the legendary former New York Daily News staff artist Bruce Stark, produced the painting shown here that depicts Ozzie Smith, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Albert Pujols and Stan Musial side-by-side in the new stadium. Stark’s incredible work, which has appeared in the pages of Sports Collectors Digest for more than 15 years (www.ronstarkstudios.com), neatly manages to plunk down guys from four different eras quite nicely, no easy challenge given the necessity to work from photographs that makes such an undertaking fraught with difficulties.

   The original artwork has been on display throughout FanFest, which is apparently headed for record attendance numbers in historically baseball-crazy St. Louis. The painting will be auctioned tomorrow as a special addition to Hunt’s All-Star Auction held in conjunction with the game. In addition, the painting is also featured in a Cardinals Painting card that is randomly seeded and numbered to 500 in Upper Deck redemption packs distributed at FanFest.

   Once I got out of the Navy in 1972, I made a kind of ill-advised vow that I would never stand in line for anything if I could help it for the rest of my life. Lining up for what seemed like forever for the privilege of eating crappy powdered eggs on an aircraft carrier in the South China Sea had prompted the ban, but it probably hurt me years later when I wouldn’t get my Macroeconomics textbooks until about five weeks into the semester.

   I mention this because I would stand in line for one of these cards. Nuff said. And no, that’s not a clever plug to have anyone send me one. It’s just an editorial comment.

Monday, July 13, 2009 3:15:21 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Thursday, July 09, 2009

Just like Nettles, this guy is an All-Star ...
Posted by T.S.

   As I have noted as number of times, having the opportunity to put a lot of spectacular artwork into the pages of Sports Collectors Digest over the last 15-plus years has been one of many joys connected to my work.

   I’ve never actually elucidated any criteria, but probably should have noted that there are a wide range of variables at play in deciding who merits regular SCD inclusion, not all of which would speak specifically to the quality of an individual’s work. I toss out that somewhat awkward sentence by way of noting that there are a lot of incredible artists who we would have loved to have featured but for any number of reasons haven’t.

http://www.graigkreindler.com/

   Graig Kreindler falls into that category, and the reason he hasn’t been there is the simplest of all: I had never seen the work before. I came across it from a forum thread on the Net54baseball.com site. I am looking forward to putting this stuff into SCD the first chance I get; his work is as spectacular as it is unconventional.

   I say “unconventional” in the good sense, in that it seems to be so unique as to defy easy categorization. I’ll offer this little glimpse here, with hopes (plans, really) to have a more prominent utilization both online and in SCD in coming months. I love this stuff!

   And remember, if you go looking for him in cyberspace, his name is Graig, as in Nettles, not Craig, as in list. Makes a big difference.

   I am also hoping to get to meet the artist at the National Convention in Cleveland in a couple of weeks, where he will be set up. I’ve got a feeling that his workload is going to increase dramatically in coming months, whether it’s from private commissions or if the card company guys rope him into their already-imposing stable of artists.

   Geez, I wish I’d seen his work about a year earlier. I would have loved to have a half-dozen or more of these pieces in the Legendary Yankee Stadium: Memories & Memorabilia from the House That Ruth Built book that we just released.

   How’s that for sneaking in a book plug? Subtle, eh?

Thursday, July 09, 2009 4:24:54 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Mannys real crime is the way he wears his pants ...
Posted by T.S.

   You gotta admit, this is a strange country we live in. In a week when a former secretary of defense who was one of the principal architects of the Vietnam War dies, his passing is barely noted because the media is fixated on the passing of an infinitely more famous (infamous?) pop star.

   In the world of sports, the fourth estate probably suffers from the same curious contradictions, but in least in our world the absurdities don’t always pass unnoticed.

   (Lou Gehrig is pictured at left in an incredible pencil drawing by Nathalie Rattner – nrattner@shaw.ca.)

Keith Olbermann, hobbyist, columnist and MSNBC anchor, and another baseball broadcaster, Tim McCarver, both pointed out the grotesque juxtaposition of MLB’s honoring Lou Gehrig on the 70th anniversary of his “luckiest man on the face

of the Earth” speech on the same day that Manny Ramirez made his, dare I say it, triumphant return after serving a 50-game suspension for using some kind of banned female-fertility drug. Don’t ask.

   I applaud both our most-famous columnist and the outspoken McCarver for reminding a wider audience that while we are certainly permitted to display outsized affection and allegiances in directions that would seem to conflict mightily with our vaunted “values,” there will hopefully always be a handful of commentators who will be quick to point it out to us.

   Every time I make an observation like that, I get this vague feeling that I am being dismissed as yet another angry old fart lamenting about how grand everything was way back when. That’s potentially intimidating, if you let it be, which I don’t. Truth is, some things were better 30 years ago than they are now. Probably not everything, but certainly some things.

   I sort of shrug off any potential aggravation from Manny’s exploits simply because he seems to me to be a product of the times. He’s our sports world Frankenstein, and since we made him what he is, I don’t get as mad at him as I otherwise might.

   On the other hand, I don’t forgive him for wearing his pants like that. It’s certainly his choice if he’d rather look like a Good Humor man than a baseball player, but I don’t have to like it.

Wednesday, July 08, 2009 5:21:51 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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Monday, July 06, 2009

Spoiled by three decades of NL All-Star dominance ...
Posted by T.S.

   When I was a young man, which I suppose could conceivably be thought to include the years between 1968-90, I generally took it as a matter of faith that the National League was superior to the American League. I guess I would trace this prejudice back to when I was a young boy, say 1960 or so, when I would watch the All-Star Game(s) with a rapture and enthusiasm that I’ve had difficulty replicating with the passage of time.

   (Since there's a rather pronounced fantasy element to the All-Star Game, illustrating it with a fantasy card "That Never Was" seem like a good idea. Famed graphic designer Keith Conforti took care of that nicely with the ersatz 1960 Topps All-Star card shown here.)

The reason I used the plural contrivance “All-Star Game(s)” is because my first recollection of watching the game on television was when they were playing two games every summer, first two days apart and then more than a week separating them.

   I was already a National League fan, thanks to Henry Aaron and the Milwaukee Braves, but once I started genuflecting in front of the flickering black-and-white television images in mid-July, the allegiance expanded to encompass the entire league.

   And so for the next 25 years, by which time I would be 35 years old and technically no longer a “young man,” I had to suffer through the indignity of watching my guys lose seven games. In 25 years! And despite the rarity, I still regarded it as an affront when those other guys won.

   Actually, one of those seven I didn’t get to watch, since I was on an aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of Viet Nam in 1971. Ironically, Aaron hit a home run in that one and so I didn’t get to see it, either.

   But other than that it’s probably fair to say I got a little spoiled over that span. I used to have a standing $50 bet with a guy I knew from my college days, a tavern owner, and as I recall I collected on that nine years in a row until I moved from New York State to Delaware in 1983. We suspended the bet, and the American League promptly won.

   And now a couple of the younger fellas here at the office reminded me today that the National League hasn’t won an All-Star Game in the last 12 tries. That peculiar language is employed because my guys haven’t lost 12 in a row; the 2002 version ended in a tie.

   That was also the last one I’ve been at. Probably just a coincidence.

Monday, July 06, 2009 3:30:20 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)

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