Bill's Baseball Card Blog

1961 Fleer 1979 TCMA Galasso 1960 Fleer 1977 TCMA Frank McCormick 1939 - 1946 Exhibits with logo in bottom right corner (Thanks to Wayne Delia's Card Images for helping to identify this one!) According to mlb.com's Cincinnati Reds website, the Reds Hall of Fame (HoF) debuted in 1958 with the induction of Ernie Lombardi, Johnny Vander Meer, Paul Derringer, Bucky Walters and Frank McCormick. All were stars from the 1939-'40 championship teams. Over the years, inductees have been selected by a variety of methods. Currently, players that appeared in a game in the last 13 years are candidates for the Modern Player Ballot, which is determined by votes collected from fans, Reds alumni, and media. The candidacies of players that appeared in a game more than 13 years ago are considered by the Reds Hall of Fame Veterans Committee. Players must have played for the Reds for a minimum of three seasons and have been retired for three seasons. Today, the Reds Hall o...

Only five pitchers in the history of MLB have struck out 20 batters or more in one game. It's been done six times - twice by Roger Clemens. I try to collect a card that best represents each pitcher's accomplishment. In chronological order they are as follows. The first was little-known pitcher Tom Cheney who recorded 21 strikeouts in 16 innings to defeat Baltimore 2 -1 on September 12, 1962. Cheney's career spanned from 1957 - 1966, and he finished with a lifetime record of 19-29 and a 3.77 ERA. The card shown is a 2011 Tri-Star Obak I purchased on Ebay. The other pitchers that recorded 20 strikeouts did it in 9-innings! Clemens struck out 20 batters on April 29, 1986 in a 3-1 Boston win against the Mariners. A spectacular accomplishment -  period. But Clemens did it again a decade later on September 18, 1996 in a 4-0 Boston win over the Tigers! The card commemorating the 1986 feat is a 1987 Topps base set card (I think) and it states "86 Record Breaker....

Son of Sandy Alomar, Sr. and brother of Sandy Alomar, Jr., Roberto rounds out an outstanding baseball family. In 2011, Alomar was inducted into the Nat'l Baseball HoF, becoming the first member as a Blue Jay . [L to R, T to B] I'm never quite sure what constitutes a rookie card, but each of the first four cards (Donruss, Fleer, Topps, & Score) show his 1987 stats, and those stats are of the minor leagues. The middle/5th card is an 89 Donruss, and it shows his rookie year stats. That is what I typically consider to be his rookie card (or at least one of), but whatever. Last card middle row is a 90 Leaf/Donruss Diamond King. Bottom row shows a 90 Fleer, 90 Score, and an out of order 89 Topps (grrr - fixed!). This page starts with an 89 Topps Leaders, 90 Topps mini, and the top row ends with a 90 Upper Deck - this is a great photo showing TWO players airborne! Middle row is a 91 Fleer, 91 Score, and a 92 French's Player Series card along with Ryne Sandber...

Welcome to my debut post of cards from my Unique Cards album. Knuckleball pitchers showing or throwing their knuckleball on a baseball card is a pretty rare thing, so I try to find a card of each, of the very few knuckleball pitchers that depicts, or best depicts, their signature pitch. In the history of the game, there have been only about 30 legit knuckle ball pitchers. This I find truly amazing! I mean, how many total pitchers have there been in the history of MLB? 8,000? 10,000? Whatever that number is, very few pitchers have had success throwing this elusive pitch - crazy! I started this collection with some cards I had in the 70's & 80's (Wilbur Wood, the Niekro brothers, Charlie Hough, and Tom Candiotti). Then I started to do some research to see who else had even a moderate amount of success throwing the knuckler in MLB. Then I started to seek out cards of said players actually showing or throwing their knuckleball. This is my goal - to have a card of all the b...

I'm excited to present my Grover Cleveland "Pete" Alexander collection as he is a member of two of my main collections - the Nat'l Baseball Hall of Fame AND the Syracuse Baseball Wall of Fame! [Follow L-R and T-B] First card is a 2013 Monarch Corona reprint mini depicting Alexander as a member of the 1910 Syracuse Stars baseball club - a rare sight and a card that I'm excited to have! Second card is a reprint from an early card set (cigarette?) I purchased from Fritsch. The third card in the first row is a tape damaged 1952 Callahan mini, which is a cool early art card. It's another favorite of mine and one of several (most all tape damaged) I got at a card show for a reasonable price (less than $1 each IIRC). The next two cards are 1960 and 1961 Fleer cards, respectively. The 1961 Fleer cards are another favorite set of mine because I like the look and I love the variety of their subjects (former and then-current players, executives, and umpires). I...

Original, well-loved, cards from my youth. Rose: "I'd walk through hell in a gasoline suit to play baseball." My Story: I started collecting sports cards back in 1970 when I was about 9-yrs old. If I recall correctly, the first packs I opened in 70 and 71 contained a card of Pete Rose. Rose became my favorite player because of his hustle and desire to win, and he was one of the main cogs of the Cincinnati Reds Big Red Machine, my favorite team. (I still consider Rose to be one of the best players ever, but I have no respect for what he has done outside of the white lines) I collected a lot of cards up until mid 1975 which is when my interests changed, but I never got rid of those cards (nor were they thrown away by mom or dad, thankfully). I got back into collecting, on and off, from the mid 80's up to this day, but only baseball cards. Over the years, I realized I had a fairly decent collection of player cards from those days and started to organize my co...