30-day baseball card challenge, a few days at a time

tony at off hiatus recently posted a 30-day baseball card challenge, similar to a blog bat around

tony used a photo of the brewers' former home, county stadium, as the backdrop for his list of 30 different posts.  i modified it to feature dodger stadium.  i've failed at the daily part of the challenge, but i like the idea.  here are the first 3 challenges all wrapped up into a single post.  i'll try not to show just dodger cards...

day 1 was supposed to feature a card from the current year with a photo you like.  easy.  here's a 2017 topps heritage dodger team card

it features a photo of charlie culberson celebrating his division winning walk-off home run last season in what was also vin scully's last home game.

day 2 was supposed to feature a card with more than one player on it. also easy. here's a 2001 topps devil rays team card

it's got a roster full of players on it, but most importantly, it features coach bill russell in the front row.  he's right about the ray, fifth from the left. i mentioned this card in my previous post.  2000 was the only year russell was on the major league coaching roster for tampa bay - he had spent 1999 managing their triple-a team, and then moved on to manage in the giants' minor league system in 2001.  davey lopes and dusty baker show up on a bunch of non-dodger team cards, too, and i've just begun putting them in my post-dodger player collections for each of those guys.

day 3 was supposed to feature a card from the first set you tried to complete. for me, that's 1978 topps.  just to be random, here's bob bailey's 1978 topps card.

bailey played for the dodgers in 1967 and 1968, and hit exactly .227 (73 for 322) both years.  that's one of my favorite statistical anomalies, and i only knew of it because, back in my day, complete career stats

were printed on the backs of topps baseball cards! bonus back of the card info: "beach" can be abbreviated as "b'ch".

check your 6

i was pretty excited back in 2001 when i first read about topps tribute.  knowing that the set would focus on retired numbers, and knowing that the padres had only two numbers that qualified, i thought it was a pretty good bet that steve garvey would be included in the set.  spoiler alert: he was not. dave winfield (whose number 31 had just been retired in april of 2001) beat out garvey and randy jones to represent the padres, while most of the dodgers with retired numbers were included (no jim gilliam or sandy koufax, unfortunately).

still, there were some number 6 cards in the set, including stan the man musial

it's been a fifteen year journey for me, but i am down to needing only two cards from the set - ernie banks and willie mays.  i would appreciate any help in finishing off this set.

for a long time (21 years to be exact), garvey's number 6 was unofficially retired by the dodgers, waiting for his enshrinement in cooperstown so that it could be officially retired as is the team's tradition.  a funny thing happened on the way to immortality, and when it became apparent that garvey would not be elected by the writers to cooperstown, number 6 fell back into rotation.  jolbert cabrera, in 2003, was the first to wear it post-garvey, and many have followed - brent mayne, jason grabowski, kenny lofton, tony abreu, aaron miles, joe torre, jerry hairston, darwin barney, and now, charlie culberson.

there's culberson on a 2016 topps now card celebrating his division-clinching, walk-off home run last september, with his 6 fully visible.

fernando's number 34 still sits in mothballs, and i wish the franchise would pull the trigger on retiring it officially even though fernando isn't a hall of famer.  other than that, and barring some revelation (that should occur, in my opinion) about manny mota's number 11, i would guess that the next number to be retired by the dodgers will be 22.  clayton kershaw should pass 2000 strikeouts this season (and then some), and he is certainly on track to get at least a thousand more.  while it doesn't show his number very well, here is the 'bonus' topps now card

i received last fall after buying the postseason team set. as a bonus, i thought at the time that it would likely be the only card to feature carlos ruiz as a dodger, but he's in flaghsip as a dodger,

even though he was traded to the mariners last november leaving what i consider to be terry forster's number up for grabs.

two card bloggers walk into a card show....

for the second time, brian from hcsa and i met up at the monthly local card show.  we chatted for a bit and exchanged cards and other baseball related items - twins for dodgers - but only one of us brought a 1941 double play card for the other.

brian reached into the way-back machine and handed over this john wyatt card

that pre-dates all but three cards in my collection.

brian also finished off my dodger team set of 1951 topps red backs with this preacher roe card

and he hit one of my nefarious 9 needs with this 2014 topps high tek fernando valenzuela card

there were some other nice want list needs in the cards brian handed over, too, but i always appreciate a nefarious 9 hit.

here's a nice die cut jackie robinson card from 2015 topps stadium club

and a piece of joc pederson's bat from 2016 panini donruss

i didn't know much about charlie culberson until he hit the division clinching walk-off homer to end vin scully's final home game. brian gave me this 2016 topps heritage high number card of culberson

and i can't help but think that culberson has already had his defining baseball moment.

brian also included a tommy lasorda book in the stuff he gave me, and i plan to read it soon.  i recently finished reading 'lords of the realm' by john helyar which details the history of baseball from the owners' perspective.  it was great, and made me think less of the owners and bud selig than i had in the past.  the book ends with the 1994 strike, so it doesn't address steroids or realignment or the latest round of expansion, but i don't think there were any redeeming efforts by the owners during that time that might have painted them in a better light.  anyway, i would recommend the book to any of you reading this.

thanks for the trade brian - too bad we couldn't meet up at twins fest, but i'm sure i'll see you around!