1999 Philadelphia Phillies Photo Cards

Number of Cards:  36
Card Size:  4" x 6"

Description:  The fronts of the photo cards once again feature full color photos with the player's, coach's or manager's name in white letters against a blue band.  Scott Rolen's card celebrates his 1998 Gold Glove win with a picture of a Gold Glove on the front of his card.  The card backs feature biographical information and complete career statistics.

How Distributed:  The 36-card set was available for sale at Veterans Stadium throughout the season.  For the fifth year in a row, there was no update set issued.

Complete Set Checklist (Unnumbered, presented here alphabetically with uniform number and position from the back of cards): 

1. Bobby Abreu (#53 - OF) 2. Marlon Anderson (#16 - 2B) 3. Alex Arias (#26 - INF) 4. Gary Bennett (#14 - C) 5. Jeff Brantley (#45 - RHP) 6. Billy Brewer (#49 - LHP) 7. Rico Brogna (#2 - 1B) 8. Paul Byrd (#34 - RHP) 9. Galen Cisco (#43 - Pitching Instructor)      10. Chuck Cottier (#3 - Bench Coach) 11. Dave Doster (#15 - INF) 12. Rob Ducey (#25 - OF)

13. Terry Francona (#7 - MG) 14. Ron Gant (#5 - OF) 15. Doug Glanville (#6 - OF) 16. Wayne Gomes (#61 - RHP) 17. Mike Grace (#44 - RHP) 18. Ramon Henderson (#59 - Bullpen Coach)      19. Kevin Jordan (#23 - INF) 20. Mike Lieberthal (#24 - C) 21. Carlton Loewer (#46 - RHP) 22. Hal McRae (#56 - Hitting Instructor) 23. Brad Mills (#9 - First Base Coach) 24. Steve Montgomery (#57 - RHP)

25. Chad Ogea (#33 - RHP) 26. Yorkis Perez (#48 - LHP) 27. Jim Poole (#41 - LHP) 28. Tom Prince (#12 - C) 29. Desi Relaford (#8 - SS) 30. Scott Rolen (#17 - 3B) 31. Ken Ryan (#51 - RHP) 32. Curt Schilling (#38 - RHP) 33. Kevin Sefcik (#11 - OF) 34. Paul Spoljaric (#50 - LHP) 35. John Vukovich (#18 - Third Base Coach)      36. Phillie Phanatic

One and Only Phillies Baseball Card (2):  Poole, Spoljaric

First Appearance in Phillies Photo Card Set (13):  Anderson, Bennett, Brantley, Byrd, Doster, Ducey, Gant, Loewer, Montgomery, Ogea, Perez, Prince, Ryan
Returning Players in Phillies Photo Card Set (13):  Abreu, Arias, Brewer, Brogna, Glanville, Gomes, Grace, Jordan, Lieberthal, Relaford, Rolen, Schilling, Sefcik

I'm not counting Yorkis Perez's fairly rare photo card issued at the 1998 ALS Autograph and Auction Party as his first appearance.

Manager (1):  Francona
Coaches (6):  Cisco, Cottier, Henderson, McRae, Mills, Vukovich

Phillie Phanatic (1):  The Phanatic gets a close up on his 1999 card.

Broadcasters (0):  N/A

Set Composition:  The entire 25-man opening day roster makes it into the set, along with catcher Tom Prince who began the year on the disabled list.  Relievers Billy Brewer and Steve Montgomery also receive cards, although they began the season in Triple-A.

Omissions:  It's fairly easy to piece together an imaginary update set checklist, as the injury prone 1999 Phillies team made fairly frequent roster moves and acquisitions throughout the season.  Seven additional players suited up for the Phillies prior to the All-Star break, and an update set released in early July could have consisted of Joel Bennett, Joe Grahe, Robert Person, Cliff Politte, Steve Schrenk, Amaury Telemaco and Randy Wolf.  On the day of the ALS Autograph Party and Auction, June 21st, Person, Telemaco and Wolf were all on the active roster.

Variations/Rarities:  Fellow collector Rick confirmed there are no rarities to be found with this set's design, although in a comment to the original post for this set he mentioned there are a few variations available with facsimile autographs.

Also See:  The Phillies produced three Stadium League sets, and these have proved to be somewhat difficult for me to track down.

• Stadium League SGA - This is a standard-sized, 9-card set with gray borders, given away on Fan Appreciation Day, October 3rd.  The backs of the cards contain individual player highlights from the 1999 season.
• Stadium League Phillies Finest - This is a standard-sized, 9-card set with no borders and Phillies Finest written on the back.  The 14,000 Phillies database entry for the set states the cards were given away as prizes to kids playing a card flipping game in the Fun Zone at Veterans Stadium.
• Stadium League Phillies Finest (5 x 7) - This is a larger version of the 9-card Fun Zone giveaway set, and the origin of these cards is (so far) unknown.

This set was originally featured in a post back in November 2014, and I'm going through these older team-issued photo card set posts to update them with new information learned (if any) over the past nine years.

1998 Philadelphia Phillies Photo Cards / 2000 Philadelphia Phillies Photo Cards

1980-1999 Phillies Team-Issued Photo Cards Want List / Phillies Team Issued Sets Index Page

1998 Pacific Online #569 Yorkis Perez

Braves 2, Phillies 0
Game 43 - Saturday Afternoon, May 21st in Philadelphia
Record - 24-19

One Sentence Summary:  The Phillies were undone again by Williams Perez as they slogged through a rainy 2-0 loss to the Braves.

What It Means:  Yikes.  The Phils have looked fairly awful in two straight games against a horrendous Braves team.  They'll try to avoid the sweep on Sunday afternoon.

What Happened:  Here's the Phillies offense for the day:  David Lough singled in the third, Tyler Goeddel singled in the fifth, and Maikel Franco walked in the seventh.  That was it.

Adam Morgan deserved better, allowing two runs on four hits in his six innings of work.

Featured Card:  The last time Perez dominated the lethargic Phillies line-up, I featured the 1999 Fleer Tradition card of Yorkis Perez.  Here's another card of Yorkis, this time from the 1999 Pacific Online set.

Recently added to The Phillies Room - 2016 Season Summary page with game results and links to game summary posts.

1999 Fleer Tradition #567 Yorkis Perez

Braves 5, Phillies 1
Game 34 - Wednesday Night, May 11th in Atlanta
Record - 19-15, 3rd place, 2 1/2 games behind the Nationals

One Sentence Summary:  The Phillies dropped a forgettable game in Atlanta, 5-1.

What It Means:  This one was a clunker from start to finish.  I expected a whole lot more games like this in 2016, and it's nice that there haven't been very many of these games for the Phillies so far this season.

What Happened:  The offense managed four hits, including a solo home run from Ryan Howard. They were completely baffled by Braves pitcher Williams Perez, who was making an emergency start after the scheduled starter (Jhoulys Chacin) was traded to the Angels.  Jared Eickhoff couldn't escape the fifth inning, going 4 1/3 innings and allowing four runs (three earned) on seven hits.

Featured Card:  The Phillies have had six players with the surname of Williams in franchise history - Cy, George, Jerome, Mike, Mitch and Walt.  They've had four players with the surname of Perez - Juan, Tomas, Tony and Yorkis.  And now you know.

Recently added to The Phillies Room - 2016 Season Summary page with game results and links to game summary posts.

1999 Phillies Team Issue

I updated this post in December 2023 and this original post is now outdated.

 
Number of Cards:  36
Card Size:  4" x 6"
Description:  The fronts once again feature full color photos with the player's, coach's or manager's name in white letters against a blue band.  Scott Rolen's card celebrates his 1997 Gold Glove win with a picture of a Gold Glove on the front of his card.  The card backs feature biographical information and complete career statistics.

How Distributed:  The 36-card set was available for sale at Veterans Stadium throughout the season.  For the fifth year in a row, there was no update set issued.

Complete Standard Checklist:  The cards are unnumbered, but I've presented them below ordered by uniform number.

2 - Rico Brogna 3 - Chuck Cottier CO 5 - Ron Gant 6 - Doug Glanville 7 - Terry Francona MG 8 - Desi Relaford 9 - Brad Mills CO 11 - Kevin Sefcik 12 - Tom Prince 14 - Gary Bennett 15 - Dave Doster 16 - Marlon Anderson 17 - Scott Rolen 18 - John Vukovich CO 23 - Kevin Jordan 24 - Mike Lieberthal 25 - Rob Ducey 26 - Alex Arias

33 - Chad Ogea 34 - Paul Byrd 38 - Curt Schilling 41 - Jim Poole 43 - Galen Cisco CO 44 - Mike Grace 45 - Jeff Brantley 46 - Carlton Loewer 48 - Yorkis Perez 49 - Billy Brewer 50 - Paul Spoljaric 51 - Ken Ryan 53 - Bobby Abreu 56 - Hal McRae CO 58 - Steve Montgomery 59 - Ramon Henderson CO 61 - Wayne Gomes Phillie Phanatic

One and Done (2):  Poole, Spoljaric
First Appearances (13):  Anderson, Bennett, Brantley, Byrd, Doster, Ducey, Gant, Loewer, Montgomery, Ogea, Perez, Prince, Ryan
Returning Players (13):  Abreu, Arias, Brewer, Brogna, Glanville, Gomes, Grace, Jordan, Lieberthal, Relaford, Rolen, Schilling, Sefcik

Relievers Poole and Spoljaric commemorate their time with the Phillies with their sole Phillies baseball cards in this set.  I think when I've wrapped up this project, I'd like to go back and look at those players who had their one and only Phillies baseball cards within the team issued sets.  The First Appearance designation is for players who have never before appeared within a Phillies team issued set.  These players may have already appeared on other Phillies baseball cards.  (I'm not counting Perez's fairly rare card issued at the 1998 ALS Phillies Phestival as his first appearance.)

Manager (1):  Francona
Coaches (6):  Cisco, Cottier, Henderson, McRae, Mills, Vukovich
Phillie Phanatic (1):  The Phanatic gets a close up on his 1999 card.
Broadcasters (0)
Commemorative Cards (0)

Variations/Rarities:  As far as I know, there are no variations or rarities to be found connected to this set.  Rick points out in his comment below that there are few cards available with a facsimile autograph.

Also See:  The Phillies issued a nine-card "Stadium League" set given away on Fan Appreciation Day.  I'd like to feature this set in a future post.  Also see the 14,000 Phillies database entry for the 1999 Stadium League Phillies Finest nine-card set, which was given away as a prize to kids playing a card flipping game in the Fun Zone at the Vet.

Trivia:  I believe this is the first team issued set I've covered that has been completely ignored by Beckett and any other online source.  The set is omitted from the 2001 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards.  Galen Cisco's card uses the same photo as his 1998 card.
Resources:  Me . . . until Rick or Steve comment with the variations available for this set from the 1999 ALS fund raising event!

1998 Phillies - The Missing Links

1998 Pacific Online #569, 1998 Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Red Barons 10th Anniversary (#15),
1995 Topps #254 and 1998 Q Cards Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Red Barons #9

This post adds two more unfortunate souls to the list of players who appeared with the Phillies during the mostly lost decade of the '90s, yet never appeared on cardboard with the team.

40 players suited up with the Phillies during the 1998 season.  Without checking Baseball Reference, I would have pegged that number a little higher, but 40 it is.

3 Cards or More
35 Players

Relievers Jerry Spradlin, Yorkis Perez and Billy Brewer all made the cut with exactly three Phillies cards.  Each of those guys were featured in a few Phillies Team Issue sets and the 1998 Pacific Online set.  When I was trying to create my Phillies Wall back in the late-90s, the 1998 Pacific Online set was a necessity.  Weighing in with 780 different cards, the set featured middle inning relievers and back-up catchers during an era when the other card manufacturers were ignoring those guys.  It's not a pretty set, but it definitely served its purpose.

2 Cards
Darrin Winston (7 games in 1997 and 27 games in 1998) - 1998 Pacific Online #576 and 1998 Phillies Team Issue #58

Winston already made the list in 1997.

1999 Sports Illustrated #61

1 Card
Mike Welch (10 games in 1998) - 1999 Sports Illustrated #61
Jon Zuber (30 games in 1996 and 38 games in 1998) - 1998 Phillies Team Issue (Special Edition)*

Welch had to share his sole Phillies card with Marlon Anderson and Gary Bennett.  Welch, a right-handed reliever was acquired from the Mets in December 1997 for minor leaguer Hector Mercado.

*See the comment after this post from reader Steve F. for more information.

0 Cards
Matt Whiteside (10 games in 1998)
Robert Dodd (4 games in 1998)

Pitchers Whiteside and Dodd join the infamous list.  Whiteside had been a mainstay in the Rangers bullpen for the better part of the '90s before the team unceremoniously released him in Spring Training 1998.  The Phils signed him a few days later.  He spent the bulk of the '98 season with Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Red Barons, although he does not appear in the Red Barons team set; most likely because he actually opened the season on the Phillies active roster.  So Whiteside is the classic case of a player caught in the middle - he was acquired too late to be included within the team issued postcard set, and he was still with the Phillies when the Red Barons were compiling the checklist for their team set.

Dodd does appear in the Red Barons set, and he took Whiteside's spot in the bullpen when the team designated Whiteside for assignment in late May.  Dodd appeared in four games with the Phillies in late May/early June, winning a game, but allowing four earned runs in five innings (7.20 ERA).

Past Missing Link Posts

1990 Phillies - Louie Meadows

1991 Phillies - Dave LaPoint

1992 Phillies - Darrin Chapin and Mickey Weston

1993 Phillies - None

1994 Phillies - Tom Edens and Bob Wells

1995 Phillies - Jim Deshaies, Kevin Elster, Omar Olivares, Chuck Ricci and Dennis Springer

1996 Phillies - Glenn Dishman, Bronson Heflin, Manny Martinez and Rafael Quirico
1997 Phillies - Rob Butler and Mike Robertson