46 To Go

I had no idea who Earl Torgeson was before I bought this card a few days ago, but was intrigued when I Google Searched him and the bio from his SABR page started out with this sentence: 

"In a 15-year major-league career filled with great stories and accomplishments of various stripes, Earl Torgeson was well known for getting in brawls."

The card was sold before I could read the second sentence of his bio.  

Here is the card.

This is my first Red Man card with a tab.  

A few facts I learned about Earl after reading his full SABR Bio:

-His nickname was "The Earl of Snohomish" after his hometown in Washington. The nickname was shared with Indians Hall of Famer Earl Averill who was from the same town. In fact, Torgeson grew up playing at Averill Field in Snohomish.   

-Prior to his rookie season he faced assualt charges in Washington for beating two men who had used vulgar language in front of his wife. Torgeson was found not guilty after the judge agreed with his actions.  

-Torgeson was in dozens of fights during his Major League career. After breaking his glasses in his first MLB brawl, he infamously would slowly remove them before charging pitchers or players to fight. 

-He chain smoked cigars

-The majority of his baseball career was spent with the Braves and White Sox, but he also appeared for the Phillies, Tigers, and Yankees. 

-After baseball, he was a County Commisioner representing the Snohomish area.    

I need 46 more cards.  

Set Appreciation Post #19- 1995 Select Certified

 This week's Set Appreciation Post has a special guest, my six year-old daughter.  

She is a kindergartener who has some strong opinions on life and a love of art work.  Parts of our house are frequently converted into art galleries for whatever art she is working on at the moment. Her art does not always stay on paper though. Sometimes, it appears in other forms.  

For example, after returning home from a trip to Washington, D.C. this spring my computer was covered in sticky notes. Each sticky note was its own piece of art work, but it also somehow formed a larger work.  

The explanation would take several minutes and there would be no baseball cards in this post if I wrote everything she said about the sticky note art work.

She already has some opinions about my baseball cards.  

For example, according to her, my baseball card boxes are all pretty boring because they are plain white. She thinks that I should have the outside of the boxes match the baseball cards that are on the inside. At some point last year, she attempted to decorate the boxes for my autographed cards, which all have the letter "N" scribbled on the outside of them. She had bigger plans that her stopped. According to her, someone wrote on the cards inside the box, so she wrote the first letter of her name on the outside of the box.  

They match and she is willing to add more art to the outside of the boxes.  

I have not allowed her to continue to do her art work on my baseball card boxes, but that did not stop her from doing one final piece of art work on my box holding my copy of the 1995 Select Certified set. The cards are bright and shiny, so the box should match, right?  

Here is the top.  

Here is the front.  

Her median was 1990 Upper Deck team logo stickers.  

Let's talk about the cards. 

Each of us will provide a take on the 1995 Select Certified set.

Here is the basic design of the 1995 Select Certified cards.  

I really like the dark greyscale background behind the color photos, which is something different. I also like the card stock and texture. It's not exactly a thick paper stock, but definitely has a sturdy feel to the card. There is a glossy finish, which I think is interesting on a card that uses a greyscale background. 

My daughter does not like this design and wants to know why a brighter color like purple was not used in the background. She suggests a pattern that you could color in like a coloring book.  

That's actually not a bad idea.  

I love the breakdown of the stats by team on the back of the card. It's like the Bowman cards, but with more color and better graphics. Sure, you get less numbers, but you still get a good sense of how the player faired against each team. Bonds torched the Expos in 1994, which is saying something because they were easily the best team in the National League.  

My daughter likes that Barry Bonds is willing to wear earrings on his baseball card, but thinks at least one team should use a pony or hearts as their logo.  

My favorite card of a former Durham Bulls player in this set is Chipper Jones. His early cards are always fun, looks a little silly here with the huge swing. I will add that the number of former Bulls players in this set is fairly small and the other choices had rather blah looking pictures.

The card did not scan well, but Chipper is actually apart of the Rookie subset in Select Certified and the background of the card is half grey and half gold. That stamp does not exactly show a ton of creativity.  

My daughter also picked out this card for her favorite Durham Bulls player in the set, although her explanation started out with, "Have you ever ate lunch with boys at school?" and ended with "making farting noises".  It took her about two minutes to explain the whole thing, I will let your imagination fill in the middle of the conversation.  

My favorite Cardinals card in the set......

is Bernard Gilkey.  

Several of the Cardinals players are pictured in road uniforms, which are nice, but are also a gray uniform on a dark gray background. I do like the action shot on the front of this card, but also really like the way that the white home uniform with the red helmet and uniform accessories pop on the dark background.

My daughter did not pick a favorite Cardinals card, because "none of them are very nice looking" and added a "No, thank you" when I told her that she needed to pick a Cardinals card. Later in the post she does pick a former Cardinals player card for her favorite overall card from the set.  

Let me off-road a few other things I like about this set, but the little one rejoins the conversation.  

One of the best parts of Select Certified is the Gold Mirror parallels.  

I am generally not a parallel person, but this one is well done. There were a few Gold cards in every box, no serial numbers, and it's the only parallel that came in the product.  Over the years, I have put together the complete set of Cardinals and I am close to having all the former Durham Bulls players. Good looking set of cards.  

If you don't dig the dark background of the base cards, these are a really nice option and they are generally not that expensive compared to the price of other popular 1990s parallels at the moment.  

Moving on.  

Select Certified is a small set with only 135 cards in the set. There were 28 Major League teams in 1995, so there are roughly 4 to 5 cards for each team. Small sets generally tend to stick to the big names on rosters and not stray into many subsets or special cards. Select Certified has a bit of both.  

The Dodgers got a special card for having three players win the Rookie of the Year in a row.  

Eddie Murray also got a special card for collecting his 3,000 hit in 1994.  

Always cool to see these kinds of cards to mark special accomplishments, especially on a small checklist like Select Certified. There are also Rookie Subset cards. I posted one at the top of the post with the Chipper Jones card, but the scan did not do a good job of showing the card.  

Here is another Rookie subset with a picture taken using my phone's camera.  

There are actually some pretty big names in the Rookie subset with Jeter and ARod. A few others including one later in the post.  The Jeter and ARod are not actually rookie cards, but still early cards that are fun to own. You can see the two-toned background a little better on photograph. 

Let's bring the little one back in to finish up the post and talk about our favorite cards.  

My daughter is up first with Mark McGwire.  

She picked this card, because Mark McGwire is the only player in the set with long hair.  

That's it, her whole reason for picking the card. I will add for context that her favorite Disney Princess is Rapunzel, and that she keeps her hair long and it must be styled everyday before she goes to school. I would like to see Mark McGwire rock some bubble braids.  

I went a little different direction for my favorite non-Cardinal, non-Durham Bulls card from this set.  I decided to pick the Hideo Nomo rookie card.  

  

Every year the baseball card world goes crazy of a certain player or two. In 1995, there was Nonomania. Everyone wanted a Hideo Nomo card and this was one of my favorites. A great card from the mid 1990s, I think if I made a list of the best cards from my time in high school, this card would be on the list.  

How does it rank on my list?  

It has been a hot minute since I have done a set appreciation post. The last set I added to my list was the 2001 Donruss set last November. The set was terrible. The 1995 Select Certified set is definitely not terrible. In fact, it's a pretty good set of baseball cards. 

Narrow it down.  Looking at the top half of the sets I have posted, I think it's better than Emotion XL (they are kind of similar though) and the 2017 Heritage Minor League set. Topps TEK feels like the right neighborhood.  I am actually going to give Select Certified the slight nod given its a set that you can actually complete, unlike Topps Tek's 8,100 card craziness.  

19. 2000 Pacific Paramount Update 

18. 2010 Topps USA Baseball  

17. 2001 Donruss 

16. 2000 Topps 

15. 2012 Bowman Platinum 

14. 2000 UD Ionix

13. Topps Lineage   

12. 2002 Bowman 

11. 1988 Donruss 

10. 1995 Emotion XL 

9. 2017 Topps Heritage Minor League

8. 1998 Topps TEK 

7. 1995 Select Certified 

6. 1986 Topps Mini League Leaders 

5. 2001 Fleer EX 

4. 1979 Kellogg's 

3. 1998 Metal Universe 

2. 2002 Topps Super Teams

1. 1983 Topps 

Hope You Can Help The Ballclub......

Do you play fantasy baseball?  

I had not played in roughly a decade, but decided to take on a team this year. I figured I was going to be a little rusty, so I just signed up for a team on Yahoo.That's all people do on Yahoo these days, right?  

Anyway, my team is doing well. I am currently in fifth place a few games out of first place in a 12 team league. My team is heavy on offense, I tend to fill in my pitching stats by picking up probable starters. I have always used that approach with my teams and it has generally worked well. 

Anyway, besides playing fantasy baseball for the competition, I learn a lot about some players I might otherwise miss. It also is a great excuse to go find some baseball cards of these new found players. There are several non-Durham Bulls/non-Cardinals who have helped my fantasy baseball team this year and four of them have also joined my baseball card collection. 

Hope these guys can still help my baseball team and my card collection.  

First up, Braves pitcher Bryce Elder.  

He's won a bunch of games and has a low ERA. Not the best strikeout pitcher, but a solid contributor to my baseball team. I worry that his first half performance has been "smoke and mirrors", but I am not really attached to starting pitchers. I will move on to someone else.  

In the meantime, Bryce has some nice on-card autographs. Picked up a 2021 Heritage Minor League card from his time in the Gulf Coast League.  

Next up is Yandy Diaz.  

Yandy has also been a good average and on-base player, but the extra base hits have been a pleasant surprise this year. I originally had him on my roster to balance out some of my power guys who hit for a lower average, but Yandy is actually hitting home runs this year.  

Yandy is on the Rays, so it might be a little surprising that I don't own one of his autographs already. However, Yandy was never actually on the Durham Bulls. He came up with Cleveland, played part of two seasons with the Guardians, and then was traded to the Rays. Yandy never touched Triple-A with the Rays and won't at this point barring an injury-rehab assignment.  

Yandy has only two certified autographs, both stickers, and they are messy. Yandy has a really tall signature and should not be trying to squeeze it onto a sticker autograph.  

Next.  

I kind of dig this card as much as I have enjoyed Mitch Keller's wins and strikeouts during the first half of the baseball season. When did this guy turn into a good player? He's like the one pitcher on my roster, not quite, that I won't release after every start and resign two weeks later.  

The card is a Bowman Tek, which only lasted one year. It was like Topps Tek, but with prospects. I am guessing it was not a very successful set and this card only cost me $2.  

Last one.  

Bryan Reynolds is my glue guy. I have Ronald Acuna, Corbin Carroll, and Wander Franco doing a lot of the heavy lifting for my offense, but Bryan Reynolds helps out everywhere. His average is decent, he hits for power sometimes, and he steals bases. At the end of the week when I look at my totals and see that I won a category by 1 home run/stolen base/run, I can look down and see that Bryan Reynolds is the player that put me over for the week.  

Fist bump.  

Reynolds was good last year and I guess his cards are becoming more popular.  At $12, this is the most money I have spent on a modern Pirates card in at least a decade. 

Friday Five: My Favorite 1988 Topps and Topps Traded Cards

I got a copy of the 1988 Topps set from my parents for Christmas that year. I was excited about getting a complete set, so I opened the set box and sorted out all of the cards. Everyone from the 1980s knows you are supposed to leave your complete Topps sets sealed, right? I was in fifth grade and baseball cards are fun, of course I opened the box. Also, it's the 1988 Topps set.  You can probably find a copy of the set at your local thrift shop for $5.  

There are probably multiple copies for less than $5 at your thrift shop.  

Is the 1988 Topps set unpopular because it's really that bad, or because it lacks a signature rookie card Truth be told, I kind of dig the 1988 Topps set. The design is underrated.  

Topps is using the 1988 design as an insert set with the 2023 Topps set. Many have not liked the 1988 Topps set for the past thirty years, but you're going to love it now and buy all the retail packs from Target and Wal-Mart.  

I personally like the Nolan Arenado card.  

Now, let me get to the countdown. I am going to include cards from the 1988 Topps Traded set in this post, because there are some good cards in there and it is also a $5 set.  

Shall we?  

5T. 1988 Topps Traded Andy Benes #14T 

5T. 1988 Topps Traded Ron Gant #39T 

I did not touch the 1988 Topps Traded set until the Cardinals signed Andy Benes and Ron Gant as a free agents before the 1996 season. There was a high-end card store that was a few minutes from my house back in the 1990s. When the Cardinals signed Benes and Gant, they set out a huge stack of 1988 Topps Traded sets on one of their counters with all the sets costing $10. I bought the set expecting it to have a Ron Gant rookie and a bunch of junky cards. 

Not the case.  

As a Cardinals fan, I got cards of Jose DeLeon, Luis Alicea, and Tom Brunansky on top of Gant and Andy Benes. There was also David Wells, Jim Abbott, and Roberto Alomar amongst others. It's a pretty good set and I have no idea how it is only crispy Alexander Hamilton.  

4. 1988 Topps Traded Robin Ventura #124T

Robin Ventura is not quite a Hall of Famer. One of the best third baseman from the 1990s and early 2000s, just a step below players like Scott Rolen. In the aftermath of the 1982 Topps Traded set, every Topps Traded set had a potential Cal Ripken waiting to rising from the checklist. This was the "it" card from the 1988 Topps Traded set. Not sure it was every really all that expensive at any point, but the fact that the card costs less than a dollar is insanity.  

This card should cost at least a dollar at a minimum.  

3. 1988 Topps Vince Coleman #1 

I loved the design of the Record Breakers cards in the 1988 Topps set. That red background really pops and it was great to see a Cardinals player on the first card of a Topps set.  The Record Breaker was for Coleman's third consecutive season with more than 100 stolen bases. I believe that Topps has reused this design in one of their Throwback/Customer Direct products.  

Here is the moment.......

The previous record was held by Rickey Henderson.  

2. 1988 Topps Mark McGwire #580 

Mark McGwire with a Topps All-Star Rookie logo in the corner. It was a no-brainer. No goatee or crazy muscles, just skinny Mark McGwire holding a bat and posing for a picture. This is one of my favorite early McGwire cards. Topps also used a picture from this same photo shoot on McGwire's 1988 Glossy Mail-In card and the A's Team Leaders card.  

I am sure if I looked hard enough, Topps has probably recycled these photos on modern McGwire cards as well. It would be borderline shocking if they have not.  

1. 1988 Cardinals Leaders #351 

Great picture here with long-time Cardinals player, manager, and coach Red Schoendienst standing next to catcher Tony Pena. Most coaches do not get cards, so it was nice to see someone as high-profile as Red get the nod from Topps. It is somewhat surprising that Pena appeared on this card over some of the more popular 1980s Cardinals players like Ozzie Smith, Willie McGee, or Vince Coleman. 

Still, not a complete reach.  

If you weren't around for 1980s baseball, Pena was the premier defensive catcher in the league and the Cardinals were loaded with Gold Glovers. The Cardinals had outfielders to spare, but no catcher. Prior to the 1987 season, the Cardinals traded Andy Van Slyke to the Pirates for Pena. The Cardinals ended up winning the National League that season, but injuries caught up with them in the World Series and they lost in seven games. 

A card back.  

Solid numbers on the Cardinals Team Leaders. I am sure Red helped somehow, someway. 

Friday Five: Super Bowlish Edition

It's not Friday, but it's the effort that counts. I love a good countdown post, but I have never consistently made them. Sometimes my day job interferes with other aspects of my life. 

It's Super Bowl weekend, so I am thinking about something with football.  

There is a bit of a problem though. 

If I had to make a post out of football cards, it would be short and feature only a few former NC State players I enjoyed watching along with a few Rams from their time in St. Louis. I might have enough Mike Glennon and/or Jacoby Brissett cards to give them their own post. I know everyone loves a good Mike Glennon card, so I am going to post one and let you know I went a different direction.  

Honestly, the title was just a ruse to get people to read the post. This is actually going to be about baseball cards, but they are all of a player who was in the NFL at one point thirty years ago. 

There are videos of Brian Jordan playing football on the internet, but most are over five minutes and you're not going to watch that. I am not either. Instead, here is Brian Jordan running over Gary Bennett with Vin Scully on the call.  

As a former Cardinals player, I have a healthy collection of Brian Jordan cards, so it took a few minutes to flip through them all and narrow the list down to five cards and a marble.  

Honorable Mention: 1997 Topps Pro Shooters Marble 

Ray Lankford is also in this set, which is why I ended up with the Brian Jordan marble. The guy who was selling these insisted that I needed to buy all his Cardinals marbles if I wanted the Lankford. Pretty interesting item and they have become rather difficult to find over the years. There are currently none for sale on Ebay or COMC. Although, someone is selling a wrapper on Ebay for $18.  

5. 2001 Fleer GameTime Patch Card 

There are not many Brian Jordan relic cards out there, let alone ones with patch pieces. Add in the fact that this is the only set that has a Ray Lankford relic, and its always been one of my favorites. If only it were a Cardinal card.  I own several copies of this card, all with different patch pieces. I need to scan them all and puzzle piece together how much of the Braves logo from his jersey I own.  

4. 1998 Fleer Ultra 

This is the best picture on a Brian Jordan card and it's not even close. Maybe it's silver medal to one of the cards on this list, but it is very, very good. This is one of those cards that is fifty cents on COMC and Ebay and there is no reason why you should not own it. I also own the fancy gold version, shown below, but not the ultra-fancy serial numbered version.  

3. 1996 Leaf Signature 

This was my first great Brian Jordan card, which fittingly came out in 1996. The 1996 Cardinals were a fun collection of young players from the post-Whiteyball rebuild (Jordan, Lankford), free agents (Ron Gant, Andy Benes), and Oakland A's retreads who came over with LaRussa (Stottlemyre, Eck). Also add in Ozzie Smith and Willie McGee to mix as bench players. Few remember the team coming within a win of the World Series. Lankford and Gant were better players than Jordan during the regular season, but Jordan was incredibly clutch for the team in the playoffs. 

The best of those clutch moments was his series clinching home run off of Trevor Hoffman in Game 4 of the NLDS.  

Jordan has also signed a bunch of cards for the Topps Archives Signature products, some of which are really nice. My favorite is this autograph on his 1997 Topps card. If I were going Top 10, this would have made it. I will add it as a mid-post Honorable Mention instead.  

2. 1998 Topps 

Easily one of the best Cardinals cards that Topps has ever produced for their flagship set. This is the best picture on a Jordan card, gold medal all the way. You know the Bo Jackson card where he is wearing shoulder pads with a bat across his shoulders? That's a great card, but I think this is its equal in many ways in the eyes of people who collect Cardinals cards. If nothing else, Jordan had a much better baseball career than Bo.  

It's true.  

1. 2000 Hologrfx Piece of the Series 

Brian Jordan's lone career World Series appearance came in 1999 as a member of the Braves. He played a very well in both the NLDS and NLCS, most notably hitting a home run off of Mike Hampton in Game 3 of the first round with the Braves trailing late in the game. Had the Braves lost, they would have been down 2-1 in the Series and facing elimination on the road.  

Upper Deck made a nice World Series themed insert for their 2000 Hologrfx product, which featured the stat players from the Braves and Yankees. Each player had a relic card that featured a "game-used" piece of base. Don't get me started and also an autographed parallel numbered to the players uniform number.  

Super rare Jordan autograph shown above. Base insert card with base shown below.  

Let's do this again next weekend.  Maybe even on Friday. 

Set Appreciation Post #14 - 2002 Bowman

When you think of Bowman sets from the early 2000s, what comes to mind?  Black borders were a must.  Tons of hype for a bunch of prospects that may or may not (ding, ding, ding) have made a significant impact in the Major Leagues.  This post is about the 2002 Bowman set, but it could really be about all the Bowman sets between 2002 and 2006.  

There is a theme for this post.  Let's try this meme.  

Base Set 

The set has a black border because it is a Bowman set from the early 2000s.  You were expecting something different.  Tisk, tisk.  I usually use the first card in the set, but it appears that I am missing my Adam Dunn card.  I have this set marked complete, so I did a little investigating to see where the card went.  

The story of where the card was is more interesting than the second card in the set.  I scanned this one when I started writing the post, just in case Adam Dunn was gone.  

The veteran cards in the set all have a red border to distinguish them from the prospect cards which have a blue border.  The pictures on the card are mundane.  The Roger Clemens card has him batting, otherwise, they are not interesting.  

The backs of the Bowman cards have changed little over the years.  These write-ups aren't exactly 1988 Score and the descriptions of the players are generous.  I threw up in my mouth a little bit when I read that "fluid shortstop" part.  

Remember that time Jeter dove into the stands at Yankee Stadium and smashed some old women and his face into one of the seats?  

There is nothing fluid about this catch. 

Derek Jeter getting an overly generous biography from a baseball card writer.  

A Lengthy Side Story About The Adam Dunn Card 

Over the pandemic, my 10-year-old spent a lot of time reading about baseball.  As a two-teacher household, it was hard to work with him while we were teaching our classes online.  My wife and I frequently told him to find a book to read for a short time when he got stuck.  He also dabbled in baseball videos on YouTube.  

He is one of those people who can read a book and can recite every fact back to you that he read.  While he generally sticks to topics like stadiums, Hall of Famers, Cardinals, and Durham Bulls players, we went through a phase last summer when he got really into reading and watching videos about players with odd careers.  

If you have never read anything about Adam Dunn, he's a weird player.  There is a Dorktown video about the weirdness of his career.  This is the preview screen for the video on YouTube.  

I could see where the video has appeal to the average 10-year-old.  

Anyway, he also killed time during the pandemic by looking through my old scorecards, ticket stubs, and baseball cards.  He'd ask me frequently about taking cards from my collection, most of which I was indifferent about.  

Apparently, the 2002 Bowman Adam Dunn card was one of them.  

"You can scan my card" is the line I got when I asked him about the card.  I tried trading back for the card, but he is currently demanding a Ji-Man Choi autograph.  That's a little steep for an Adam Dunn base card.  

Luckily, I am on vacation, so writing an extra side story in this post doesn't really matter. 

The World's Most Smudged Autographs 

In the early days of this blog, I actually worked on finishing off a set of 2002 Bowman autographs.  I had pulled several out of packs back in the day, decided it would be an easy project.  There are very few cards on the checklist, no real big names.  

It would have been really easy, but 90% of the 2002 Bowman autographed cards are smudged.  

One-time Durham Bull and drug test failer, Wilson Betemit with smudges.  

Art Howe's favorite first baseman who would not take a walk, Carlos Pena.  

My favorite card in the set belongs to former Cardinal outfielder Ryan Ludick.  

I spent some time, that I am never getting back, trying to find these autographs in good condition.  There are several of these cards that I have multiple copies of due to trying to upgrade.  No matter how hard you look, they are all smudged.  

Big mistake.  

Topps having quality control issues......

  

Best Non-Cardinal/Non-Durham Bull Card 

I like looking through old Bowman sets to see the prospects that did not make it almost as much as those who became something in the Majors.  This Ronald Acuna card makes me feel old.  He was a career Minor Leaguer with the Mets who got a baseball card in the 2002 Bowman set.  Little bit different player than his son, Ronald Acuna Jr.  

Ronald Sr. had a career-high of 8 home runs playing for the Mets two A-Ball teams in the Florida State League and South Atlantic League. While he lacked power, Ronald stole 20 bases almost every season he played in the Minors and had several years where he crossed 30.  Ronald Sr. also has a card in the 2002 Bowman's Best set.  

I cannot find anything about what happened to Ronald Sr. after he stopped playing baseball outside of a ton of photos of him at Braves games (New Balance sweatshirt).   

Best Cardinal Card

This was such an easy pick for me.  The second I picked out this box from the stack, I knew the Cardinals card that I was going to pick for this post.  

So Taguchi was the first Japanese player signed by the Cardinals.  He was initially somewhat of a disappointment and ended up spending parts of his first seasons in the U.S. playing with the Cardinals Triple-A team.  In the end, he was a fourth outfielder for the Cardinals, but he was one of those lovable bench players. 

The back of his card was actually fairly accurate.  He was a spray hitter and superb defensive player.  The Cardinals ended up pairing him up with outfielders like Chris Duncan and Reggie Sanders, who could hit but had limitations on defense.  Frequently Duncan or Sanders would start the game, Taguchi would come in late as a defensive sub.  

While he was really known for his defense, I think his best moment in the Majors was his go-ahead home run off of Billy Wagner in Game 2 of the 2006 National League Championship Series.  The Cardinals lost the first game of the NLCS and were tied with the Mets late in Game 2.  I am sure that if the Mets win the game, go up 2-0, the series turns out differently.  

This is the home run.  

Taguchi ended up on the Phillies after his contract ran out with the Cardinals and he managed to pick up a second World Series ring with the team in 2008.  

Best Durham Bulls Card 

I chose a former Durham Bulls player pictured as a Blue Jays prospect.  Rich Thompson was a decade away from playing with the Bulls when this card was produced.  However, if you followed Triple-A baseball a while back, it was pretty hard not to know the name Rich Thompson.  He was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in 2000 out of James Madison University and was in Triple-A by the next season.  Such a quick riser would surely make it to the Majors, right?

Here is his well-earned 2002 Bowman card that was likely made due to his rapid climb through the Minors. Topps also put him in their base set as a prospect and in T-206.  

He disappeared from major baseball card products after 2002, but he continued to play in Triple-A.  

Right up on the back of the card seems fair.   

So, here is what happened to Rich Thompson:  

+He played a total of 13 years in the Minors, he appeared for a Triple-A team in 12 of those seasons.  

+He played for the Triple-A teams of the Blue Jays, Pirates, Diamondbacks, Phillies, and Rays. 

+He twice made the Majors.  Once in 2004 with the Royals where he played in 6 games, but only got 1 at-bat.  He did not have a hit.  The Rays called him up in 2012 where he had 2 hits in 22 at-bats.  His career batting average is under .100 and he has more stolen bases (7) than hits (2).  Rich Thompson still made it, that counts for something.  

+His final two seasons in professional baseball were spent with the Durham Bulls.  He was excellent on the 2012 team, hence the call-up to the Rays.  Thompson had a rough year in 2013 and retired after breaking his foot while fielding a ball.  

Some years Rich Thompson was on your team, some years Rich Thompson was not on your team.  He was a scrappy player who was easy to support.  Further, while the Minor League records can be a little sketchy at times, I would have to think that his 300 career steals at the Triple-A level would have to be pretty far up the list.  Overall, he has almost 500 steals in the Minors.  Again, that has to be far up the all-time leader's list.  

Thompson is still loved around the Minors almost a decade after he retired.  The Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs, Phillies Triple-A team, has given away multiple bobbleheads of Thompson and I have also heard there are pictures of him hanging in the front office of the team.  

How Does It Compare?  

This set is not really all that interesting, so it has to rank in the bottom half of the list.  This is post #14, so I will start at 2017 Topps Minor League Heritage and work down the list.

-Both 2017 Topps Heritage Minors and 2002 Bowman are prospect-driven sets.  While I am not a huge fan of the 1968 Topps design, a boring border with interesting cards is better than a boring border and uninteresting cards.  

-1995 Emotion XL is at least interesting and has good photography, even if some of the labels slapped on the players are really stupid.  Better than over glossed Derek Jeter bios.  

-1988 Donruss, while I don't love the borders, it's still more interesting than the 2002 Bowman set.  Plus, that set has a Tom Glavine rookie, which is better than any prospect card in the 2002 Bowman set.  Let's go down another spot.  

-2000 UD Ionix.  Now, we are talking about the right neighborhood.  Predictable short checklist with the same 2 or 3 players on each team getting cards.  Ionix has better autographs and some nicer high-end touches, but there is something nice about having the larger checklist of 2002 Bowman where you get cards of the players I put into this post.  

I am going with 10th place on my list.   

14. 2000 Pacific Paramount Update 

13. 2010 Topps USA Baseball  

12. 2000 Topps 

11. 2000 UD Ionix  

10. 2002 Bowman 

9. 1988 Donruss 

8. 1995 Emotion XL 

7. 2017 Topps Heritage Minor League

6. 1998 Topps TEK 

5. 1986 Topps Mini League Leaders 

4. 2001 Fleer EX 

3. 1979 Kellogg's 

2. 2002 Topps Super Teams

1. 1983 Topps