#23 - Craig Robinson (PHI)

It's really funny looking at non-star players from eras past.  Here, Craig Robinson looks like the guy in my high school yearbook who won the award for "most likely to remain the same the rest of his life."  He's 5'-10" and 165 lbs.  This is otherwise known as Average Joe.  With a bell curve for dude size, Craig fits 37% of all American males.  And such dudes can be a major leaguer when they grow up.  I like that Craig is wearing one batting glove, and that photographers love to capture gloves laying on grass.  Craig is a humble guy, too, as he even chokes up on the bat for a photo op.  I didn't know that Eugene was a team in the PCL in 1971.  I always thought the AAA had larger cities, like Portland and Las Vegas.  I looked it up, and sure enough, Eugene, OR had a PCL team from 1969-73.

Craig was with the Phils in 1973, but was traded to the Braves in December.  The next card in this set will be his traded card.  Craig's 1974 season with the Braves was a regular one, playing in 145 games, and getting over 500 plate appearances.  His next three seasons (his last) he would not play even 40 games in a year.  He finished his career just one home run behind Duane Kuiper on the all time list.  Kuiper had one.

Cartoon:  Being signed is pretty darned thrilling, I guess.  Craig didn't win a World Series or MVP or break records, I guess as well.  Otherwise he might have said those things were most thrilling.  What kind of pen did they use to sign contracts back in 1970?

Ballpark background:  Although it looks like a great big lawn, I'm pretty sure this is Shea Stadium.  Those twin 10,500 foot high light tower poles look like the ones at Shea.  All the way to the left of Robinson's chin you can see the edge of the second deck sticking out, with the "lower deck" seats under it.  I don't know what they were called, but it was kind of the next seating level in the "bowl" up from the field box seats.  Other shots in this set and other years' cards give this away as Shea.