#55 - Frank Robinson (CAL)

Uh, what do I say?  Well, let's start out with a total bummer.  Frank's first ten years in the major leagues was as a Hall-of-Fame outfielder in the National League, but with the complete misfortune of having three other outfielders named Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Roberto Clemente in their glory years outshadow him at nearly every turn.  I mean, what more can you do than start out with the all-time rookie HR record and never look back?  Short of being Babe Ruth, not much.  And if his NL days weren't enough, his first year in the AL with the Orioles, he won the bleeping triple crown.  I'm not talking about just any triple crown, I'm talking about .316/49/122 in the pitching dominated late 60's.

But to give Frank the credit he deserves, one could talk for years.  I don't have time to do that here.  But I will say I enjoyed seeing him up close as skipper of my Giants in the early 80's.  Frank gave the umps quite a bit of his mind, and other things, when necessary.  Frank didn't have the best managing career, but he had some bad teams.  But 16 years of that after a HOF career as a player is really quite a combination and fairly unheard of.  Frank was hired as the first black manager in baseball back in the mid-70's with Cleveland.  That it took nearly 30 years from Jackie Robinson to Frank Robinson is still a head-scratcher.  Frank was traded in Sept of the 1974 season, and although late, I'm still including Frank's card in the "Traded with no Traded Card" category.

One of the things I really like about cards like this is all the small print on the back.  It means "full major league career."  Frank certainly had that.

Cartoon:  Well, nobody else does, because Frank watches movies standing up.  He is blocking everybody else's view.  You can tell by the look on his shadow's face that he's enjoying this Western.  Of course if Frank played today, he'd have an in-home theater room where he could watch without bothering anybody else.

Ballpark background:  Not a clue.  It appears as if Frank is wearing a home uni, but the Angels had a very light colored gray road uni that might look white in the sun.

#39 - Ken Suarez (TEX)

I don't remember this card from my youth, although I'm sure I had it then.  Ken's career seems to be filled with micro facts.  He played very few games, and his '73 campaign with the Rangers was his high point with 90 games played.  He was almost totally at catcher, except in 1968 he played one inning of left field for Cleveland, one inning of "outfield," one out at second base and two outs at third.  I wonder if those non-catcher appearances were in the same game, as if they did this to get somebody else to play all nine positions.

I found out some strange things about Suarez whilst doing some research.  Although he has a 1974 card, he never played in the majors in '74.  His last game was in Sept. of '73.  He was traded to the Indians just before the start of spring training in '74, and was one of the pieces in the Indians late '74 trade with the Angels for Frank Robinson.  I'm wondering if Ken was in the minors for the '74 season (and beyond?) and was involved in two trades as a minor leaguer, and this is the reason why he has no further major league stats.  He has no card in the Trades set.

Cartoon:  Ken is a deputy sheriff, but it doesn't say where.  I'm sure it's not Mayberry.  Well, I wonder.  When did the Andy Griffith show go off the air?  Could Ken have replaced deputy Fife?  He probably would have been good at catching criminals with a baseball bat.  Louisville Slugger?

Ballpark background:  Ken is posing here at the big ballpark in the Bronx.  Yankee Stadium as it is also known. 

#19 - Gerry Moses (NYY)

Gerry Moses' stint with the New York Yankees was very short, and already over by the time this card was released.  Moses didn't play for the Yankees in 1974.  He was traded during spring training to the Tigers, yet didn't have a card in the Traded set.  So, along with Paul Popovich, (card #14), I'm adding a new "Traded with no Traded Card" label.  I'm wondering if the Traded set had its own deadline for making the set.  Moses played all of 18 games in 1973 for the Pinstripes, 17 at catcher, and one at DH.  The following year, 1975, was his last in the bigs, and played a mere 7 games split between the Padres and White Sox.

I remember this card from when I was a kid, but nothing stood out about it other than it was a baseball card in my set.  Of course, when you play behind Thurman Munson, you might not get much playing time at all.  And just how his Moses' first name spelled anyway?  This card says "Gerry," but the Baseball Reference [dot] com website spells it "Jerry."  I typed in "Gerry" and it came up anyway.  Maybe the web designers at BR had the same question and decided to allow both spellings get to his stats.

Cartoon:  Wow, small world, to play sandlot ball with Archie Manning.  What I wonder about Manning is why he would wear a football uniform playing sandlot ball.  Maybe Moses is the one who convinced him that he had a brighter future on the gridiron.  Don't look now, but I think Pig Pen grew up in their neighborhood, too.

Ballpark background:  I really can't figure out where this photo was taken.  It's likely that it was at a Spring Training facility of another Grapefruit League team, given the Yanks' road threads.  There's a chain link fence at the stands, and there's no warning track before the fence.  I've never seen a big league park like this, so I'm giving this card the spring training location label.

#14 - Paul Popovich (CHC)

This card shows Paul with the Chicago Cubs.  He was traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates on April 1, 1974, just a few days before opening day.  Even though he was traded, Topps did not issue a card of Popovich in its Traded set released later in the year.  Maybe this was a belated April Fool joke, or maybe Topps thought the trade itself was an April Fool joke.  In any case, Paul would play only two more years, '74 & '75, in a limited role with the Bucs.  What never shows on his card is that when he was traded in June of 1969, the Dodgers sent him to the Expos, who traded him to the Cubs that same day.  I'm not sure if it was part of a three-way trade, or whether the Expos planned the maneuver as the middle-man.

This is the first card in this set where the nondescript "infield" position shows on a card.  His career was spent mostly at second base, with some short and third mixed in.  In '74 he played about evenly between 2B and SS with the Pirates, with a majority of his second sacker action coming from starts, and all of his stints at short from being inserted later in the game.

Cartoon: I'm not sure what bonuses were back in the early 60's, but 40 grand seems like quite a lot.  It seems that Topps is playing with words here, as Paul received only a "reported" bonus.  Didn't he get a real one?


Ballpark background: This photo was taken in 1973 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, one of the home ballparks of my youth.  In fact, 1974, the year of this Topps set, was the year of my first visit there.  The green stuff you see behind Paul is actually artificial turf.  It's a bit too green and uniform looking for astroturf, but that's what it is.  I'm not sure why it looks so green, as Candlestick Park in the 70's had some of the most horrifically streaky, faded looking carpet in the Bigs.  This photo must have taken advantage of the reverse-grain velvet effect.  The orange seats were real box seats with real metal bars dividing up the rows.  The dugouts weren't dug out, but level with the playing field.  There are what looks like 25 towels hanging from the visitor's dugout wall.  As was typical at the 'Stick, the shadow line from the upper deck divided the sun drenched box seats (tank tops and shorts) from the freezing reserved section (parkas and down coats, even in summer).  Only the front row or so of the reserved seats see sun in this shot.