Sports Cards Ate My Brain

Joe Adcock was the Braves mainstay at First Base from 1953 to 1962.  After 3 years in Cincinnati he came over from the Reds in a four team trade that also involved the Dodgers and the Phillies. On July 31, 1954 Joe hit 4 home runs and a double.  His record for total bases (18) in a game stood until 2002.  He ended his career with 336 home runs and still stands at 99th place all-time in that category. He got the game winning hit during the game in which Harvey Haddix, of the Pirates, pitched 11 perfect innings but lost in the 12th. Joe was also a very good fielder and led National League first sackers in fielding 4 times. He played one year with Cleveland and then closed out his career with 3 seasons on the Los Angelas/California Angels. I received the 1960 card at the bottom of the scan as a Topps Home Team Advantage Giveaway.  You got one card in a plain silver pack for buying a certain amount of Topps products.  It was an incredible surprise to pull a card I needed

 (For those of you who have no idea who Bill the Cat is please search for Bloom County.) Jim Acker     Jim Acker was originally drafted by the Braves as a First Round pick in 1980 out of the University of Texas.  He was selected by Toronto in the 1982 Rule 5 draft.  I'm speculating that Bobby Cox may have had something to do with that since Cox went to the Blue Jays as manager in 1982. Jim was traded to the Braves in mid-season 1986 for pitcher Joe Johnson.  He spent parts of 4 seasons with the Braves and had a decent 3.71 ERA; however, in a reflection of how bad the Braves were in the late 1980's, he had a 7 and 27 record.  He started 15 games for Atlanta but was mainly a relief pitcher and led the team in Saves in 1987 with 14. In a fortuitous move, Atlanta sent him back to Toronto during the 1989 season.  The Braves got reliever Tony Castilla and some catcher named Francisco Cabrera.  If you don't know about Cabrera watch this . I always thought

The Braves are currently 75 and 75 and are 4.5 games out of the last Wild Card position.  The true Braves fan in me says they could get into the Wild Card game and then make it to the World Series and upset the American League champ.  The realist in me says this will not happen. The Braves just cannot score runs with any consistency.  The lack of clutch hitting over this season has been extremely frustrating.  I like Justin Upton a lot but with just ever so slightly better clutch numbers he would probably have 20 more RBI and be leading the league.  A big stat I just found is that Atlanta only has 26 Sacrifice Flies this year.  That is 6 less than any other team in the National League. A stat I heard on Friday's TV broadcast was that the Braves had scored 1 or 0 runs in 37 games this year.  That is basically a quarter of the season.  Add in the games that the Braves scored 2 runs and is must be a third of the season, at least. Best example of the team weakness is when the Phi

Wow!  5 page views on the last post.  My readership went up 67%! And now, for your listening pleasure: The Beatles! The last 5 cards I got from the non-sport boxes that the vendor had.  I wanted to buy more out of these boxes but talked myself out of many cards from various sets even though they were really cool. I got card from 4 different Topps Beatles sets. 1964 Topps Beatles Black and White Series 2 Card 69 - The classic mirro pose from Paul and George. Not a lot going on here on the back. Card 98 - Ringo! 1964 Topps Beatles Color Card 55 - The whole Fab Four in one shot.  Obviously taken from the Ed Sullivan show appearance hi-lighted above. Great card backs - by far the best of the 4 series I have cards from. 1964 Topps Beatles Diary Card 9A - John Lennon singing lead.  Again, from the Ed Sullivan show. Paul goes on a diatribe about British deejays. 1964 Topps A Hard Days Night Card 37 - Paul chatting with someone off

Fisticuffs! I picked up my first 2 old boxing cards: 1910 T218 Mecca Champions Series 3 - Charles Eyton (Card 105) This card caught my eye because of the frame border. There are apparently variations with different factory numbers. Eyton later went on to be a silent movie producer. 1948 Leaf 88 - Lou Ambers The front of this card is almost pristine except for the centering It was in the $3 box because of the paper loss on the back. The next post with hi-light the last 5 cards from the boxes.  

The last of the baseball cards I got at the show are 5 cards from 1956 Topps: 131 - Bob Roselli Another backup catcher.  Had 9 at bats in 1955 but was featured in an early series.  Go figure. 185 - Bill Bruton Led the NL in steals for the 3rd straight year in 1955.  Set the table for the big boppers in the Milwaukee lineup. 244 - Bob Buhl A solid pitcher for several years with the Braves.  Was 3rd in the NL in ERA in 1955. 254 - George Crowe 15 HR and 55 RBI in only 303 ABs in 1955. 294 - Ernie Johnson ERNIE!  With Pete van Wieran's recent passing, all 3 of the Braves voices I grew up with are gone.  Ernie was a top flight relief pitcher for several years for the Braves and a key piece of their bullpen during their World Series campaigns in 1957 and 1958.  You young'uns probably know his son better from watching NBA games on TNT. I have 7 more cards to write about from this show but I'll keep them a mystery until the next post.

I need many cards from the "big" Topps sets of the early 50's.  I picked up 10 cards from these sets.  Here are the first 5. I added my first 1952 Topps Braves cards: 97 - Earl Torgeson I prefer my earlier Bowman Torgeson's but it is nice to finally have a cards from this iconic set. 1953 Topps 185 - Jim Pendleton The Braves received Jim from the Dodgers before the 1953 season. 214 - Bill Bruton My favorite Bill Bruton card so far. 1955 Topps: 23 - Jack Parks Played 11 years in the minor leagues before making the Majors with the Braves in 1955. 103 - Charlie White Another backup catcher from 1955.  I see a theme! Next up will be 5 1956's.

My new favorite vintage vendor was at the most recent show I attended about 3 months ago.  I bought 20 cards as that was all my budget would allow. I filled in 2 1950 Bowman's that I needed.  These give me a little more than half of the Braves in the set. 55 - John "Buddy" Kerr The back tells us that, as of 1950, Buddy held the record for most consecutive games without an error for a shortstop at 383 games. 74 - Johnny Antonelli (From the cardback) In high school he pitched 3 no-hitters and 5 1-hitters, striking out 231 batters in 103 innings, giving up 36 hits. I got 1 more 1950 Bowman that I thought Dustin over at Coot Veal and the Vealtones needed but I didn't read the want list correctly and he already had it.  242 Dick Kryhoski.  It is up for trade if anyone wants it. I'll post the of the cards I got over the coming days.  Some of the cards are not baseball so I'll post those last.

I decided to give the show Utopia a chance.  So far the producers have already had to intervene because one of the people got sick after a night of everyone (almost) drinking. It seems that in a perfect Utopian society there will be no fat people.  The only overweight person is pregnant so that does not count.  I guess us large folks are TV worthy. Now they are having a "trial" for the guy who got so drunk he started trying to grope people and got into a fight. Now they are already talking about potentially calling 911 if something goes wrong.  They are so self-reliant! What a perfect society! Time to watch Boardwalk Empire and give up on this crap.

I've been meaning to actually post something for a while but am hooked on Star Wars Online and have spent waaaaaaaaaay too much time, and money, playing it. I haven't gotten many cards lately but I'll scan some of the newest old cards I got. I've gotten also gotten hooked on Big Brother and am wondering how Frankie is still in the house.  Since Ariana Grande is his sister I'm sure he doesn't need the half million dollars. Miscellaneous ramblings: Not happy about "Thursday Night Football" moving Big Bang Theory and Sherlock off of their time slots.  I don't need the NFL on Thursdays.  The college football games are nice to flip to during commercials or reruns. Somebody please put the Braves out of their misery.  My Labor Day was depressed by the Phillies no-hitter.  I'm surprised the Braves haven't been no-hit earlier this year with their pathetic of fence. The power went out for an hour and a half right as I was about to pos