Night Owl Cards

In the process of wrapping up the selections for the Greatest 100 Cards of the 1970s countdown, I've come across cards that I've forgotten about or am looking at in a new way after becoming so immersed in this hobby. One of the last things I did in my research was look through the Hostess cards from the '70s. While they are among my favorite oddballs and very much a hoot, most of them are regurgitated/rejected Topps photos and very few Hostess cards are great enough to make the final 100. There might be 1 or 2 on the list. This George Hendrick Hostess card from 1979 lies just outside the top 100 and it is there solely because Hendrick may be the only player to wear a '70s track suit on his baseball card. Hendrick is a unique individual when it comes to baseball cards. And because of this, he is the man that resurrects my "I'm Bad-Ass And You're Not" feature after a long period of inactivity. Hendrick -- although not really overlooked among f...

Two recent, unrelated events conspired to remind me that I have not added anyone to the "I'm Badass and You're Not" Club for a long time. The first one was the realization that it is Dave Stewart's birthday. The famed "death-stare" pitcher for the A's and Blue Jays, who started out with the Dodgers, was as bad-ass as they come on the mound and already a worthy member of the Badass Club. The second one was receiving a pair of cards from AdamE of Thoughts and Sox . They are both going to my goal of completing the 2001 Upper Deck Decade '70s set, and each card features the same player: It's my catching hero from when I was a kid, Carlton Fisk. Fisk was legend in New England. New England-born and bred, he was the Olde Towne Team through and through, or at least that's how Red Sox fans looked at him. And even if you didn't grow up in New England, if you grew up in a family of Red Sox fans -- and Yankee haters -- then y...

The latest inductee into the "I'm Badass and You're Not" Club is probably a controversial one. But I think that's the case only because of the times in which we live. Pedro Martinez has been retired for only a couple of years. The wounds are still fresh. The words still linger. But, let's face it, if I was inducting Bob Gibson into the Badass Club in 1968, would Cubs fans object? Of course they would. But now? Try to find someone who doesn't think Gibby was bad-ass. So it is with Martinez. People squawk about his supposed "head-hunting." His combative ways. His baiting quotes. But people are still too caught up in the emotions of his very recent career. And, besides, most of the complaints come from Yankee fans. Those don't count. Not when they're sitting on all those rings. The fact is, I think Martinez is terrific. He is one of my favorite players of all-time. He came to mind again on Saturday as I watched the painful Yankee...

The newest member of the "I'm Bad-ass and You're Not" Club is Don Baylor. Hit him as hard as you can. He ain't going down. When I last saw Baylor, I didn't like him very much. It was during that flap between Hong-Chih Kuo and spaz-punk Gerardo Parra last season. After Parra's infuriating preening after homering of Kuo -- who had thrown wildly in the general direction of Parra earlier in the at-bat -- you could see the Diamondbacks braintrust lip-flapping in the dugout as they jawed with the understandably upset Dodgers. Baylor, the hitting coach for Arizona, chewing on a toothpick, looked positively evil. How funny, I thought then, that Baylor would be so fired up over what began as a very tenuous brush-back. Wasn't this the guy who got hit 267 times during his career and shrugged off every one? Baylor is one of the all-time greats at getting hit by a pitch. Only three other players in history subjected their body to one of baseball's mos...

I'll let you know right up front, it's going to be difficult to get a post out of me this week. Back-to-back-to-back-to-back 12-hour work days, along with annually the busiest Saturday of the year, will bring my hobby habits to a semi-screeching halt. But I'll do what I can. I'll begin with the results of the latest "Best of the '70s" poll. The numbers are in on which '70s Topps Tom Seaver card you consider the best, and the winner is no surprise at all. In third place with five votes: Artificial turf Seaver. In a tie for second place with six votes each: Look-at-the-legs-on-that-guy Seaver ... ... and, yes-my-signature-is-sideways-you-want-to-make-something-out-of-it Seaver. But, in first place with 19 votes because this was no contest: Comin' at ya Seaver. Great card. Cropped a bit strangely. But great card. The 1974 Seaver will be entered into the Best of the '70s page as soon as I get a chance. Thanks for your votes...

The bouncer at the front door of the "I'm Badass and You're Not" Club has been rather picky lately about who gets admitted. So I thought I'd throw a player at him who is without a doubt deserving of entry. He had no choice but to let in Eddie Murray. Murray is badass for a variety of reasons. The first is his ability. Anyone who has 3,000 hits, 500 home runs AND a World Series ring is operating in territory previously visited only by Hank Aaron and Willie Mays. Plus, he was a switch-hitter. In fact, I think Murray is underrated. I know he's in the Hall of Fame and his number is retired, but I think he needs to be mentioned with the greatest hitters of all-time. The second badass qualification is the mutton-chops he featured through much of the 1980s. You can't get more bad-ass then that. This is one of the first cards in which those chops were in full bloom. I wonder how much time was spent taking care of those? I think this might be the best...