(Greetings on March 15, otherwise known as the Ides of March, Oscar Day, Selection Sunday and World Baseball Classic semifinals day. It's also Everything You Think Is Wrong Day, set aside for folks to ponder that maybe they're not right all the time -- probably the most valuable thing to do out of this whole day. Time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 367th in a series):
Take a gander at this card. Not much to look at, huh? Maybe you'll find his story more interesting. Maybe not.
This is a card of Alonso Tellez (misspelled on the card). At the time this card was issued, Tellez was in the middle of his two seasons with the San Antonio Dodgers, the Double A affiliate of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Tellez played in 118 games for San Antonio in 1986 and 119 games in 1987. He batted .263 over those two years and recorded 48 doubles.
He also played in two games for the Triple A Albuquerque Dukes in 1986 and played in 104 games for the Double A Jacksonville Expos in 1989.
That's the sum total of his professional baseball experience for Major League Baseball organizations. He never played in the major leagues.
Yet, Tellez has nearly 4,000 hits for his career -- probably more, but records either weren't kept or are very elusive -- for some of his teams.
I learned most of this from Adam Darowski, a baseball historian in Negro League and Latin American baseball and a designer for baseball-reference.com. Here is one of his posts about Tellez:
"Wait!" I said. "I have this card!"
Tellez played for 26 years, from 1978-2004, mostly in the Mexican League. If you view his baseball-reference page, you notice that there are no statistics available for many of the years that he played. Then there is the gap from 1980-85 where nothing is listed.
But Tellez was still playing. He competed for The Liga Nacional (National League), which was a breakout league or "outlaw league" that was created during the 1980 Mexican League players' strike. Instead of crossing picket lines, Tellez, a young player at the time, played in the independent league, which survived until 1986 on minimal funds with family members helping keep the league afloat through selling food at games, etc.
Tellez played in the outlaw league until 1985 before returning to the Mexican League for one year. He then joined the Dodgers organization, went back to the Mexican League, played for the Expos organization for one year and then remained in the Mexican League for 16 seasons.
Note that the write-up says "before hanging up his spikes following the 1980 campaign." That implies he didn't play at all after the 1980 season, but that's when he moved to the independent league during the players' strike. He played from the ages of 20-24 in that outlaw league.
I received this card just over five years ago. It came along with the rest of the San Antonio Dodgers set from Bob at the best bubble.
A sampling. The set has that DIY feel of a lot of 1980s minor league sets with a perhaps questionable horizontal layout and not-so-clear black-and-white photos. Some are better than other (Tellez).
As is my habit with minor league sets the last few years, in order to conserve binder space I put only the minor league cards of the players who eventually played in major league baseball into the Dodgers binders. There aren't too many examples of that in this set. Mike Huff, Jack Savage, and the coaches card, which includes Dennis Lewallyn.
But I'll be making an exception for Tellez, who definitely did play professional ball and was inducted into the Mexican Professional Baseball Hall of Fame in 2010. He will be added to the binder.
This is what's great about minor league cards of decades past. They include subjects that major league sets steer clear of completely. One of the big reasons I collect baseball cards and have for so long is because of the stories -- of the players, of the teams, of the game. Not just the stars or hot rookies.
So that's one thing I can say for 2026. It's the year I learned about Alonso Tellez.
Comments
Amazing.