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Saturday, February 2, 2019

1972 Kellogg's All-Time Greats Baseball Card Backs - #11

Speaker was the Center Fielder Finalist when the team was selected. 




He played from 1906 to 1928 for four different teams.  He was a Texas cowhand, whatever that is.  FYI - that is someone who tends to cattle.  

Look closely at the picture on the back.  Check out where his hands are on the bat.  That is definitely an old school approach.  

The card mentioned that he had one liability - he was overshadowed by playing during the same time as Ty Cobb.  He had a .3447 career batting average while Cobb leads the MLB rankings at .367.  Shouldn't that officially be .345?  Baseball-reference.com has him at .345 and Cobb at .366.  




Due to Cobb winning 12 batting titles, Speaker only managed to win one.

He still has the all-time lead in career doubles, and he led the league in that category eight times.

It was mentioned that he might not have been the greatest fielder, but he did become the first centerfielder to play shallow. 

Both Speaker and Cobb finished their careers in 1928 with Philadelphia's A's.  Too bad they didn't play their last game on the same day. 

4 comments:

  1. So who got to start in centerfield in their last game? ;)

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  2. Cobb's last game is listed as being on 9-11 and Speaker's was on 8-30. The team's last game was on 09-30 and they finished only 2.5 games behind the Yankees so they had a lot to play for in September.

    Mule Haas played centerfield in the last game.

    This team also had Lefty Grove, Eddie Collins and Mickey Cochrane. That's five guys from the Kellogg's All-Time Greats set.

    Cobb's last game - https://clutchlings.blogspot.com/2014/12/ty-cobbs-last-game.html

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    Replies
    1. Dang. That's a lot of talent. Not an expert on tobacco cards, but if there were any 1928 sets, the Athletics would have one heck of a team set.

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  3. They also had Jimmie Foxx and Al Simmons.

    ReplyDelete