1970 Kellogg's Baseball Card Backs #73 - #75

I'm jumping around a bit with my comments on the card backs.  My next focus will be on the card backs from the 1970 Kellogg's baseball card set.  This is the first set of their 14-year run.  I already looked at a few of the newer sets which had some great comments.  Can the initial set be as interesting?

I really like a lot of things about the 75-card set.  What I don't like is that one is more likely to get a common player out of the cereal box.

#75 Don Mincher - The 1968 Expansion Draft is mentioned as being on October 15, 1968.  It doesn't mention that he was the first selection of the Pilots.  The NL draft was held on October 14th.  This surprised me since it seemed like the season might still be going.  The last game of the World Series that year was on October 10th.  No time was wasted in getting to the draft.  Can you name the other three teams in this draft?

Mincher played one season for Seattle before being traded by the Brewers before the 1970 season.  His number of games played on this card doesn't match what is on baseball-reference.com.  That could be an error or a result of research done.  I should check a Topps card to see what it shows.

UPDATE - Both the 1970 Topps and 1970 O-Pee-Chee cards list his games played as 140.  I checked out all of my cards and all list the games played as 139.  I guess it is uncorrected, but I will keep looking.  One of my cards came from a six-card pack that I opened.

#74 Tommy Harper - he was also selected by the Pilots in the Expansion Draft.  He played three seasons with Seattle/Milwaukee before being traded.  Nothing unique in the bio.

#73 Denny McLain - here's a hobby that probably ins't mentioned much - organ.  It turns out that he created a few records in the off-season.  Since Lou Boudreau was a Cub announcer for a long time, I already knew that Denny was his son-in-law.  They should have mentioned that McLain was the 1968 AL MVP 20 years after Boudreau won the same award.

Normally McLain is mentioned as MLB's last 30-game winner, but since it was still fairly recent (1968), the card mentions it without the fanfare.

Post #512 - Let's Play Two

Sorry Eddie Mathews, but this post isn't about you.  Why?  You didn't make it into a Kellogg's set with your 512 career homers.  Ernie Banks equalled your career total and played late enough to get into Kellogg's sets.

Banks got into the 1970 and 1971 sets as well as one of the small sets from the 1990s.

I'm busy today with some flooding in our neighborhood.

Here a Goose, There a Goose.....

I was in Colorado Springs yesterday, hometown of Goose Gossage.  I've been past the park named after him before and it's a great place for baseball.

This time in town I noticed a lot more.  Goose's autographed pictures seemed to be everywhere that I went.  It seems like he remembers his hometown well.  I know that he's gotten a lot of bad press lately talking about how to play the game, but the same could be said by older players in every other major sport too.

I'm tired from the trip so that's all for today.  Maybe we'll play two tomorrow.

Going to Baseball Games as a Kid - NL and AL

When we were kids we'd go to a few Cub games per year and probably about 5-10 White Sox games.  Since the crowds were big for the good teams we always seemed to go and see the other 1970s teams that weren't very good - Expos, Padres and Astros.

Nate Colbert played for all three of these teams, so I bet I saw him play way too much.  He got into four consecutive Kellogg's baseball card sets (1971 - 1974).  He was traded to Detroit after the 1974 season.  He only hit 10 of his 173 homers after the trade.

Steve Blass played for the Pirates so we didn't get to those games.  We didn't see the Dodgers or Reds much either.  He played all ten of his seasons with the Pirates, appearing on Kellogg's baseball cards in 1972 and 1973.

The White Sox games worked the same way.  We never ended up seeing the good teams there either.

Kellogg's Hockey Cards - I Don't Have Them All Yet

I picked up some of these Kellogg's hockey cards recently.  I don't really collect hockey cards, but I figured that I'd work on this set since it only has 24 cards.

I'm not a big fan of these cards because they are really just Score brand cards.  There is no mention of Kellogg's on the front of the card.  I assume that the normal Score Patrick Roy looks exactly like this on the front.

Sure it says Kellogg's on the back, but that isn't enough for me to be highly interested.  Kenner did this with their Starting Lineup figures at some point and people quickly lost interest in the cards.

Why Aren't There More Nice 1975 Kellogg's Cards?

Other recent purchases included some 1975 Kellogg's baseball cards.  I knew from the listing that they weren't in great condition.  That seems to be the norm for 1975 cards.  Finding nice 1971s being difficult makes sense since there were no factor sets, but what about the 1975 factory sets?

Were there lots of 1975 factory sets?  If so, where did they go?

More about Tiant some other time.  I'm hoping someone can shed more light on the problem with 1975s.

Recent Card Purchase - Check The Borders

I picked up this 1976 Tom Seaver recently.

The 1976 set is one of my favorites and I think that the Seaver card is great.

Here is my problem.  The 1976 cards have so much white border that when the card is discolored it really looks bad.  The Seaver pictured is one of those cards.

I haven't been buying much on e-bay lately and condition certainly is questionable when doing so.  The National will be a great chance for me to check out what I am buying.