Showing posts with label Luis Tiant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Luis Tiant. Show all posts

Saturday, April 30, 2016

1976 ASG +40: Luis Tiant 1976 Topps #130

The Yankees are at Fenway for a weekend Series which means that they are once again on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball....even if Curt Schilling won't be part of the festivities.

We tie into the evening by featuring Red Sox alum Luis Tiant as part of our 1976 All-Star Game 40th Anniversary coverage.

1976 Topps #130 Luis Tiant 

1976 was the 3rd and final All-Star game for Luis Tiant. He entered the game in the fifth inning and immediately gave up a Triple to Pete Rose. However El Tiante was able to get out of the inning unscathed. Steve Garvey hit a sharp grounder to third which may have gotten down the line had George Brett not been holding Rose on the bag. Rose's Reds Teammates Joe Morgan and George Foster than followed with a Pop Out and Ground Out. Tiant set down the NL in order in the sixth separating pop out of Phillies Greg Luzinski and Bob Boone with a strikeout of Astros Outfielder Cesar Cedeno.

Luis Tiant's other All-Star games were in 1968 and 1974 he took the loss in both games.

 1976 All-Star Game Luis Tiant vs Cesar Cedeno

We scanned the video of the 1976 ASG to check out Tiant's distinct delivery. Above he is facing Cesar Cedeno, even in this blurry image you can tell that Tiant has his back to the plate.  The catcher in the shot is Tiant's Red Sox teammate Carlton Fisk.

Tiant spent all but two months of his career in the AL, consequently the 76 All-Star Game is the only tie he pitched at the Vet. Yes in those pre-interleague days Luis Tiant pitched 19 seasons and 573 games but the only way you got to see him inside the Philadelphia city limits was to got to the 1976 All-Star game. Similarly his only appearance in the Astrodome was the 1968 All-Star Game.
 
Phungo Luis Tiant Index
I have created Indices for many Hall of Fame players, to these I have been adding a few for noteworthy non-hallers. Tiant is now part of this group.
1975 Topps #430 (This is a great card)

Sources and Links
1976 ASG 40th Anniversary Index 
YouTube - 1976 ASG
Baseball Almanac
Baseball-ref

Sunday, July 21, 2013

Sunday Night Baseball: 1975 Topps #430 Luis Tiant

The Yankees and Red Sox are at it again on National TV tonight. Yes the two teams may be featured a bit to often, but I don't think anyone can deny the match up has had a good share of drama. I watched a bit of the Saturday game found it enjoyable.

Tonight we take a look at 1970s era BoSox pitcher Luis Tiant.


1975 Topps #430 Luis Tiant

El Tiante is one of the memorable characters from my baseball fan youth.  From the mound he had a distinct delivery where he turned his back to the plate during his windup.  He won 3 games during the Red Sox memorable 1975 postseason - The start he didn't win was Game 6 of the World Series (the Carlton Fisk Game)  

Luis Tiant falls into the borderline HoF category.  Hist career pitchers WAR of 66.1 ranks 40th all-time. That puts him ahead of Bob Feller, Juan Marichal, Jim Bunning, Don Drysdale and Mariano Rivera.  Critical points here are that Feller lost 3 years to military service and he and Drysdale both have World Series rings. The Marichal and Bunning comps legitimize Tiants resume a bit more.  

He had a 19 year career that extended well beyond his Boston years.  His 6 years with Cleveland included an impressive 1968 season (21-9, 1.60 ERA) that was overshadowed by Denny McLain's 31 wins. His Boston peak came during a 5 year period from 1972-76 when he won 96 games. In 1974 Tiant went 22-13 with a league leading 7 shutouts. He finished his 19 seasons with 229 victories and 2400+ Ks.  

1975 Topps

Between 1971 and 1973 Topps made several attempts at action shots with very mixed results. The 1972 Topps In Action "parallels" are particularly.....odd. The late Chris Stufflestreet had an entire blog dedicated to 1973 Topps photography which had a lot of great action shots and some more mediocre.

In 1974 the results were much better and by 1975 the results are pretty acceptable.  The above #430 Tiant card is among the finest examples. If there is a complaint, I would say that it is that the pix is very white, Tiant's uniform blends into the crowd a bit, but that is a minor complaint.

1975 Topps commons can sometimes be found in dime boxes. This card is in very good condition, and even though Luis Tiant is in the near HoF category I don't see this card going for over a quarter.     

Other Voices
1975 Topps Blog (Night Owl Cards) - #430 Luis Tiant - This is as fine a love letter as you will find to this card.


Sources
Baseball-ref.com
wikipedia.com

a thousand words

a thousand words
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