Alex Rodriguez: Exclusive Member of Topps #1 Five Timers Club

Last Year in the wake of the commotion regarding Topps awarding the #1 Card to Derek Jeter we took a look at the other lead off cards from Flagship. One of the things we found out was that the Captain had not made the top spot previously.

 However one of his teammates had done it a number of times

2005 Topps #1 Alex Rodriguez

This isn't A-Rod's first #1 but it is the first time he was honored with the top spot as a member of the New York Yankees. I am not positive but I am pretty sure that is Derek Jeter hovering in the background. The photo and the card is a summary of Alex Rodriguez's Yankees career. No matter what he did Jeter would always be looming.

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2005 Topps #1 Alex Rodriguez (b-side)

Given his polarizing career and personality, I found the Buck Showalter Quote and related Text on the back of A-Rod's 2005 Card pretty amusing.

"A Good Man with a Pure Heart" and "One of the game's Classiest Emissaries" are definitely not in the narrative I most often see associated with Alex Rodriguez.

Five Timers Club
Alex occupied the top spot four other times including three with the Yankees. He is the sole 5 time member of the Topps #1 Club.   

(Four Scans below are from Baseball Card Database)

Realizing that Alex Rodriguez is a Five Time Topps Lead-Off player reminded me of "The Five Timers Club" sketch on Saturday Night Live. Essentially anyone that has hosted the show five times a member of an exclusive club. Folks in that club include Tom Hanks, Steve Martin, Alec Baldwin, Paul Simon and Justin Timberlake.

Alex is the charter member of the Five Timer Club related to #1 Cards in Topps.

Sources and Links
Topps #1 Club
Baseball Card Database
NBC

1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

Regardless of your thoughts on Alex Rodriguez climbing up another rung on the Lifetime Home Run Ladder the occasion does give us an opportunity to re-examine the careers of baseball legends of the past.

A-Rod is currently (2015 04 27) standing at 659 Home Runs, one behind Hall of Fame Centerfielder Willie Mays.

 1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

When he retired Mays' 660 Career Home Runs ranked #3 on the list behind Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron.

The above card honors Mays' 1954 MVP season when he finished 3rd in NL Home Runs (41) behind Ted Kluzewsk (49) and Gil Hodges (42). Mays may not have won the HR title that year but he got his MVP for leading the league in Batting Average, Slugging, OPS and OPS+ while being a member of the NL Pennant Winning New York Giants who went on to sweep the Cleveland Indians in the World Series.

If one uses WAR as the MVP barometer the BBWAA got this one right. Mays led the League in WAR for All players,  His Offensive WAR tied Duke Snider but he exceeded the Duke in dWAR

Willie May received 2/3 of the 24 first place MVP votes. Seven of the eight remaining top votes went to Ted Kluzewski, with Mays teammate Alvin Dark mysteriously getting the last #1 vote (3.6 WAR)

1961 Topps MVP Subset
Apparently Topps Airbrushed Mays' cap. I guess they wanted a photo from the year that the MVP was awarded, but did not want to show the defunct New York Giants logo. Or perhaps they could not for legal reasons.

Regardless it is the rare airbrushing of a card for a player who did not switch teams until a decade later

FTC (For the Collector)
I laid down $9 for this card at a show in 2009. That is probably a bit of an overpay for a card in such marginal condition.

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 1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

Nice text, there is acknowledgement of Mays' military service in the year immediately prior to his MVP.  Also note that here on the back of the card Topps elects to use the New York Giants team name.

1954 was the first of two MVP awards for Mays, the second coming in 1965. To honor the award Topps placed Mays on card #1 in 1966. This year's Heritage set that homages 1966T paired Mays with current Giants star Buster Posey on Card #1

History Changes

Career Home Run Leaders (games through 2015 04 26 - from Baseball-ref)

The leader board as of press time on April 27 2015. 

Sources and Links
Phungo HoF Index - Willie Mays
Baseball-ref

Snapshots 2012 10 08 - ALDS Game 2 - Yankees 2 @ Orioles 3

Team Phungo closed our 2012 MLB campaign where we started it, At Camden Yards. For the sixth consecutive year I was able to procure a playoff ticket.  Somewhat sadly that ticket was not for a Philles Postseason game.  Regardless time moves on and it has been exciting to watch the Baltimore Orioles usher in a new playoff era.

On Monday night the Orioles defeated their AL East Division Rivals 3-2 in a rather dramatic game.  There weren't many offensive fireworks as both teams had to scratch out all five of their combined runs.

There were a couple of notable performances Wei-Yin Chen and Andy Pettitte both pitched well, Chris Davis had a pair of RBIs for the O's.  Ichiro basically stole a run for the the Yankees with some creative baserunning in the first inning. 

Snapshots (click on any photo to enlarge) 

National Anthem  

Always cool to be at any Big Flag game.  Both Baltimore and For McHenry take great pride in their place in American History and their connection to the Star Spangled Banner. 

 Wei-Yin Chen

After getting into some jams early Chen was able to settle down and gave the O's 6 1/3 innings.  This photo of Wei-Yin was taken during warm ups.

Nate McClouth 

Hard to imagine after a few up and down years Nate McClouth is batting leadoff for a 90+ Win team in the ALDS.

Record Setter

Alex Rodriguez (looking a bit exasperated)

I heard last night that Alex Rodriguez set the  blob postseason record.  Blob is the term that Night Owl Cards has used for the last out of the Season, a Series, or Game.  A-Rod has now been the final out of 4 Playoff games  

Coda

Andy Pettitte

I really haven't heard what Pettitte is going to be up to after the 2012 season.  But he turned 40 this summer and has already retired once.  If the O's end up defeating the Yankees, Monday night may have been Pettittes final MLB appearance. 

SUS - Shut Up Stats: Grand Slams for Gehrig and A-Rod

2011 Phungo 42-NYYa4 Lou Gehrig

Last night in the Yankees 6-4 win over the Braves Alex Rodriguez tied Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig for Career Grand Slams with 23.

Using the Baseball-Reference Home Run Log feature we can find out a little more about the 23 Slams hit by each of the players.

		Lou Gehrig
Slam#	HR #	Date	For		Vs	Pitcher	Score	Inning
1	11	7/23/1925	NYY		WSH	Firpo Marberry	behind 5-6	b 7
2	44	5/7/1927	NYY	@	CHW	Ted Lyons		t 9
3	65	1927-07-04 (2)	NYY		WSH	Bobby Burke		b 6
4	88	5/11/1928	NYY		CLE	Joe Shaute	behind 0-1	b 6
5	142	1929-09-10 (2)	NYY		DET	Phil Page		b 1
6	145	1929-09-18 (2)	NYY		CLE	Milt Shoffner		b 7
7	154	1930-05-22 (2)	NYY	@	PHA	Bill Shores		t 1
8	179	7/31/1930	NYY	@	BOS	Ed Durham		t 7
9	223	8/29/1931	NYY	@	PHA	Lefty Grove		t 6
10	225	8/31/1931	NYY		WSH	Lloyd Brown		b 5
11	227	1931-09-01 (2)	NYY		BOS	Ed Morris		b 3
12	240	5/26/1932	NYY	@	WSH	General Crowder		t 6
13	265	1932-09-09 (1)	NYY	@	DET	Earl Whitehill		t 3
14	305	5/10/1934	NYY		CHW	Lee Stine		b 5
15	307	5/13/1934	NYY		CLE	Lloyd Brown		b 1
16	314	6/10/1934	NYY		PHA	Bill Dietrich		b 1
17	321	7/5/1934	NYY		WSH	Lefty Stewart		b 3
18	359	7/7/1935	NYY	@	WSH	Bobo Newsom		t 5
19	368	1935-08-21 (1)	NYY	@	SLB	Jim Walkup		t 3
20	414	8/15/1936	NYY	@	PHA	Randy Gumpert		t 8
21	422	1936-09-09 (2)	NYY	@	CLE	Oral Hildebrand		t 2
22	458	8/31/1937	NYY	@	CLE	Mel Harder		t 5
23	488	8/20/1938	NYY	@	PHA	Buck Ross		t 1
		Alex Rodriguez
Slam	HR #	Date	For		Vs	Pitcher	Score	Inning
1	8	4/18/1996	SEA		DET	Clint Sodowsky	ahead 2-1	b 2
2	12	5/17/1996	SEA	@	BAL	Alan Mills	behind 7-9	t 8
3	22	7/6/1996	SEA	@	TEX	Kevin Gross	ahead 3-1	t 4
4	126	7/19/1999	SEA		ARI	Vicente Padilla	tied 3-3	b 6
5	130	7/30/1999	SEA		BAL	Arthur Rhodes	behind 1-2	b 5
6	144	9/16/1999	SEA	@	TBD	Esteban Yan	behind 0-2	t 8
7	153	4/16/2000	SEA	@	TOR	Pedro Borbon	ahead 15-7	t 8
8	214	7/5/2001	TEX		SEA	Brian Fuentes	ahead 8-1	b 4
9	275	7/27/2002	TEX		OAK	Billy Koch	tied 6-6	b 10
10	323	7/31/2003	TEX		BOS	Todd Jones	tied 3-3	b 11
11	388	4/26/2005	NYY		LAA	Bartolo Colon	ahead 6-2	b 4
12	430	4/3/2006	NYY	@	OAK	Barry Zito	ahead 3-0	t 2
13	447	7/2/2006	NYY		NYM	Alay Soler	behind 2-4	b 3
14	467	4/7/2007	NYY		BAL	Chris Ray	behind 6-7	b 9
15	486	6/7/2007	NYY	@	CHW	Ryan Bukvich	ahead 4-3	t 9
16	517	9/25/2007	NYY	@	TBD	Jason Hammel	ahead 1-0	t 3
17	552	9/14/2008	NYY		TBR	Edwin Jackson	tied 0-0	b 1
18	583	10/4/2009	NYY	@	TBR	Andy Sonnanstine	ahead 6-2	t 6
19	587	5/14/2010	NYY		MIN	Matt Guerrier	behind 3-4	b 7
20	590	5/31/2010	NYY		CLE	Chris Perez	ahead 2-1	b 7
21	596	7/6/2010	NYY	@	OAK	Trevor Cahill	tied 1-1	t 3
22	618	4/23/2011	NYY	@	BAL	Josh Rupe	ahead 9-3	t 8
23	639	6/12/2012	NYY	@	ATL	Jonny Venters	behind 0-4	t 8

He didn't know it at the time, but after Gehrig hit career Slam #23 he would play less than 60 more games. Lou Gehrig hit his last Grand Slam at the age of 35 - he only lived to be 37.  Alex Rodriguez is now 36.

There were at least two future Hall of Famers that Gehrig hit his slams off of, Lefty Grove and Ted Lyons.  None of A-Rod's victims appear to be of that caliber - Barry Zito is likely the best pitcher of the bunch.

Three of Rodriguez Slams are of the Walk-Off variety.  None of Gehrig's 23 were Walk-Offs.  Of course none of the Lou Gehrig's Home Runs were steroid induced either.

Source: Baseball-Reference.com