2016 Topps the Originals: Duos

Today we take a look at the rather random Dual Player cards of 1967 Heritage
 

1967 Topps #334 Twin Terrors Bob Allison and Harmon Killebrew
Four our cover card we picked this one because the Dual Player cards typically feature 2 players and it’s a Twins Card – get it?

However I am thinking Topps may dump the 'Terror' portion of “Twin Terror” for this cards Heritage counterpart.
 
Future Hall of Famer and 500 HR club member Harmon Killebrew was an obvious choice to represent the Twins. Bob Allison’s qualifications were a bit more wanting, he was coming off of a 70 game 1966 season in which he hit 8 Home Runs, well down from the 28 he averaged from 1959-65.

Flip

#334 Twin Terrors Allison Killebrew (b-side)

Nice bios of each players on the back of the cards. Although 2/3 of the text is dedicated to the lesser accomplished Allison. Regardless it is about twice as many words as I expected to see on the upcoming Heritage Card.
  
More Duos

 The Tigers card features a couple of mega prospects one of which is in the Hall of Fame. 

 

The White Sox came up with one of the weaker combos in the subset. Don Buford is acceptable but Pete Ward is coming off a 1966 season where he batted .219 with 3 dingers.

But for mre the Indians card is the worst of the 1967T Multi-Player subset. "Tribe Thumpers" is NOT alliterative!

Menke would spend some time as Hitting Coach for the Phillies, We probably should dedicate a post to him at some point.

Pretty strong one here - Donn Clendenon batted .299 with 28 Home Runs in 1966. He was just a step behind Willie Stargell (.315, 33 HR), but both were outpaced by teammate Roberto Clemente who won the MVP award in 1966.

We will Definitely be returning to this card in a future posting. 

Over at the 1967 Topps blog there is a write up on the #423 Giants Fence Busters Card that features Mays and McCovey.

Checklist
1967 is a decent edition of this subset, you may recall the 1966 duos were very random and consisted of just five cards. There is a great deal of Randomness in 1967 as well, but it's size (12 cards) and talent makes it a stronger set.

Team	1967 Topps	2016 Heritage
Cardinals	#63 Card Clubbers Brock/Flood	#63 Stephen Piscotty - Matt Carpenter
Indians	#109 Tribe Thumpers Colavito Wagner	109 Francisco Lindor - Jason Kipnis
White Sox	#143 Sox Sockers Ward Buford	#143 Josh Reddick (Oakland Athletics)
Mets	#186 Mets Maulers - Kranepool Swoboda	#186 Curtis Granderson - Juan Lagares
Tigers	#216 Bengal Belters Cash Kaline	#216 Ian Kinsler - Miguel Cabrera
Pirates	#266 Pitt Power – Stargell Clendenon	#266 Starling Marte - Andrew McCutchen
Phillies	#309 Hurlers Beware Callison Allen	#309 Maikel Franco - Ryan Howard
Twins	#334 Twins Terrors Allison Killebrew	#334 Miguel Sano - Byron Buxton
Braves	#396 Altanta Aces Menke Cloninger	#396 Nick Markakis  (solo?)
Giants	#423 Fence Busters – Mays McCovey	#423 Brandon Belt (solo?)
Indians	#463 Hill Aces McDowell Siebert	#463 Josh Hamilton - Texas
Orioles	#521 Bird Bombers Powell Blefray	na
Orioles	#1 Robinson Bauer Robinson	#1 Moustakas Escobar Hosmer

Last week we got a glimpse at the 2016 Heritage Checker for comparison. We have added the list here for comparison. To me the originals win on almost every card - the exceptions are possibly #109 Indians, #216 Tigers (close call), and amazingly Phillies (2008 WSC puts Howard over Dick Allen). 

Quick note on the Mets card, Topps has a run of Rookie Pairs that run from 161-190 that they interrupted to match Granderson/Lagares with Kranepool/Swaboda. One may make the argument that the Heritage card should win the Met battle, for me the 1999 SI Greats of the Game card w/ Ed Kranepool eating the Fried Chicken Dinner gives the edge to 1967T.

Sources and Links
1967 Topps/2016 Heritage Index
Harmon Killebrew HoF Index
1967 Topps Blog
Cardboard Connection 
Terapeak
Baseball-ref
Pnilly Inquirer

1964 Topps - 2013 Heritage Index

This is an Index of Posts related to our series on 1964 Topps.

1964 Topps #135 Johnny Callison 

Most of the posts originally ran in 2013 coinciding with that years Heritage release which was inspired by 1964 Topps.


1964 Topps / 2013 Heritage Postings 

1964 Topps Design (Ray Culp, Lou Brock, Gus Triandos)  

1964 Topps b-Sides (Ray Culp)

1964 Topps Rookie Cards (Dick Allen)

1964 Topps League Leader Cards (Hank Aaron, Ken Boyer, Bill White) 

1964 Topps Team Cards (Phillies, Reds)  

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

Chris Stufflestreet - Vintage Sportscards 1964 Topps Giants

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

The Johnny Callison - Dale Murphy Connection

Strange confluence of events led to this post.

Last night I was bindering some cards, one of which was this Dale Murphy card.

1983 Topps #401 Dale Murphy All-Star

The flip side of each 1983T AS card has the summary of an all-star game. Dale Murphy's card features the 1964 All-Star Game

1983 Topps #401 Dale Murphy All-Star (b-side)

There is a lot of copy here - The 1964 All Star Game will always be the Johnny Callison Game to me. Topps does finally get around to mentioning the Phillies Outfielder in the third sentence. Regardless I am happy to see the game noted in the 1983T All-Star set.

This morning @MallonDan noted via twtter that Johnny Callison was born on this date in 1939 and mentioned the 1964 All-Star game. I noted this and thought, "I just read about that game on a Baseball Card last night"

Later in the day Andy at @HighHeatStats mentioned it that the all-time leader for Home Runs among players born on March 12 was Dale Murphy.

That's when I thought Hey I was just looking at the card that connects both of these players that share a birth date.

etc
I am adding this post to our 1964 Phillies series.

Sources and Links
@MallonDan
@HighHeatStats
1964 Phillies @ 50
Baseball-ref

2015 Heritage the Originals: Teammates Subset?

There are a couple of special cards in the 1966T set that include 2 or 3 teammates.

1966 Topps #52 Power Plus Wes Covington Johnny Callison

At card #52 we have the first of the combo cards which happens to be dedicated to the Phillies. Johnny Callison is a worthy subject for a card titled Power Plus, not so sure about his partner.

Wes Covington was coming off a 1965 season in which he hit 15 homers and tallied 45 RBIs. Which I would consider unremarkable power numbers even in the pitching centric middle 60s. Other candidates for the card could have been Dick Allen (20 HR, 85 RBI) or Dick Stuard (28/95).

In addition it was Covington's last season with the Phillies, he was traded during the off-season and was likely gone by the time this card was issued.

1964 Phillies @ 50
Wes was also the a  member of the 1964 Phillies, as a Left fielder for the club he had similar numbers to 1965 13 HR, 58 RBI, .280 BA 126 OPS+, and 1.4 WAR. Covington's dWAR numbers hurt his total throughout his career.

During the clubs fateful stretch run manager Gene Mauch elected to frequently use a platoon in Left field. Following the teams collapse Covington was very unhappy and he would eventually ask for the aforementioned trade.

One of the more humorous parts of an extremely interesting SABR Bio by Andy Sturgill mentions that Covington had already spent his World Series bonus money. He purchased a rifle which he brought into the clubhouse and declared "This is for the sportswriters"

Fortunately for Wes Covington he was able to make the postseason both prior to and after his Phillies tenure. He won a World Series withe 1957 Milwaukee Braves and returned to the series with the club the following season. He also got a pinch hit appearance in the 1966 Series with the Dodgers who lost to the Orioles. 

1966 Topps Combos
Sorry drifted into our 1964 Phils coverage there, now back to our regularly scheduled post.

You may have noticed I had a Question Mark in the title, that is because I am not really sure one should call this theme a subset.  There are 5 combo cards in 1966 Topps with no apparent rationale for the players or teams. All 5 cards appear in the first couple of series. The four other teams repped are the Pirates, Giants, White Sox and Astros.

Willie Stargell is the only Hall of Famer in the subset with each card containing a player that is somewhat comparable to Johnny Callison.

#99 Bucs Belters - Willie Stargell, Don Clendennon

#156 DP Combo Dick Schofield Hal Lanier 

#199 Chisox Clubbers Bill Skowron, Johnny Romano, Floyd Robinson 

#273 Astros Aces - Bob Aspromante and Rusty Staub

Special Thanks to Jim From Downingtown who's research I stole for this post. He points out that the power outage doesn't occur just on the Phillies card, The Chisox card is dubious and ignoring Roberto Clemente on a Bucs Belters card does sound like a gaffe. 

Flipped

1966 Topps #52 Power Plus Wes Covington Johnny Callison (b-side)


There is a fairly detailed write up on the back of each card, although the Wes Covington portion of this one devotes a lot more time to his Braves career than his Phillies tenure.

2015 Heritage Combos
Who will Topps go with for the 2015 Combos?
Will 2015 Heritage have combos? 

I am saying yes to the combos and take a stab at some projections

Phillies Power Plus - egads nobody, I will stick with the standbys of Utley and Howard or Topps could maintain the continuity of the Covington trade by including Jimmy Rollins
Bucs Belters -McCutchen and How about Super Utility guy Josh Harrison filling the Clendennon role.
DP Combo (Giants) - This one is a little complicated. Brandon Crawford is the starting Shortstop for the World Champs, but there was a revolving door at 2nd. I am going with St Johns Alum Joe Panik.
Chisox Clubbers - If we can't go with Jose Abreu 3 times, I will add Konerko and Adam Dunn. I know they are both gone, but it is a deserved nod to their long careers.
Astros Aces - This is great the card is named Aces but has two batters. Going to go with 2 young guys here Altuve and Singleton - just because he came up with the Philllies.

Sources and Links
Willie Stargell HoF index 
1966 Topps Blog
2015 Heritage/1966 Topps Index
1964 Phillies @ 50 Index
SABR Bio by Andy Sturgill
cardboard connection
Topps Database
Baseball-ref

50 Years Ago: Johnny Callison All-Star Game Hero

One of the highlights for the 1964 Phillies season was in the 35th Midsummer Classic played on July 7 1964.  

1967 Topps #85 Johnny Callison

Less than three weeks after Jim Bunning tossed a perfect game versus the Mets another Phillies player had a memorable day at Shea Stadium. Johnny Callison came up with 2 outs in the bottom of the 9th inning of a tie ballgame. With two men on the left-handed hitter pulled the first pitch into the right field stands. The 3 run homer gave the NL a dramatic 7-4 victory.

The 1964 Phillies SABR collection Year of the Blue Snow has a chapter dedicated to Callison's Home Run in the 1965 ASG. Among the interesting tidbits unearthed by SABR biographer Mel Marmer are that Johnny Callison came into the game as a pinch hitter for the pitcher (Bunning) and expected to be removed. However, Hank Aaron wasn't feeling well and Callison ended up remaining in the game. Callison Also got to face the same pitcher twice, Dick "the Monster" Radatz.  In his first AB Callison flew out to CF Mickey Mantle. In the 9th versus Radatz, Callison felt he needed a lighter bat and used the lumber of future HoF ASG teammate Billy Williams.

Callison's fly out came on a low pitch from Radatz. Apparently it was deep enough to scare "the Monster" and the pitcher threw a High Fastball for his first pitch. Callison folllowed the same thought process, correctly guessing the pitch and location enabling him to connect perfectly.

1967 Topps #85 Johnny Callison #85 (b-side)

Johnny Callison's ASG heroics are the subject of the first cartoon on the flip side of his 1967 Topps Cards

1967 Topps
Last year we discussed Callison's HR during our 2013 ASG coverage - The game was hosted by the Mets for the first time since the Day Callison hit his dinger. Around the same time the card was also profiled by the 1967 Topps Blog

More 1964 Phllies
1964 Phils Series  Index


Sources
Baseball-ref
YouTube/The Baseball Page
The Year of the Blue Snow: The 1964 Phillies

1964 Phillies @ 50

This is an index of postings related to the Phillies infamous 1964 Phillies team that led the National League most of the season only to collapse in the final few weeks. 

1964 Topps #135 Johnny Callison
Most of these posts were written during 2014 thus the feature title. I am sure we will add some postings in the future but the foundation is all 2014. 

1964 Philies Series
Dick Allen (65 Topps) 
Dick Allen John Hernstein RC (64 Topps)   
Ruben Amaro
Dennis Bennett (64 Topps)
Jim Bunning Perfect Game  (65 Topps)
Johnny Callison  (64 Topps)
Johnny Callison ASG Home Run (1967 Topps)
Johnny Callison 1964 ASG (1983 Topps Dale Murphy)
Clay Dalrymple (1963 Fleer)
Pat Corrales (1965 Topps RC)
Wes Covington
Ray Culp
Ryne Duren
Tony Gonzalez (61 Topps)
Dallas Green (62 Topps)
Alex Johnson (66 Topps, 66T w/ Trade Statement)
John Herrnstein (65 Topps)
Art Mahaffey (1960 Topps Rookie Star) 
Gene Mauch
Cookie Rojas (first ASG in Minnesota - 1965)
Bobby Shantz
Costen Shockley (1965 Topps Rookie Stars) 
Roy Sievers (1964 Topps)
Chris Short (1967 Topps)
Tony Taylor (1976 Topps)
Frank Thomas (1965 Topps) 
Bobby Wine  (1963 Topps)
Rick Wise (1972 Topps In Action)

2014 Heritage the Originals - 1965 Topps #4 League Leaders Home Runs

The typical format of the 1965 Topps League Leaders has been referred to by Night Owl Cards as Olympic Podium style. The League Leader on the Top, with two smaller photos of the 2nd and 3rd  place finishers. Of course in many categories there are ties. Take the 1964 Home Run Leaders

1965 Topps #4 League Leaders Home Run

This LL card is packed full of players - It is kind of a cool one for Phillies Fans. You get Johnny Callison plus 3 Hall of Famers.  I am sure it is a must have for Giants fans as well, I mean how many LL cards have 3 players from the same team.

Willie Mays and Billy Williams sort of get equal billing, although Mays had 14 more Home Runs then Williams (47-33). Callison and the other folks on the bottom tier each tallied 31 dingers.  This can all be seen on the flip of the card:

 

1965 Topps #4 LL Home Runs (b-side)

Kind of interesting feature here, the HR hitters are listed down to 18 and then we are presented with a separate list of all the players that hit a Grand Slam. The latter list includes the only career grand slam hit by Pete Rose, which was off the Phillies and Dallas Green.  

Traditional 1965T Olympic Podium

1965 Topps #3 LL Home Runs (image swiped from baseball card database)

The AL counterpart to our titular card is a fine example of the 3 man LL card, with some stellar reps in Harmon Killewbrew, Boog Powell, and Mickey Mantle. 

MLB 2013 did feature some ties in the LL categories, it will be interesting to see how this is handled for Topps in 2014 Heritage.

More Banished Chris Short
A few weeks ago we discussed the omission of Phillies pitcher Chris Short from Topps cards prior to 1967. The fine creative folks over at Cards that Never Were figured out that this meant that Topps had to create an NL ERA LL card without Short, who placed 3rd in 1964. CTNW put together their own custom card that is pretty sweet.  Cards that Never Were is on a bit of Chris Short binge - their example of the 1965T Chris Short card is here. (hat tip to Chris Short fan Jim From Downingtown for pointing me to the CTNW LL posting)

1965 Topps/2014 Heritage Index   

Base - #534 John Herrnstein 

Rookie Cup - #460 Dick Allen 

Rookie Stars - #282 Dick Estelle & Masanori Murakami 

2010 Topps Vintage Collection - #VLC2 Johnny Mize

World Series - #139 The Cards Celebrate

More info on 1965 Topps
The entire 1965 Topps Series was covered by Kevin B of Orioles Card "O" the day on The Great 1965 Topps Project
Cardboard Connection
Sports Collectors Digest (TS O' Connell)
Golden Age of Baseball Cards
Dean's Cards
Beckett

PSA

Sources

Night Owl Cards 

Cards that Never Were

baseball card database

baseball-ref.com

2014 Topps 

1964 Phillies @ 50: Johnny Callison 1964 Topps #135

2014 marks the 50th anniversary of the 1964 Phillies. The team is primarily remembered for their collapse, losing ten games in a row and a 6.5 game lead during the final two weeks of the season. It should also be remembered that the 1964 squad is the most competitive team the Phillies fielded between the 1950 whiz kids and their late 70s playoff run.

1964 Topps #135 Johnny Callison 

We kick off our 1964 Phillies series with a look at fan favorite Johnny Callison, who likely would have been the NL MVP had it done been for the teams collapse. Callison finished 2nd to Ken Boyer who played for the Pennant Winning Cardinals.

For 1964 Callison's offensive numbers included 31 Home Runs which ranked him 3rd in the league, 104 RBIs (4th), and 101 Runs Scored (6th). On the defensive side of the ball Callison was impressive as well, leading RFs in Putouts, Assists, and several advanced metrics including Range Factor, Zone Runs and Fielding Percentage.    

Callison made his 3rd of 4 all-star teams in 1964 - and it is a good thing he did. Callison tagged Dick Radatz for a 3 Run Wall-Off Homer that gave the senior circuit a 7-4 victory at Shea Stadium. It was the first time a Phillies player had ever homered in the All-Star Game.      

From 1962-65 Johnny Callison put together four great season. He clubbed 112 Homers during the span logging a WAR of 6+ each year. He played a minimum of 157 games each of those seasons and was a significant offensive force for the Phillies throughout the era. Unfortunately Callison's offensive production fell off after that period. The Phillies traded Callison following the '69 season and he finished his career playing for the Cubs and Yankees.

Johnny Callison Died in 2006 at the age of 67. When the Mets hosted the All-Star game this past summer, Steve Wulf wrote this terrific piece on Johnny Callison for ESPN.com to commemorate his Game Winning HR in the 1964 all-star game.

1964 Topps
Callison was a youthful 25 in 1964, but if you think that he looks younger than that on his 1964 card - You would be correct! That is because this 64T image is a recrop of the pix used for Callison's 1961 Topps #468 Card. 

More Callison
1963 Topps #434
1965 Topps #310


Sources
Baseball-Ref
ESPN

ReWind: 1964 All-Star Game - 1965 Topps #310 Johnny Callison

The Last time the All-Star Game was hosted by the Mets was at old Shea Stadium in 1964.  The game was a big one for one Phillies Rep.   

1965 Topps #310 Johnny Callison

With the scored tied in 2 outs in the 9th Johnny Callison hit a 3 run homer to give the NL a 7-4 walk off victory.

The moment noted on the reverse of Callison's 1965 Topps card: 

1965 Topps #310 Johnny Callison(B-side)

1965 Topps

Commons from the much loved 65T set can often be found in the 3/Buck bin.  A semi-star like Callison would likely fetch somewhere between 50 cents adn a dollar. Commons from the set run from #1-370. The High Numbers start at 371 and run to the end of the set, 598. Non-stars among High Numbers go for around a dollar.

Other Voices

ESPN recently ran a full length piece on Callison and his famous Homer here.

1967 Topps #85 Johnny Callison

Sources

Baseball-ref.com

ESPN.com

Happy New Year!

Chinese New Year that is. 

Thursday marked the Chinese New Year, 2011 is the Year of the Rabbit or Hare - The Chinese Zodiac runs in 12 year cycles rather than a 12 (or 13 month Ophiuchus??) cycle. 

Year of the Rabbit luminaries include:

Born in 1927 Richie Ashburn!

Sorry, PC still on the blink so your getting Photos rather than scans.

Ray Chapman (1891)
Bert Blyleven (1951)
Red Dooin (1879)

Chapman was killed by pitch thrown by Carl Mays in 1920.  The incident led to rule changes regarding the use of new baseballs and batting helmets.  Red Dooin was the Phillies catcher roughly 100 years ago.  

   

Johnny Callison (1939)
Cy Young (1867)

Randy Johnson (1963)
Lou Gehrig (1903)
Placido Polanco (1975)

Lot of great Year of the Rabbit players - 1987 is off to a pretty good start as well - I am saving that spot for Phillies Prospect Dominic Brown.

Other rabbits I didn't have the patience to look for included Joe Gordon (1915) and Jim Bouton (1927).

Going Way Back 
Representing 1855 Paul Hines who won the first triple crown in 1878.  Another Triple Crown Winner, Carl Yastrzemski is a Rabbit as well (1939).  The first Rabbit would be Nate Berkenstock (1831) who is the earliest born player in the history of baseball.

Rabbit King
That is a lot of incredible names but perhaps the most significant Baseball related Year of the Rabbit Birth is Hall of Famer Walter James Vincent Maranville or RABBIT MARANVILLE born November 11 1891. 

Swag from Vintage Sportscards

The Vintage Sportscards Blog is consistently one of my favorite card blogs. Chris' column provides a unique historical perspective and I agree with many of his opinions regarding vintage cards and their facets such as condition and value.

Here are some of the Phillies beauties He sent my way in a trade.

1966 Topps #254 Ferguson Jenkins/Bill Sorrell RC

I always figured this would be one of the last cards I would get from the Phils 1966 team Set. A Rookie Card of a Hall of Famer. Unless you are a Jenkins fan or a HOF RC collector you may not know that Fergie came up with the Phils. In 1965 Jenkins got himself into 7 games as a reliever for the Phils. During the Off-Season he was traded to the Cubs for whom he had his best years including his 1971 Cy Young Campaign.

Billy Sorrell got himself into 85 games during the course of three different Major League campaigns. It's not much, but he did get to share a baseball card with a Hall of Famer. This card bring my 1966 Phils Topps Team Set to 20 cards out of 27.



1964 Topps #135 Johnny Callison
1955 Bowman #64 Curt Simmons

These are two other great cards among the many Vintage Phils Chris sent my way. The 1964 set keeps growing on me. It is on my list of sets from the 1960s that I am considering building.

I would also like to build a Bowman set at some point. Both 1954 and 1955 are under consideration.

Right now I am just concentrating on my Phils sets from those years - here are links to those want lists

1964 Topps
1955 Bowman


Thanks to Chris for the cards, and I have a package all set to go out your way. It would have hit the streets today, but I didn't realize it was a postal holiday.

Philly Card Show Report - 2010 03 13 - Vintage Phillies

Extremely busy with work, catching up on trades, and enjoying the first weekend of the Madness.

During the latest edition of the Philly Show, I pretty much focused on vintage. Including admission I threw down $81 - I will hit the highlights over the next week or so.

First off is the Phils

1950 Bowman #30 Eddie Waitkus

Anytime you get a bargain Eddie Waitkus card you pick it up. I will dedicate an entire post to Mr Waitkus at some point - but for now I will just mention that this card went for $3 and I was happy to have picked it up.

1957

1957 Topps #214 Phillies Team
1957 Topps #15 Robin Roberts

It must be Robin Roberts week here at Phungo, this is the 2nd consecutive post to feature a Roberts Card. The Team Card went for a dollar. Roberts was $5, a little bent up, but looks good otherwise. I doubt I a anywhere near finishing the Robin Roberts Phils Topps Run, but this card makes me one closer.

60s High Numbers and Other Stars

1965 Topps #310 Johnny Callison
1964 Topps #482 Phillies Rookies (John Briggs, Danny Cater)

I also picked up a bunch of 60s era Phillies High Numbers and Star Cards. Both of these came out of the three for a buck bin.

Other than the Phils, I picked up about a dozen cards for my Topps '59 set and a bunch of Vintage HOF cards. In the three for a buck bin I found about 25 Star cards and High Numbers from 1957-1974. For between $1-$8 each I added a handful of 1952-1962 cards of commons, stars and Hall of Famers.

I will try and feature some of the other cards in the coming weeks.