International Polar Bear Day: Sherry Magee T205

Tuesday February 27th is International Polar Bear Day. The day is dedicated to raising awareness of the plight of the Polar Bear. You can even Adopt a Polar Bear for just $30 - well virtually anyway.

1911 T205 Sherrwood Magee

Sherry Magee is one of those borderline Hall of Famers from the deadball era that I don't know much about. He was traded away from the Phillies prior to their 1915 NL Pennant winning season so he did not get to play for that squad. He did manage to get into a World Series with the 1919 Cincinnati Reds who defeated the ill-fated Joe Jackson / Black Sox team.

In 2003 Magee was added to the Phillies Wall of Fame during an era that included several other early 20th century Phillies such as Gavvy Cravath and the original Billy Hamilton. Magee's best year with the club was 1910 when he led the league in Batting Average, Runs, RBI and Total Bases. In addition to those traditional stats he led the league in OBP, Slugging, OPS, OPS+, and Offensive WAR. That is a Mike Trout type year kids!

T206 may get all the notoriety because of the Honus Wagner card but I much prefer their 1911 predecessor T205 (see below). There is so much more going on with T205, The color, Gold Borders, Facsimile Signature and Team Logo are all things that stand out and then you flip the card over and...

1911 T205 Sherrwood Magee (b-side)

Look at all that text AND Stats. It may only be Games Played, Batting Average, and Fielding Percentage but they are stats. The Final Stat line includes the League Leading batting average mentioned above. The final line in the biography mentions the 263 Total Bases.

Not sure how many issues prior to 1952 Topps contain both a written synopsis and a stat box.

At the bottom of the card we return to todays theme "International Polar Bear Day". T205 were issued for a variety of Tobacco brands, This one just happens to be Polar Bear.


Retros

2002 Topps T206 #123 Pat Burrell (mini)

Among the Topps many retro brands are both T205 and T206 cards. This is a 2002 mini, which means it matches the size of the original tobacco cards from the early part of the 20th century.

 

2002 Topps T206 #123 Pat Burrell (mini / b-sdie)

 

Flipping over the card we get to see a faux Polar Bear ad, as Topps is not associated with the Tobacco company.

 

One of my minor collections is Polar Bear cards, both originals and retros. I have no official list, but do enjoy picking up the ones I see. Ideally I would like to have 1 T205 from each team - that would make for a good set for me.

 

This is all because my High School Mascot was the Polar Bear. It's a funny connection, I suppose it make me feel good when I hear stories about Polar Bears and I think of my younger days.

 

 

International Polar Bear Day

Yes it is a real think and if you want to learn more about the plight of the Polar Bear you can check here.



Sources and Links
Phillies Wall of Fame Index
Polar Bears International
Baseball-Ref

Phungo Polaroids Bryce Harper

Did a quick local Baseball Tour this past weekend.  

Orioles Loss v Indians on Friday Night.  

Baseball Card Show in York PA on Saturday.

Bryce Harper Show on Saturday Night. 

2011 PolarPhungo #3 Bryce Harper

There was a definite buzz during the Senators game, and it was exciting to see a fairly full house at an AA game hang on every pitch of his ABs.  In the end Harper who is yet to homer at the AA level had a pedestrian 1-4 night.  He did hit a ball to the track at the deepest part of the park just right of center.   His one hit led to him scoring a run - Harper looked good running the bases advancing on a fielders choice, Wild pitch and a Flyout. 

The Senators ended up losing an otherwise disaster of a game 11-5 to the Akron Aeros (Cleveland Indians AA) - But like a lot of minor league parks, there was a lot of other entertainment.  The park was nice although since it is on an Island on the Susquahanna River there are a lot of bugs - Mayflies. 1B Tyler Moore had a couple of Hits including a homer for the good guys.  Beau Mills had a homer for the Aeros - I think Mills might have been player of the week for the Eastern League. 

Introducing PolarPhungo Cards - Cubs @ Phillies 2011 06 10

Okay, I admit a week isn't very instant, but things have been crazy at Phungo HQ and I have had this idea floating around in my head for a while. 

I wanted to create some sort of Instant Card for the Phungo Game Reports.  There has also been a bit of a  Polaroid revival happening, which I thought would be a great backdrop for i-cards, which I have dubbed PolarPhungo.

 2011 PolarPhungo #1 Roy Halladay

2011 PolarPhungo #2 Carlos Zambrano

Both cards above were created using the FREE Photo Editor Pixlr, which I learned about a few months back from Dave over at the prolific custom card blog Goose Joak.  There are all kinds of great things going on in the custom card department and it is fun checking out the creativity of different collectors. 

The first three editions of Phungo Cards were all produced using MS Paint, which has sufficed for making simple cards from the photos I have taken. I have definitely been thinking of moving on to Photoshop in order to get a more professional look.  Thanks to Pixlr I hope to come up with a more updated look for the 2012 Phungo set.


Game Report

Both of the above photos were taken at the Cubs v Phils game a week ago Friday.  The Phils won the game 7-5 thanks to another good pitching outing from Roy Halladay and a Placido Polanco Grand Slam.  A couple of Phils relievers let the Cubs back into the game via some sloppy pitching with a big lead, but Michael Stutes and Antonio Bastardo were able to come in and nail down the win.

The Polaroiding of the photos covers up some sins in my out of focus photography.  It is a shame, We had some great seats at the game, but were seated beside a rather annoying "young" woman (actually in her 40s) which cut into our enjoyment of the game and limiting picture taking opportunities.