Sunday, December 13, 2015

A Venerable Old Card Part 2

I was working a little bit with my early 1980s cards earlier this week and ran across a cool card I thought I would use for this week's Venerable Old Card Post.  This would fit into the Cardinals part of my collection, but the card was taken pre-Cardinals.  Here's this week's card....


It was one of the first cards that I ran into while I was flipping through my stack of 1981 Donruss cards, which I know make up a complete set, but they still aren't quite sorted out.  For whatever reason, I do not really associate manager cards with Donruss.  However, the first year I really got into the Donruss cards was 1988 with the blue plaid set.  Before then, I would get a pack or two a summer.  Of course, I have filled in the earlier Donruss sets in more recent years.  I wasn't even collecting yet in 1981.  

Few things I like about the LaRussa card:

  • Is that a White Sox batting jersey from the early eighties?  

  • Tony retired in 2011 and I am not sure that his hair style changed at all in 30 years of managing.  Just a little bit of grey.  

  • Like almost every 1981 Donruss card the picture in this card was taken in Comiskey.  You can sort of make out the pinwheel fireworks things on the scoreboard. 

  • LaRussa is in the 1981 Topps set as the White Sox manager, but the managers in that set were in a tiny box on the top of the team card.  Makes me want to give this card the unofficial title of being the first manager card of the Hall of Famer.  




4 comments:

  1. I personally have never counted those '81 Topps as manager cards; they're straight up team cards in my eyes. So, I would second your unofficial title.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I just put that same card in my binder last night!

    ReplyDelete

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