A Venerable Old Card Part 6

I spent a little bit of time in Northern Michigan during the Christmas holiday.  I still did my normal writing for this blog, along with my work at the Cardboard Connection.  When I am in my office at home I watch Netflix, or put my ITunes on shuffle, something for background noise.  I did not really have those options while I was in Michigan so I spent some time watching old Cardinals games or listening to old concerts.  Fun stuff.

A few of the games I watched were of the 1985 Cardinals.  I liked the Cardinals throughout my childhood, my father is from St. Louis, but the early years of my life were spent in a few different places.  People in my house watched the Cardinals, I liked playing baseball in my yard, collecting cards, and would check out a little baseball when people in my house watched a game.

I moved to St. Louis at some point during the summer of 1984.  The Cardinals were not so great that year, so 1985 was the first year that I got to experience a winning Cardinals team.  I am sure that people may recall players like Ozzie Smith, Vince Coleman, Willie McGee, Terry Pendleton, maybe even Jack Clark on those 1980s Cardinals teams.  However, the team also had some good supporting players around depending on the year.  One of the best was Cesar Cedeno, who played for the team during the last few months of the 1985 season.

Many my recall Cesar Cedeno as a member of the Reds or Astros.  Some may also remember him as an extra in the "Let Them Play' scene in The Bad News Bears.  Bob Watson got most of the speaking lines in that scene, but Cesar is there......

During the first half of the 1985 season Cedeno played for the Reds and posted a .241/.307/.336 slash line.  Hardly anything to write home about, so the Reds traded him to the Cardinals for a Minor League pitcher.  In all, Cesar only played a total of 28 games in a Cardinals uniform, but hit .434/463/.750 with 6 home runs, 4 doubles, and 19 RBIs in only 76 at bats.  He provided the final push to help the team get past the Mets, who were really good that year, and into the playoffs.  Not a great video, but this was a big home run in a September game against the Mets.  

The next season Cedeno made a brief appearance with the Dodgers, but retired after the 1986 season.  He obviously does not have many Cardinals cards, but they might be my favorites in the Cardinals sets from that year.  Well, outside of the Vince Coleman rookie cards......

So, for this week's Venerable Old Card post I am going to go with the 1986 Donruss Cesar Cedeno card.  He had one card in Fleer, Topps, and Donruss and they are all portrait style cards.  Still really cool that all of the card manufacturers managed to get him into sets considering he only played a brief time with the Cardinals.  Not necessarily a stand out card, nor a Hall of Fame player, but still a really cool card if you spent time watching the Cardinals in the 1980s.