When Prospects Become Utility Players....

I had made a run on some Daniel Robertson cards a few years back in anticipation of his arrival with the Durham Bulls.  The A's traded the middle infielder to the Rays for Yunel Escobar and Ben Zobrist.  At the time, Robertson had just completed A Ball in the A's organization and was considered a top 100 prospect across the board by MLB.com, Baseball America, and Baseball Prospectus.  While he was in A Ball Robertson hit .310/.402/.471 with 15 home runs, 37 doubles, and drove in 60 runs.  Sounds worthy of some notoriety, especially given that he was just 20 at the time.

I went out and started putting together a little collection of Robertson cards.  He had several in various different Bowman products while he was in Oakland.  My two favorite Robertson cards at that time were his 2015 Bowman Inception card.....

because I really like looks of this set.  I am not sure about that face he is making on the card, but it's still a well designed set with nice card stock.  I also own a copy of his Bowman Chrome rookie card....

which is not quite as nice to look at as the Inception card, but these always seem like good cards to hang on to when you are doing a little prospecting.  

Three years later Robertson has spent a season with the Durham Bulls in 2016 and played most of the 2017 season in Tampa on the Rays roster.  He's been through all of those hoops players jump through when they get to the Majors...first game, first hit, first home run...

and all of this time I have been fairly quiet about Robertson baseball cards.  They are out there, it's not like he's disappeared from sets.  It's more about the fact that Robertson has gone from being a Top 100 prospect who was traded for a player like Ben Zobrist, to a player who is on the Rays roster just because he is versatile.  

Daniel Robertson is a utility player.  His .200 batting average and 5 career home runs suggest that this is likely going to be his role as long as he is employed as a Major League baseball player.  That's not always a bad thing, every team needs these types of players and they can be fun players to collect.  

I have several utility types that have been favorite players to collect at different points of my times.  Since I am a Cardinals fan who grew up in the 1980s/1990s you should probably be able to guess my original utility player without reading any further, because every 1980s Cardinals fan loves Jose Oquendo..... 

who was dubbed "The Secret Weapon" by former Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog.  If you watched the Cardinals in the late 1980s, you knew Jose Oquendo was showing up at some point, you just did not always know where and when he was getting into the game.  He had some big moments for the team too, like his Game 7 home run against the Giants in the 1987 National League Championship Series.....

was the probably the most memorable.  Topps made a complete set of Oquendo cards in their Archives set a few years back with him playing each of the nine different positions.  Some of the pictures do not really fit, the card above is a first base card even though he's either playing short or second, but it was still a really nice collection of cards to assemble.  

Jose had some nice years, but he was truly a light hitting infielder.  Still a fun player to collect and very popular with Cardinals fans.  

As far as the Durham Bulls go, I do have a pretty good collection of Ben Zobrist cards, but I think he is in a different category of "utility" player then the other players I am using in this post.  He does play all over the place, but when you're making multiple All-Star teams and winning taking home World Series MVP Awards, you are probably your own category of utility player.  

Prior to blogging, my interest had started to wain a bit by the time I had starting writing in this space, I did collect Sean Rodriguez cards.  He played for the Rays for a few years after being traded there from the Angels in exchange for Scott Kazmir.  The time with the Rays included a stop over or two in Durham.  

I even saw him hit the Bull, win steak, with a home run a few years ago..... 

Sean Rodriguez does not have a ton of cards for a current day player, which includes a very limited number of appearances as an autograph signer.  Not that they are expensive when you find them....

or anything that would make him difficult to collect.  

Which brings me back to Robertson.  For whatever reason, there are companies that are still making nice baseball cards of the former Durham Bulls middle infielder.  I guess I could look into collecting a Cardinals utility player, but it appears that there are not many Greg Garcia baseball cards....

and I really do not like him anyway.  He's like the second coming of Daniel Descalso, which is not a very lovable player, nor fun to collect.  I actually enjoy watching Daniel Robertson play for the Rays.....

and I am going to go ahead and pick up a few of his cards this year.  So far the past two months, I have added two of his cards and spent a grand total of $5.  $3 of the $5 was for shipping the cards.  

Here's what I picked up.

This card is actually from last year's Topps Update set.  It seems that I skipped over that product.  Not sure about all of the stuff that is going on around the border of the card, but since I bascially paid a dollar for this card I am just going to focus on the fact that it is autographed and has a picture of Daniel Robertson.  Sterile card design be damned.  

Again, I am focused on the autograph and the fact that Robertson is on the card.  I do not even know where to start with that Promising Pros script up at the top of the card.  Looks like some sort of 1980s television graphic.....

of some kind.  The word "Promising" makes me lean more game show.  

Anyway, more Robertson cards to come as the summer goes along regardless of whether he is hitting .220, or not.  So far, five games into the season, he's actually hitting .250 with 5 walks in 13 plate appearances.  Hopefully the rash of walks won't push his cards up too high.