Set Appreciation Post #17 - Topps Lineage

Topps Lineage is really an off-brand version of Topps Archives.

Yes, there are positives here, but I think there are limitations because of its format.  

Same general idea as far as the checklist goes, but rather than recycling a bunch of their former card designs, Topps used the same border for all the cards. Looks like something that was likely a rejected design for one of their base sets at some point.  

Here is the basic design.  

I like the photograph of Koufax, but there is just nothing really special or interesting about the design of this card. It's just not very good.  

Back of the card.  

No stats on the back. I actually like this idea for this type of set, especially given the way that Topps wrote these snippets. If you had to summarize the career of Sandy Koufax in two sentences, it would be difficult to do a better job than what is on the back of this card. The modern players are just as well done. 

The card backs are a positive for this set.  

Similar to the Koufax card, there are plenty of other older players throughout the set. 

Whoever made the set actually did a good job of picking out former players. Nice mix from all different areas. The older players, such as Tris Speaker, are generally colorized, but the card photos still look decent. The photography on the older players is another positive in Topps Lineage.  

I like that Lenny Harris makes an appearance on the Ryne Sandberg card. He's a first ballot guy if someone ever makes a Hall of Fame for utility and bench players. Also shout out to Topps for not using the cringeworthy Milwaukee Braves logo from the 1950s and 1960s, even if they used the cringeworthy Cleveland Indians logo on the modern players.  

Any set that has a subset of cards with Topps All-Star Rookie Trophies can't be all that bad, right?  

Favorite Cardinals card.  

Bob Gibson.  

Favorite former Durham Bulls card.  

Evan Longoria.  

Best non-Cardinal/non-Durham Bulls card.  

An aquward looking, 21 year-old Freddie Freeman.  

How many Braves players have baseball cards with this same pose at the Braves Spring Training Stadium?  

It's a lot.  

Topps Lineage is still not all sunshine, lollipops, and rainbows.  

There is still the ever-present horrible airbrushing. I picked out two different examples. The Adrian Beltre card is just incredibly bad. The Damon card is not quite as bad, but they airbrushed him out of a Tigers uniform, but left Jim Leyland in the background.  

If Jim Leyland were smoking in the background, I would forgive the bad airbrushing.  

Topps used the parallels from their flagship sets on the Lineage cards. A bunch of sparkles and colors that do not look very good with this card design.  

Sparkly Lou Gehrig?  

No.  

However, I do like the cloth cards based on the old Cloth Stickers. Topps had some cloth/silk parallels around in different products around this time. Good looking cards that they should consider bringing back.  

I have thought about finding all of the Cardinals and former Durham Bulls cloth sticker cards from this set, but that is somewhere way down on the list of things to do. 

Let's talk about another positive.  

The inserts are great, but similar to the Archives sets, the designs are all borrowed from older Topps products.  

There are the 2011 Rookies insert that is a copy of the 1980s Rack Pack All-Star cards.  

Hank Conger with a Hooters ad over his shoulder.  

There are 1975 Topps Minis. Miniature in real life, but not here because of the scan.  

There are also relic cards with the 1975 Topps Mini design. I am sure that there are a few floating around in one of my boxes of relics, but I am not going to go surfing for one at the moment.  

We also have the 1964 Topps Stand-Ups.  

Love the green and yellow backgrounds on these cards.  

There are also autographs. There were some decent current player autographs in this set. Early autographs of Stanton, Posey, and Freeman. I bought a box of Lineage while I was on vacation in St. Louis back in the day and ended up with a Charlie Morton autograph.  

Charlie is pretty old now, but he's had some good seasons along the way.  Solid autograph. 

The autographs of the older players are really nice. I have a few of the players who appeared for the Cardinals. I will go with Duke point guard, Dick Groat for this post.  

The 1952 Topps design has been completely overused at this point, but what are you going to do?  

HOW DOES IT COMPARE?

 Lineage is essentially a Topps Archives set. I like that they do not recycle former flagship set designs on the base cards. I think that is the biggest positive here, along with some of the autographs. There is nothing here that really stands out to me, so I am going to go with the bottom half of my rankings.

In my opinion, it is not as good as the first four sets in the bottom half of my Set Appreciation posts. So, that's below the Heritage Minors, Emotion XL, Donruss, and Bowman. I thought long and hard about how this set compares to the Ionix and Bowman Platinum set. I was tempted to put it behind both of those sets, but I think the autographs are the saving grace here. 

Yes, copying the design of the 1952 Topps set is slightly annoying, but they are good looking cards. I am ranking the Topps Lineage set 11th.  

16. 2000 Pacific Paramount Update 

15. 2010 Topps USA Baseball  

14. 2000 Topps 

13. Bowman Platinum 

12. 2000 UD Ionix

11. Topps Lineage   

10. 2002 Bowman 

9. 1988 Donruss 

8. 1995 Emotion XL 

7. 2017 Topps Heritage Minor League

6. 1998 Topps TEK 

5. 1986 Topps Mini League Leaders 

4. 2001 Fleer EX 

3. 1979 Kellogg's 

2. 2002 Topps Super Teams

1. 1983 Topps 

More Of Your Favorite 1970s Durham Bulls

I got another stack of 1975 Topps Minis that I am going to split into two different posts.  

I am going with four cards for this post, a few more at some point during the next week.  There are a total of 23 former Durham Bulls players with cards in the 1975 Topps Mini set.  Out of the 23, I had 7 of the cards when I last gave an update in October.  These four will jump me up to 11, roughly half way.  With another stack on my desk, I am going to hopefully wrap up this project before the end of the year.  

Let's get into the cards.  

First up, I am going with the player I consider the greatest Durham Bulls player ever.  I guess you could make an argument for Chipper Jones, but I would still take this guy.  I cannot find a stand alone clip, but Morgan actually mentioned his time as a Durham Bulls during his Hall of Fame speech.  

Specifically, he talked about the influence Bill Goodman, the manager of the Bulls at the time Morgan played there, had on his career.  Goodman was also the Red Sox starting third baseman for much of the 1950s, and won the 1950 American League batting title.  

Not the best condition, but I will look for an upgrade later.  The edges of the card have some paper loss and chipping, and the corners are all soft.  I got the card for next to nothing, so I really cannot complain.

Next up we have Mike Jorgensen.  He actually played with the Raleigh-Durham Mets, but same thing as the Bulls.  He ended up making it all the way from the Carolina League, with the Bulls, to the Majors with the Mets in a single summer.  That's pretty impressive.

The Mets traded Jorgensen to the Expos for Rusty Staub.  Jorgensen ended up back on the Mets later on in his career.   He actually ended his career with the Cardinals when I was a kid.  Jorgensen was a left-handed bat off the bench and a back-up first baseman to Jack Clark.  He also ended up briefly managing the Cardinals during the 1995 season.  

Last two.  

Matlack was another Raleigh-Durham Mets player.  I have spent a lot of time on him in past posts, so you can search around and find Matlack cards.  Definitely an underrated player of the 1970s.  

Frisella was on the 1967 Durham Bulls, and had a great season while pitching in the Carolina League with the team.  He was a solid Major League player too, almost exclusively used as a reliever.  Sadly, he died in a dune buggy accident during the offseason in 1977.  

Let's check the updated checklist, remember the red highlighted cards are the ones I have already found.  

#44 - Pat Dobson

#89 - Jim Ray 

#90 - Rusty Staub 

#98 - Rich Folkers 

#125 - Ken Singleton 

#143 - Cliff Johnson 

#155 - Jim Bibby 

#165 - Doug Rader 

#180 - Joe Morgan 

#245 - Mickey Lolich 

#282 - Jerry Morales 

#286 - Mike Jorgensen 

#290 - Jon Matlack 

#342 - Leroy Stanton 

#343 - Danny Frisella 

#351 - Bob Boone 

#371 - Gates Brown 

#441 - Bob Heise 

#476 - Ed Figueroa 

#615 - Pat Darcy 

#621 - Rawley Eastwick 

#630 - Greg Luzinski 

#637 - Ted Martinez 

A few more later in the week.  Hopefully.  

There Are Enough Baseball Cards For Everyone

 Have you tried to find baseball cards recently? 

There are not any for sale in retail stores these days.  I am certain they have all been bought in bulk and are all currently being resold on Facebook and Twitter for twice the price.  I am not going to provide an examples, or call out anyone's social media posts.  They are plentiful if you want to find them.  

All this craziness over a White Sox prospect/rookie who has been in baseball card products the last two years.  As a baseball card collector who does not do "prospecting", but watches a lot of Minor League baseball, you should buy cards of prospects who the Cardinals are too cheap to sign.  Like Luis Robert.  

Sure bet they are at least a solid Major League player.  

Here's another Luis Robert gem from my collection.  

    

My teaching assignment for the coming school year has changed a few times over the past few weeks, a little stressful, and slightly time consuming.  I have picked up a few new cards over the past two weeks, but have not had the opportunity to sit down and write anything about them.  While people can buy out all the packs of 2020 Topps cards at Target, there are still plenty of baseball cards out there in other places.  There are enough baseball cards for everyone.

My first pair of cards are from the 2020 Topps Heritage set, both autographs that I found on the cheap.  

First up is A's pitcher A.J. Puk.  I saw him play for US College National team while he was in college at Florida.  I saw him pitch a combined no-hitter, so I am collecting his card regardless of how well he pitches in the Majors.  For what it is worth, he off to a good start during the first few weeks of the 2020 season.  The A's are using him as a reliever, but he's done well in that role.  I am probably biased to some degree, but he is going to be a really good pitcher.  Hopefully he gets back into the rotation.  

Next.  

Everyone's favorite Cardinals shortstop who strikes out way too often.  I am not a huge Dejong collector, but if the cards are there, cheap, and I can use combined shipping then sure, I will buy them.  I do not own many DeJong autographs.  Maybe only two or three, which is a low number for a modern Cardinals player with a high number of certified autographs.  I think this might be the nicest one in my collection.  Love the 1971 Topps design.  

I saved the best cards for last in this post.  I was really excited to add these cards to my collection.  I have been working on the 1970 Kellogg's passive-aggressively for the past three or four years.  They are more expensive than the other Kellogg's sets, but they are a personal favorite.  So, I picked up three cards.  Two of these are new, and another is an upgrade over another copy I own.  

This Gibson card is my upgrade. 

This is a pretty clean copy.  The bottom border is a little discolored, the scan did not pick it up, but that is much better than having a giant crack in the middle of the card.  

The last two Kellogg's cards are former Durham Bulls.  

Again, this is a passive aggressive attempt to collect the 1970 Kellogg's set.  If I end up with the whole set at some point, these cards will fit into the set.  If I never quite get there, then they are nice additions to my collection of former Durham Bulls cards.  Morgan played for the Bulls in 1963.  This card has a really clean surface, but again the border has some discoloration.  You can see it a little better on the right side of the card.  It's hard for a white border to stay white for 50 years.  

Last card. Lolich was on the Bulls in 1959 and 1960.  Really unrated pitcher from the 1960s and 1970s.  Much more deserving Hall of Fame candidate then Jack Morris, right down to the Game 7 pitching heroics in a World Series.  Of the three Kellogg's cards that I have posted here, this is by far the cleanest of the group. 

Set Appreciation Post #6 - 1983 Topps

This was the first year that I collected cards, but I opened more packs of Fleer than Topps.  I went back and collected this set later on in life, and it is an absolute favorite.  This is the largest set that I have featured on one of these posts, so I have picked out more than one card for some of the categories.  

Design 

One of my favorite Topps designs of all-time, and in my opinion, the best from the 1980s.  I know a lot of people rave and rant about 1987's wood borders, but this is much better.  Maybe I am biased towards the sets from my childhood, but no matter where I am as a collector or what I am interested in collecting, the cards in the 1983 Topps set have always had a strong appeal to me.  

I like the two photographs on the front of the card and the color schemes that Topps used around the edges of the card.  I know there are some similarities to the 1963 set, but I like this version better.  Every team has their own color scheme, which often has nothing to do with the actually team colors, but still looks good.  

The back of the cards are nice too.

This might also be one of my favorite card backs.  The stat lines are the same old same old, but the contrast between the orange and gray background and black print is easy on the eyes.  It makes things easy to read.  I also like that the highlights and facts on the back of the card focus on that player and their performance on the field, not something random which is the case with other Topps sets.  Nothing like, "Tony Armas set a record for total bases in a Major League game", which is on the 1982 Topps Gene Richards card.   

The silhouettes are a nice touch too.  

Overall, I give this base set high marks.  Again, personal favorite, and I know that there are plenty of other collectors who have differing opinions of this set ranging from indifferent to dislike.  

The Super Veteran Bulls 

One of the most recognizable subsets in the 1983 Topps set are the Super Veteran cards.  The subset also has a strong connection to the early 1960s Durham Bulls, who were the Carolina League affiliate of the expansion Houston Colt .45s.  Two notable Major Leaguers rolled through the Durham Athletic Park during the 1962 and 1963 seasons.  

Rusty Staub appeared on the 1962 Bulls, winning the Carolina League MVP that season.  He was in the Majors with the Colts the following year.  During the 1983 season Staub was playing with the Mets, which was his second stint with that franchise. He was a good player for a long time, and not one that I place with just one team.  Staub was a bench player at this point during his career, so especially neat that Topps gave him this card.  Don't get many fourth outfielders and left-handed bats off the bench with subset cards.  I love the old photo with the Colts.  

Joe Morgan was on the Bulls in 1963, and for a long time was their only former player who was in the Baseball Hall of Fame.  Oddly enough, the Durham Bulls had a former player in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, 1940s quarterback Ace Parker, before they had one in the Baseball Hall.  The old photo of Morgan is fantastic.  You get to see the front of his Colts jersey too.  Morgan played for a bunch of teams at the end of his career, but was still a decent player.  My interest in baseball and Morgan's career barely interested, so he's a player a mostly know about through others, reading, videos, etc.  It's weird not seeing him on the Reds.  No, I don't remember watching him play at all.  

Topps re-did the Super Veteran subset in the 2014 Topps set.  It was as disappointing as you can imagine.  That old fashioned photo of Matt Holliday feels really inauthentic.  

Just makes me sad.  

This is really the only thing not to like about the 1983 Topps set.  I am not sure how many times Topps has used the card designs from this set over the past decade, but I know it has at a minimum appeared in Topps Archives and as an insert set in a Topps base set.  They are never as good as the original.  

Best Cardinals Cards 

I have two favorite Cardinals cards in this set.  I have picked one in each of the other sets that I have featured in one of these posts, but none of those sets were almost 800 cards.  One was a no-brainer, so let's talk about that one first.  

There are three rookie cards that most collectors know in the 1983 Topps set, those are Sandberg, Gwynn, and Boggs.  However, there is also a rookie card of Willie McGee.  

He won more batting titles than Ryne Sandberg.  He won more World Series rings than Sandberg and Gwynn.  He won more MVP Awards than Wade Boggs and Tony Gwynn combined.  Also, all three of those players might be in the Hall of Fame, but none of them won a batting title for the National League while playing in the American League.  

Seriously, Willie was a good player.  There is some weird contingent of Cardinals fans who thinks he should be in the Hall of Fame (no), and that the team should retire his number (no).  If I made a list of really important must-own Cardinals rookie cards from the 1980s, this 1983 Topps Willie McGee card would definitely be on the list.  

Second Cardinals card.  

This was not my first Ozzie Smith card, that was likely a 1983 Fleer, but I still owned this card.  Ozzie was easily the most likable player on the Cardinals when I first started collecting cards and following baseball.  His cards were important to me as a six year old, and since he did not retire until I was in college, they have always remained important.  

I like the action shot on the card.  Not sure if this is a hit or not, but it looks like Ozzie has at least a chance to make it a close play.  I like that there is another player talking to a fan in the background.  

Favorite Former Durham Bulls 

There were quite a few to choose from in this set, but I went with two members of the Bulls teams from the 1960s.  First up, I will go with my second Rusty Staub card of the post.  

I really like the action shots in the 1983 Topps set.  I feel like many have a story to tell.  The photo on this card shows Staub dropping his bat and heading to first base, but I have always thought that this was likely a routine fly ball.  He looks a little disappointed in his expression with his eyes are up.  Maybe I am wrong, but Rusty's face is saying flying out to right field.  If you have this set, or even just a few cards, it's worth your time to flip through and look at the action shots.  

Next up.  

I had to go with the Greg Luzinski card.  

He was on the 1969 Raleigh-Durham Phillies, which is what the Bulls changed their name to after they were forced to merge with the bankrupt Raleigh Pirates.  They were also a Phillies affiliate, so there is that part of the name.

Raleigh is a city.  Durham is a city.  Raleigh-Durham is an airport.  

Back to the Luzinski card.  

"The Bull" was a feared power hitter who was paired with Mike Schmidt for the majority of his career, but his last few years were spent as a designated hitter with the White Sox.  Greg Luzinski was out of shape, and did not really look like a professional athlete when this card was made.  He could still hit though.  Love the action shot of him wearing the softball style White Sox uniform.  Not sure what happened in this at-bat, hard to tell, definitely a fly ball though.  

He does look really annoyed in the portrait photo though.  

Best Non-Cardinal/Non-Durham Bulls Card 

I will just go ahead and tell that this card is my favorite in the set.  It's even better than the Willie McGee card, which hurts a little to say out loud in public.  

Simply put, this is one of the best rookie cards from the 1980s.  

The spots are on my scanner.  Little people were playing with it while I was working.  

The picture is a little bit odd, but I think that's one of the reasons I like this card.  This is clearly a Spring Training picture with Gwynn wearing the 53, which he never wore in a Major League game.  Always love those pictures of great players and they're wearing some odd number. Albert Pujols is wearing jersey number 68 in several of his rookie cards.  Same idea here.  

 

I also miss those brown and yellow Padres uniforms.  I am glad the team is switching back to this color scheme for the 2020 season.  

Back of the card.  

Gwynn was not in the Minors for very long, but did hit in all three stops.  This is the one card where I would have actually liked the random fact box, so they could squeeze in that he played college basketball and was drafted by an NBA team.  I am sure it is on another Topps Tony Gwynn card.  

How Does It Compare?  

You should already know.   

Not sure we need a lot of discussion here.  If I were just doing the Topps sets from my life time, this might be first overall.  Really not much to think about, this is the best set I have written up on these posts.  

6. 2000 U.D. Ionix 

5. 1986 Topps Mini League Leaders 

4. 2001 Fleer EX 

3.1979 Kellogg's 

2. 2002 Topps Super Teams

1. 1983 Topps  

I'm Going To Build These Different Frames, With Gold Colored Metal...."

So what's the deal with all of these cards having gold frames these days?  This all started a few years back when Topps put a bunch of these gold framed inserts into their 2014 Topps Update set?  Did we need a gold frame around Joe Morgan?  He's a great second baseman and all, former Durham Bulls player too, but why can't we just have a baseball card with him on it.....

I mean is the frame holding the card together or is it a decorative thing?  If I pull the corner apart will the whole card just crumble, or will it look like a baseball card without a gold frame?  I rather like Joe Morgan, so it's not like I am going to pull the frame on this card apart.  Just when you thought they were going to leave the gold frames here, nope here come even more gold frames.

If Topps had known they were going to have this many cards with gold frames they should have called up Eric Sogard back when he was in contention for the "Face of MLB Award", and gotten him to switch to gold framed glasses, it would have been the perfect marketing campaign for a brilliant idea.  

Maybe just as good as selling just the tops of muffins.  What do you do with the bottom of the muffins?  The same thing could be asked about all of the baseball cards Topps makes without gold frames.  

 

Topps also had these guys in Museum Collection with the gold frames.  Do you think a card with a gold frame, but signed in silver ink is sort of like wearing a black shirt, black shoes, but you are wearing a brown belt?  I personally don't like the combination.  but I don't mind breaking some of those fashion rules at times.  White shoes with black jeans seems like a good idea.....

So after all of these other gold frames someone over at Topps had this great idea to put some more gold frames baseball cards.  When these cards came out I was thinking maybe Topps really likes this look, or maybe they got some bulk deal on gold card frames.  I don't really look around when I go to places like Costco, maybe the gold baseball card frames are sitting up on one of those top shelves with all of the shipping crates with the plastic wrap...

Since Topps is saving money by buying the gold frames bulk at Costco it means that this time around they had the chance to get a few different Major League Players to sign the cards inside the gold frame.  It's not Keith Hernandez or anything, but this is one of the cards.....

This guy is supposed to be baby Pedro Martinez, who was on the Mets for awhile, but he couldn't win a World Series.  He's not Dwight Gooden.  Either of them.  

Since when did they have baseball in Tampa?  

People go to Florida to die, not to play baseball.  This guy is kind of young, probably not making any money yet, so he's probably eating dinner at 4:30 so he gets the Early Bird Special.  

Friday Five: Top 5 Durham Bulls Second Basemen

I must say that I really enjoy writing these posts on the Durham Bulls.  Minor leaguers are fun to research and there is a lot of work you have to do to connect some of the dots on the players.  So far I have published two Durham Bulls Friday Five posts on their Top 5 catchers and first basemen of all-time and I am already contemplating scrapping/revising those lists.  Actually I am at peace with my list of first baseman, but my catchers list will likely be redone at some point.  I started working on the second baseman post several weeks ago and did more work for this post than anything I have posted on here in a long time.  Hope you enjoy this list:


Shout Outs:

Some of the Minor League stats are records are not the best once you leave the 1980s.  How many RBIs did Joe Morgan have for the Durham Bulls?  I am not sure, but he .332 with 13 home runs and 20 doubles in only 95 games.  Don't worry, he's on the list and not in this shout out section.  The actual five second basemen on the list are ranked on both their time with the Durham Bulls and their impact beyond.  I am going to post a few players here who look like they might be deserving of the honor, but I could not find enough data of some sort to give the player a nod onto the list.  Almost all of the players in this section appeared for the Durham Bulls during the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s.  

Rewind to that first base post for a second.  I am going to add this one:

John Radulovich- This Tigers farmhand appeared on the 1953 Durham Bulls.  He is listed as a first baseman and a second baseman, but there is no exact break down of where he played in the field and how many times.  There are also many minor leaguers who start off playing a position and end playing another position.  It appears that Radulovich start out playing second, missed time for World War 2, and then returned to the Minors in the late 40s and early 50s as a first baseman.  In this case, there is a record for the 1953 Durham Bulls that Radulovich appeared in 101 games at first base for the Class B Carolina League team that season.  Why the late shout out?  In 395 at bats the 30 year old (very Crash Davis like) hit .349, with a .585 slugging percentage, 19 home runs, 4 triples, and 28 doubles.  All of that stacks up against the five first basemen I picked a few weeks ago.

now second basemen...

Mike Fontenot- I am throwing a curve for my first shout out player.  Mike Fontenot has spent the last two years playing a lot of second base for the Durham Bulls.  The long time Cub and Giants second baseman has been an invaluable part of two division winners and the 2013 Governors Cup Championship team.  All of the players on this list have better numbers than Fontenot, but he's also one of the few players on my Friday Five Durham Bulls Second Baseman list who I have seen in person.  I can tell you the Bulls probably would not have gotten as far as they had the past two years without this Major League veteran taking the field.

Rufus Anderson- Rufus Anderson spent a few years in Durham during the summers of 1959, 1960, and 1961 playing shortstop and 2nd for the Class B Carolina League Team.  Again, the defensive records are not great, but it looks like he played 2B for 108 games in 1961.  I am not sure where he played in the field the other two years on the Bulls, but I can probably speculate that some of the time was playing second.  During his 1961 season the 22 year old Tigers farm hand hit 19 homers, 5 triples, and 21 doubles while posting a slash line of .272/.314/.439.  For the era, Anderson displayed a good deal of pop for a middle infielder.    Anderson never appeared in the Major Leagues.

Edward Richardson- This guy was Kevin Youkilis before Kevin Youkilis.  His last year of professional baseball was spent in Durham playing for the Class B Houston Colts affiliate.  It appears that Richardson played a lot of second base that year for the Bulls, but also spent time playing other places on the infield during his career.  During his one season in Durham his slash line was .256/.414/.426.  Not a typo, but that's a pretty hard line to duplicate.  For what it's worth Youk had a .382 OBP, but had a slugging percentage of .478.  Richardson's on base was greatly helped by his incredible 117 walks that season.  He also had 13 home runs, 25 doubles, and 73 RBIs.  You wonder what would have happened to a guy like this if he played during a different era.

Woody Fair- He's listed as having played second base on his Baseball Reference page, but I am not sure if he played there for the Durham Bulls.  What I do know is that he appeared for the 1946 Durham Bulls and played in 139 games that season.  During those 139 games he had 569 at bats and hit .348 with a .589 slugging percentage, 24 home runs, 7 triples, and 51 doubles.  Again, not sure if he played second base, but that's a really good season.  In fact, in talking to a few folks who witnessed the Carolina League in the late 1940s and early 1950s, they are hard to find, they describe Woody Fair as the best player in the league during that time.  He appeared almost exclusively for Carolina League teams between 1946 and 1951.  Interestingly his final season in 1951 was spent playing for the Raleigh Capitals managed by former Cardinals star Joe Medwick.

5.  Elliot Johnson

The most recent member of the team on this list, Johnson was an important part of the very successful Charlie Montoyo Era for the Durham Bulls.  Johnson appeared in games for the Durham Bulls during the 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010 seasons.  He also appeared in 2 games for the 2011 team, but we are going to ignore those 9 at bats.  I am not sure if I can really point out a singular great season that Johnson posted during that time for the Bulls, but the team won and he was on the field a lot playing pretty well.  In 2009 the Bulls won the Triple A National Championship game with Johnson slashing .265/.324/.450 with 11 home runs, 11 doubles, and 7 steal in 68 games.  The slash line was pretty typical of Johnson's time in Durham and he usually had pretty good pop and speed to go along with solid defense.

4.  Tony Graffinino 

Graffanino appeared for the Durham Bulls as a farmhand for the Braves and Rays.  During his first trip through Durham he was a 21 year old second baseman playing for the Braves A ball team.  He posted a .275/.342/.460 line with 15 home runs, 30 doubles, 24 steals, and 69 RBIs.  Six years later Graffanino appeared for the Bulls as a late twenty-something trying to make it back up to the big leagues.  I might add that he was successful and ended up playing in the Majors until 2007 before spending 2007 and 2008 back in the International League.  During his second appearance in Durham Graffanino hit .313/.379/.499 with 9 home runs, 6 triples, 25 doubles, 58 RBIs, and 16 steals in just 87 games.  He also appeared in 10 games with the Bulls during the 2000 season, but it looks like it was a rehab appearance, but for what it's worth he had a .286/.405/.543 line during those games.

3.  Mark Lemke 

Lemke appeared for the Durham Bulls in 1987 and spent almost the whole summer playing for the second base for the team.  While you probably do not remember Lemke hitting in the Majors, he held his own during his time in the Minors.  During the 1987 season the Bulls second baseman hit .292/.364/.485 with 20 home runs, 28 doubles, 3 triples, and 10 steals.  Lemke went on to be an important member of the 1990s Braves teams including the 1995 World Series Champions.  

2.  Ron Gant 

Gant played second base?  Absolutely.  Gant appeared in 135 games for Durham Bulls in 1986 all of them at second base.  During that season Gant hit .277/.372/.529 with 26 home runs, 10 triples, 31 doubles, 102 RBIs, and 35 steals.  I thought I was surely going to find a Carolina League MVP in there for that performance, but it appears that Ron was best by Mets prospect Gregg Jefferies who hit .354 with 43 steals in just 95 games with the Lynchburg Mets.  Still a great year for Gant and one of the better offensive seasons in the history of the Bulls.  Gant started off on the infield for the Braves, but eventually ended up as an outfielder for the majority of the team he played in Majors.  He was a feared power hitter, but ended up spending the second half of his career bouncing around the league.

1.  Joe Morgan 

Obviously the biggest impact beyond his time with the Durham Bulls, but he was a pretty special player during his brief stay with the team.  Again, the record on Morgan's time with the Bulls is incomplete.  He hit .323 with a .434 slugging percentage in 95 games with the Bulls, but their is no record of walks, nor his on base percentage.  Morgan also hit 13 home runs, 20 doubles, and 2 triples in just 322 at-bats.  Morgan went on to be an important part of the 1970s Cincinnati Reds teams hitting over 250 career home runs, driving in more than 1000 RBIs, and stealing almost 700 bases.  He won two World Series rings for the Reds in 1975 and 1976 and was elected to the baseball Hall of Fame in 1990.  Bill James called Morgan "the percentages player in baseball history"