The other week I made fun of Bob Forsch for having a perm on a 1980s baseball card. Tom Herr is on this week's card, and he also rocked a perm for parts of the decade. I am going to skip over the hair and tell you all of the things I remember about the Cardinals second baseman during the 1980s.
1. He had the smallest home run space of any second baseman in the All-Star Baseball game.
It's the number 1 at the top of the disc if you never played. Give me Ryne Sandberg or Bobby Grich all day long.
2. Walk off grand slam against the Mets on seat cushion night in 1987.
3. This sac fly he hit in the 1982 World Series that scored two runs. Really Gorman Thomas misplayed the ball, but Tommy Herr hit it.
and I did not really know much about this play during the 1980s. More like the 1990s when I learned more about the 1982 World Series. Still counts.
4. He was traded to the Twins for Tom Brunansky.
The 1989 Topps Cardinals Leaders cards had Tom Brunansky on it, plus Luis Alicea who replaced him at second base. Feels like a 1980s troll job from Topps.
That's it. That's my Tommy Herr list. Now for a card.
This is a card I have picked up in the past year. I really have not ever gone after any of these cards, but I included one of these in an article over at my other writing gig and I decided to check one out. This is an All-Star Game Program insert card. MLB put them in the programs for a few years during the 1980s, people cut them out, and there are a few floating around the internet. Again, a more recent pick up, not an actual card I had in my collection during the 1980s. Plus, there is no way the first/second grade me would have ever cut out a card this neatly.
This was already cut when I acquired it. Here is the back.
No stats, just the All-Star Game logo from 1984, which was hosted by the Giants. Huey Lewis and the News performed the National Anthem at this game.
First off, this post has more 1986 Topps Glossy Mail-In cards, but I am only going to mention Vince Coleman once. I'm done. Let's look at some cards.
First off, I skipped a few cards during my first post. I was trying to show the set off in numerical order, but I missed this grouping of cards.....
with Darryl Strawberry, Ron Guidry, and Chris Brown. Probably distracted by writing about a Cardinals player and I skipped right over this scan.
Guidry was towards the end of his career, but his 1985 was great. He led the American League with 22 wins and finished second in Cy Young voting. Strawberry was not really high on my list in 1986, Cardinals and Mets had a pretty good rivalry at that time, but this is a nice card. I like the polyester uniform and the action shot. Nice card.
Chris Brown was a prospect in the set. Interestingly, he and Strawberry, along with Eric Davis, all came from the same part of Los Angeles, and grew up playing baseball together. Not sure if Topps put these cards together intentionally. Brown's baseball career never panned out and he ended up driving trucks in Iraq. When he returned from Iraq he died from burns as a result of a house fire. Bizarre incident.
The Hershiser card is a second year card. I often associate the peak of his career as being in 1988 with the Cy Young Award and the World Series title, but 1985 was not far behind. The 19-3 record with a 2.03 ERA clearly got buried behind Gooden and Tudor that season.
Gary Carter was a catcher. Again, not a huge fan of the Mets, but he was a really good player.
I learned something with this last card. I am well versed with Seaver's time with the Mets and Reds, but I also know that I have a bunch of White Sox and Red Sox cards from the time I collected in the 1980s. Always assumed that those final years were his way to hanging around the game. It turns out that Seaver still had some good years though. Picked up his 300th win as a White Sox....
with Richard Nixon in attendance. Not as good as his years with the Mets and Reds, but not exactly a slouch.
I actually had all three of these cards when I started this project, but ended up replacing all three of them. Some soft corners from the younger version of me. Although, after doing a little cleaning this past weekend, I actually found another copy of the Pedro Guerrero card. Guessing I might have replaced it while he was on the Cardinals, or at some point afterwards.
Fisher was a good young pitcher for the Yankees, had a very good 1985 out of the bullpen. He was actually a member of the 1982 Durham Bulls. He was traded to the Pirates for Rick Rhoden and was given a chance to start, but injuries derailed his career. Fisher appeared in only 35 games between 1989 and 1992. Gibson and Fisk's inclusion is the set is pretty obvious, both very good players at this point.
The Tommy Herr was the only Cardinals card that I needed for this entire project. I remember these were sold in groups, but I do not seem to have the break down of these cards. Obviously I did not get these, I was also missing the Murray and Mattingly. I used to base the portions of the sets I got on the Cardinals players in each grouping. If there were enough Cardinals in the set, and they were spread out, then someone got skipped. Sorry, Tommy.
Murray is a Hall of Famer, but the Mattingly card would have been a great one to own around this time. I do not think that Mattingly should be in the Hall, but his first five or six seasons were excellent. If he had played at that level for a few more years, he would be in.
Easy to pick out a favorite card in this set. That Quisenberry card looks great with the front view of that submarine deliver. I like that the baseball is a blur in front of Quiz. I do not specific collect Quisenberry cards, but he was on the Cardinals for a few years at the end of his career. His cards usually at least catch my eye. There are a few other 1980s Quisenberry cards with a similar view, but this is the best of them.
Last set of cards for this post......
This is a hard group to end on. Who do I like in this group? I like the brown Padres jersey on the Steve Garvey card. That's all I got. The rest of the set next week.
