Beckett Message Boards

"Steady Eddie" Murray was a Rookie of the Year, an eight-time All-star, three-time Silver Slugger, three-time Gold Glove Award winner and a World Series Champion who in 1981 led the AL in both Home Runs and RBI. A switch hitter, he hit home runs from both sides of the plate in 11 games during his career. He played for the Orioles, Dodgers, Mets, Indians, Orioles again, Angels and finished with the Dodgers again. Only Mickey Mantle has hit more home runs as a switch hitter.  I currently have 730 different Beckett recognized cards of Eddie. Here are nine of them from my collection.

       
1996 Leaf Gold Press Proofs #102 Eddie Murray
1997 Circa Rave Reviews #8 Eddie Murray
1997 Pinnacle Artist's Proofs #PP65 Eddie Murray S


1998 Donruss Preferred Seating #27 Eddie Murray CB
2002 Fleer Fall Classics Series of Champions Game Used #EM Eddie Murray Bat
2002 Ultra Fall Classic Memorabilia #22 Eddie Murray Bat

       
2005 Sweet Spot Classic Materials #CMED Eddie Murray O's Jsy
2005 Sweet Spot Classic Materials #CMED1 Eddie Murray Dgr Jsy
2006 Upper Deck Epic Materials Green #EM3 Eddie Murray Jsy/75

Satchel Paige's career is the stuff of legends. His professional career spanned five decades. One of the most famous and successful players from the Negro Leagues, he was 42 years old when he made his Major League debut for the Indians in 1948. That set a record for the oldest player to make a MLB debut. He was 59 when he played his last MLB game, also a record. He was the first black pitcher in the American League and the first former Negro Leaguer to pitch in a World Series game. He was also the first player to be inducted into the Hall of Fame by the Negro League Committee. Paige had a vast array of pitches, fastball, curve balls, change-ups, knuckleball, his famous hesitation pitch and an effective eephus pitch all of which he could throw at different arm angles. He was known to occasionally call his infielders in and have them sit behind the mound as he struck out the side. As of this posting, I have 107 different Beckett recognized cards of Satchel Paige including these nine.

       
1989 Bowman Reprint Inserts Tiffany #8 Satchel Paige '49
1990 Negro League Stars #20 Satchel Paige
1993 Ted Williams Locklear Collection #5 Satchel Paige

         
2003 SP Legendary Cuts Blue #113 Satchel Paige
2003 SP Legendary Cuts Etched in Time 300 #SP Satchel Paige
2004 Sweet Spot Classic #149 Satchel Paige FF/1948

       
2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes #182 Satchel Paige Indians
2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes #185 Satchel Paige Indians HDR
2013 Panini Cooperstown Orange #17 Satchel Paige

Today I am posting another food issue. More specifically, cookie cards and even more specifically, Mother's Cookies cards. I have 163 of these from 1984 - 1998. Here are nine from my collection.

       
1984 Astros Mother's #1 Nolan Ryan
1984 Giants Mother's #1 Willie Mays
1990 Mariners Mother's #13 Randy Johnson

       
1990 Mother's McGwire #1 Mark McGwire
1991 Mother's Griffeys #4 Ken Griffey Sr. and/Ken Griffey Jr.
1992 Astros Mother's #8 Jeff Bagwell

       
1992 Rangers Mother's #5 Ivan Rodriguez
1994 Mother's Piazza/Salmon #1 Mike Piazza/Tim Salmon
1997 Giants Mother's #2 Barry Bonds

Mother's Cookies are my favorite food cards. Wish they still made them!

Sandy Koufax is one of the greatest pitchers in baseball history. He was a member of 6 All-Star teams and 4 World Championship teams. He led his league in Strikeouts 4 times, Earned Run Average 5 times and Victories 3 times. Koufax won the pitching Triple Crown and the National League Cy Young Award 3 times in 1963, 1965 and 1966. In 1963 Koufax was also selected as the National League's Most Valuable Player. Koufax threw a then record 4 No-Hitters during his career. He was the first pitcher to win the Cy Young Award three times and he did it when there was only one award given instead of one for each league. He walked away from the game at the age of 30 after winning his third Triple Crown and became the youngest player ever elected to the Hall of Fame. At the time of his induction, he was the only pitcher in history with more strikeouts than innings pitched.  To date I have 259 unique Beckett recognized cards of Koufax in my collection. I've showed you a bunch of my vintage Koufax cards as I scanned my way up through the 50s and 60s. Here are nine more from my collection.


1961 Topps #207 Dodger Southpaws/Sandy Koufax/Johnny Podres (Sandy shares this card with his teammate, Johnny Podres.)
1962 Post #109A Sandy Koufax (with Red Lines) (Cut from the back of a box of cereal in 1962.)
1964 Topps #136 World Series Game 1/Sandy Koufax

 
1965 Topps Embossed #8 Sandy Koufax (An insert in 1965 Topps packs.)
1967 Topps #236 NL Pitching Leaders/Sandy Koufax/Juan Marichal/Bob Gibson/Gaylord Perry (Sandy is pictured with three of his Hall of Fame contemporaries.)
2002 UD Piece of History #65 Sandy Koufax SP (This is a short print from UD's 2002 set.)

       
2011 Topps Update #US140B Sandy Koufax SP
2012 Topps Gypsy Queen Mini Sepia #290 Sandy Koufax
2019 Topps Factory Set Chrome Greatest Reprints Refractors #TGCR17 Sandy Koufax (Another bonus included in my 2019 factory set.)

Here comes Mike Trout! Mike's name popped up next on the randomizer. After ten and a half seasons, Mike has been named to the All-star team nine times, won eight Silver Slugger Awards, a Rookie-of-the-Year Award, led his league in RBI and Stolen Bases once each and most noteworthy, won three MVP Awards while coming in second in voting four other years. He is this generation's Mickey Mantle and his cards are some of the most sought after among today's crop of collector's, myself included. Since his rookie card appeared in this thread when I scanned in nine cards from 2011, he has made several appearances in posts from most of the years since. I currently have 640 unique Beckett recognized cards of Trout. Here are nine more that I haven't shown you yet.

         
2012 Bowman Gold #34 Mike Trout
2012 Topps Allen and Ginter #140 Mike Trout
2012 Topps Gypsy Queen #195 Mike Trout

        
2012 Topps Update #US144A Mike Trout
2014 Classics Timeless Tributes Silver #97 Mike Trout
2014 Topps Update All Star Access #ASAMT Mike Trout

       
2016 Bowman Chrome National Convention Refractors #BNR1 Mike Trout
2016 Stadium Club Black #280 Mike Trout
2016 Topps Toys R Us Purple #1 Mike Trout

Let's do the year 2020. A year unlike any other year we have ever experienced. I was about halfway through eight weeks of daily radiation treatments in the spring when Covid hit. I made it through my treatments and never missed a day of work in the process but it was tough going for a couple of months. In March I bought a single pack of Topps Opening Day having no idea I would not see another pack for sale again all year. Even today I still haven't seen a pack for sale. There is no LCS near me anymore so Hobby packs are out of the question and I don't buy online. Retail cards disappeared for most of us in 2020. I will say I got a clean bill of health in November showing less than 0.001% of cancer. I still have to do occasional checkups but it looks like that two year battle is behind me. Now if we could just put Covid in the rear-view mirror and get back to life the way we all want it to be. Here are nine 2020 cards from my collection.

       
2020 Diamond Kings DK Materials Holo Gold #98 Mookie Betts/50 (I sent a bunch of Orioles cards to a collector in Baltimore for this card.)
2020 Topps #392 Luis Robert RC
2020 Topps Base Set Photo Variations #78C Bo Bichette/batting FACTORY

       
2020 Topps Base Set Photo Variations #276C Yordan Alvarez/batting, white jsy FACTORY
2020 Topps Heritage #437 Fernando Tatis Jr. SP
2020 Topps Heritage #466 Mike Trout SP

       
2020 Topps Heritage Chrome Refractors #THC502 Mookie Betts
2020 Topps Tribute Dual Player Relics Purple #DRIK Ichiro/Yusei Kikuchi (Thanks to Kerry for this beauty.)
2020 Topps Update Photo Variations #U158 Ernie Banks SSP

In a 13-year career interrupted only by his service in World War II, Joltin' Joe DiMaggio was a perennial All-star in each of his seasons. His nine World Series Championships are surpassed only by former teammate, Yogi Berra. Joe led the AL in Batting, Home Runs and RBI twice each and won three Most Valuable Player Awards. One of the greatest players of all-time, he is known as much for his marriage to Marilyn Monroe as he is for his 56-game hitting streak. I currently have 451 different Beckett recognized cards of the Yankee Clipper including these nine.

       
1961 Nu-Card Scoops #467 Joe DiMaggio/(Four Homers)
1979 TCMA 50'S #1 Joe DiMaggio
2001 Topps Chrome Before There Was Topps #BT10 Joe DiMaggio

       
2002 Ultimate Collection #41 Joe DiMaggio
2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes #139 Joe DiMaggio
2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes #140 Joe DiMaggio HDR

       
2009 Upper Deck Goodwin Champions Preview #GCP1 Joe DiMaggio
2012 Topps Golden Moments Die Cuts #GMDC5 Joe DiMaggio
2015 Panini Cooperstown Crown Royale #55 Joe DiMaggio

He never played a Major League game but Earl Weaver managed the Baltimore Orioles for 17 seasons. He was no friend of the umpires. He was ejected from regular season games more than 90 times and several more times during the post-season. Three times he was ejected from both games of a double header and twice he was ejected before the game even started. I have 66 different Beckett recognized cards of Hall of Famer, Earl Weaver including these nine.

       
1969 Topps #516 Earl Weaver MG RC (Here's Earl's rookie card.)
1970 Topps #148 Earl Weaver MG
1971 Topps #477 Earl Weaver MG

       
1972 Topps #323 Earl Weaver MG
1974 Topps #306 Earl Weaver MG/Jim Frey/George Bamberger/Billy Hunter/George Staller (Shown with his coaching staff.)
1997 Topps Stars Rookie Reprints #15 Earl Weaver

       
2002 Greats of the Game Dueling Duos #11 S.Anderson/E.Weaver (Pictured here with his nemesis, Captain Hook.)
2003 Topps Retired Signature Autographs #EW Earl Weaver G
2004 Topps Tribute HOF #65 Earl Weaver

You can almost always find the game results and sometimes the box scores in the sports pages of your local newspaper. Sometimes you can find cards of your favorite players included in the newspaper too. Here are nine "newspaper" cards from my collection.

       
1981 Red Sox Boston Globe #128 Carl Yastrzemski (The photos used for this 1981 Boston Globe set were never intended to be issued as cards until a Globe employee got a hold of the printing plates and illegally produced this set in two series of 64 cards each.)
1981 Tigers Detroit News #17 Ty Cobb (This set, issued by the Detroit newspaper commemorates the 100th anniversary of professional baseball in Detroit.)
1990 Arlington Post All Star #NNO Ken Griffey Jr. (I believe this card was distributed by the Greater Arlington/Mansfield Spotlight Yellow Pages.)

       
1991 Alrak Griffey Gazette #2 Ken Griffey Jr./Holdin' On (This card of The Kid making one of the most spectacular catches of his career while destroying his knee in the process was produced by Alrak Enterprises and issued to honor Griffey Jr.)
1991 Texas Enquirer #NNO Nolan Ryan (This unlicensed Ryan card sports the fictional Texas Enquirer header and commemorates Ryan's seventh no-hitter.)
2004 Yankees Fleer Daily News #5 Derek Jeter (This card was issued as part of a nine-card un-perforated sheet that was included as an insert in the Daily News.)

       
2004 Mets Post Fleer #8 Mike Piazza (This is from a nine-card standard-size set, upon being cut from non-perforated sheets, and was issued as an insert in the New York Post.)
2006 Red Sox Upper Globe #13 David Ortiz (This is from a set issued by the Boston Globe and included as an insert in their paper.)
2007 Red Sox Upper Deck Boston Globe #7 Jacoby Ellsbury (The Boston Globe followed up their 2006 set with this set in 2007. The 20-card set was issued in two ten card perforated sheets. The sports guy at our radio station got a hold of a huge stack of these and gave me about a dozen sets.)