2019 Sportlots purchases: Willie and the Bird

The afterglow of Michigan absolutely dominating MSU yesterday has me plenty energetic on this chilly Sunday, so let's go back to my unposted Sportlots stuff and have a look at a couple of guys who were winners in their own time.

Rookie phenom Mark Fidrych burst onto the scene and the national consciousness in 1976 with his trademark nickname,

a crazy pre-pitch routine on the mound, and some absolutely dominating numbers:  a 19-9 record, league-leading 2.34 ERA, 24(!) complete games, and a 9.6 bWAR. He was named the AL ROY and placed second to Jim Palmer in the Cy Young balloting, plus he started the All-Star game.  As a rookie.  TWENTY FOUR COMPLETE GAMES.  CC Sabathia tops the list of complete games by active MLBers with 38, and Justin Verlander is second with 26.  The Bird did it in a season.  Wow.

Unfortunately a knee injury in spring training the following year derailed that momentum, and a torn rotator cuff suffered a few weeks later sapped him of any effectiveness for the rest of his career.  Though he seems to have enjoyed his post-playing life, he sadly passed away in 2009 after an accident while working on a dump truck.  Fans of the Tigers and the sport in general will always remember Fidrych fondly for his amazing '76 season and mound antics.

Because of his brief career he didn't appear on a ton of cards so my Bird collection was fairly small before this latest Sportlots run, but I was able to boost it a bit with this fun group of seven pickups:

The oldest card in this scan is Mark's 1980 Topps base, which gives me all of his single-player flagship issues and leaves me short just a league leader card from '77, the same year his RC was produced.  Next is the low end but solid '88 Pacific Legends, which did quite a nice job with player selection, which I'm betting you'll agree with if you like collecting both stars and fan favorites.  Then comes '92 Action Packed All-Star Gallery (once again!) which is packed with lots of great players in a small set.  1994 Upper Deck All-Time Heroes is another product we've seen more than once in this series, and the design brings to mind Upper Deck Vintage designs that would come out in the ensuing decade.

Then we get into the next decade where things are a little more modern.  Again, you'll see a lot of sets repeat as I often tried to find all of the available Tigers I needed while searching each, so Topps' funky 2001 American Pie gets another appearance here.  I was also excited to find the Bird in Fleer's classy 2004 Greats of the Game, even though he was only really "great" for one season.  And lastly, it was also nice to see him make the cut for SP Legendary Cuts (sorry) as that always offers a nice design and is generally filled with legends as well.

This lucky bunch of seven cards give me 22 of the Bird and have me wanting lots more.  The Fleer Greats card has my favorite design while Action Packed and UD provided the best photos.  I've put his other cards I'm interested in on my TCDB wantlist, so don't be surprised if you see him make another appearance here in the future!

Next we move from the mound to the outfield and a player who enjoyed a much longer and productive career in Motown.  William Wattison Horton patrolled the deeper part of old Tiger Stadium for parts of 15 seasons from 1963 until he was traded to Texas in 1977.  While here he socked more than 250 of his 325 career homers, made four All-Star teams, put up a career-best 5.4 bWAR in 1968, and was a driving force behind that team that won it all for a reeling city.  His #23 was retired in 2000 and his contributions to the team and city as a fan favorite made that a natural choice.  You may have seen this clip before

in which Horton, from his LF position, made a perfect throw home to catcher Bill Freehan to nail speedster Lou Brock in Game 5 of the '68 Series.  The play was crucial with Detroit down 3-1 in the Series and helped turn things around, with Detroit owning the last three in a row.

My collection of Willie is also smaller than I'd like it to be, but purchases like this one help motivate me to grow that number with more cool stuff like this:

I was glad to give this group a triple dose of vintage goodness.  Topps cards from 1975 (I already have the Mini) and '76 flank a simple oddball-ish example of 1976 SSPC.  I still need to track down Horton's '64 Topps RC, or any of his cards from the '60s for that matter, as the oldest I have of him right now is from 1971 Topps.  There's something for me to work on in 2020.

The next couple are from sets you just saw in Fidrych's scan:  '92 Action Packed ASG and 2001 Topps American Pie.  I really like the photo Action Packed went with, which shows a focused slugger at the plate in an old-school Tigers uni.  The back notes that he was fourth in franchise history in HR at the time with 262, and Cecil Fielder (who was traded) and Lou Whitaker, who were active back then, never caught up.  In fact, only one player managed to eclipse him (as well as #3 Hank Greenberg):  Miguel Cabrera, who'd need 61 more to top franchise legend Al Kaline.

After those we end the day with a couple "newer" cards.  The first is 2006 Fleer Greats of the Game and another gorgeous design.  I also love that year's version for its various team Greats insert, which includes the Tigers, but this is simply another joy to look at.  Horton is my eighth Tiger from the base cards and I'm short just the Denny McLain, which I might get eventually, but I'm not terribly motivated since he's been such a jackass since he retired.

Last up is 2014 Panini Golden Age, a set whose design and checklist definitely evokes A&G and Gypsy Queen.  That means it's not exactly high on my list of favorites, but I was still happy to add it to Willie's collection.  The back highlights his outstanding 1968 season as the AL's "dominant offensive force" in "one of baseball's most pitching dominated seasons."  His bat certainly loomed large for the Tigers both in the regular season and playoffs, but don't forget his arm as seen in that clip above!

This fun look at a pair of fan favorites gets me down to two more posts, which I hope to have done soon with COMC's sales looming.  My plans include one more multiplayer post followed by a big solo finish I know other Tigers fans will enjoy.