that lurking lasorda

sometimes, tommy lasorda shows up where you would least expect him.  like fielding grounders behind a rookie first baseman on eric karros' 1993 upper deck sp card.

other times, he's congratulating players as heroes returning to the dugout like tim wallach on wallach's 1994 upper deck card

or trying to impart some knowledge to bob ojeda on his 1992 upper deck card

although, if i were ojeda, i'm not sure i would take the advice of a guy who was 0-4 on his career.  other times, he appears in name only, like on roger mcdowell's 1993 upper deck card.

of course, he also fills out cards all on his own as seen on this 2003 upper deck vintage card.

hopefully there are some card photographers getting ready to head to spring training.  i'd take a boring posed photo with tommy lurking in the background any day.

jesse's got himself a post

thanks to his status as a dodger double dipper!

[this is the thirty-first installment in the double dippers posts.  here are the previous posts - brett butler, omar daal, eric young, nick willhite, chris gwynn, mickey hatcher, dave anderson, don zimmer, rafael landestoy, dave hansen, jose vizcaino, hideo nomo, greg maddux, mike maddux, jon garland, chan ho park, vicente romo, gene mauch, denny lewallyn, von joshua, joe moeller, dioner navarro, rudy seanez, bart shirley, randy wolf, ismael valdes, bobby castillo, mike devereaux, pete richert, and jay johnstone.]

orosco first came to the dodgers in 1988, just in time for his second world series title in 3 years.  here's his 1989 score card.

orosco teamed with jay howell to lead the dodger bullpen to the fruits of victory in 1988, but he was one and done - leaving la for cleveland as a free agent.

after three seasons with the indians, orosco was traded to the brewers, as evidenced by his 1994 topps card:

after milwaukee, it was five seasons in baltimore and one in saint louis before orosco returned to the dodgers.  here's his 2002 topps traded card

orosco stayed for two years this time, appearing in 91 games for the dodgers.  by this time, he had already passed hoyt wilhelm and dennis eckersley to claim the top spot on the career games pitched list. orosco split the 2003 season between the padres, yankees and twins, and although he signed a contract with the diamondbacks after the season ended, he didn't make it back to the majors.

here's to you jesse orosco - another dodger double dipper!

twinkie, twinkie little star

rod from padrographs sent me a package recently filled with twinkie goodness.  unfortunately, not the hostess kind with cream filling, but cards of minnesota ballplayers are ok too.  here's a looksie:

2011 topps joe mauer insert of some sort.

i like the persian rug background.  it really ties the card together.  as we all know, joe struggled mightily in 2011 due to various injuries.  i'm hoping he bounces back in 2012.
here's another mauer - this one from 2011 topps gypsy queen

that's a nice framed parallel.  anyway, mauer's time missed meant that the twin faithful were subjected to the offensive mis-firings of drew butera, seen here on a 2010 bowman chrome card.

this is one of the reasons they signed ryan doumit and invited pretty much every available catcher to spring training this year.
rod also included some allenn & ginter, including former twin jim thome

and now former twin jason kubel

i found the kubel card interesting because the twins always seemed to play up kubel as a dakota boy.  i did not realize that, while he was born in south dakota, he played high school ball in california. 
here's a nice card of an idaho farmboy, harmon killebrew, on a 2011 topps heritage then and now insert

bautista only has about 420 home runs before he catches up to the killer.

finally, here's a 2011 topps lineage tsuyoshi nishioka.

it may be difficult to believe, but his 2011 season may well have been a bigger disappointment than that of mauer or justin morneau.  now he has jamey carroll to compete with for a job. 

thanks for the cards rod!

autographs of the little known

whether meant to be checklist filler or prospecting investments, i have never really been a fan of bowman's attempts at providing cards of players in single a.  by the time it all started in the early '90's, i was losing touch with the dodgers' farm system and didn't know who the top prospects were in aaa, let alone rookie ball.  anyway, upper deck seemed to do the same sort of thing in the 2000's, and as a result, i have some cards of players whom i do not know.  and not just cards, but relics and autos, too.  like this 2003 upper deck spx andrew brown jersey and auto card.

i was surprised to learn a few months ago that brown actually made it to the majors with the indians and a's later in the decade.  also surprised to learn that he was twice traded for milton bradley - first from the dodgers to the indians, and then from the padres to the a's.  once again, i was surprised to find that he was still pitching professionally in 2010.  nothing against brown, he was just never really on my dodger radar.

at least brown eventually pitched in the bigs.  not so for orlando rodriguez, whom upper deck had sign at least 999 stickers for their 2004 sp authentic release

rodriguez made it as high as aaa in 2005 and was most recently pitching in the mexican league in 2010.  he may have been injured along the way, as he apparently didn't pitch in 2004.  hopefully signing all those stickers wasn't the problem.

and then, there were the scout autos.  i know there was lots of consternation about these cards when they were distributed in 2008 bowman.  i mean, who are more little known than scouts?  still, i sought this one out. 

ralph avila has been a scout for the dodgers since 1970, and was the first scout to make a presence in the dominican.  he signed pedro and ramon martinez, raul mondesi, and others for the dodgers, and helped establish the baseball academy system that most teams use today.  sometimes it's good to know about the little known.

and the yeager goes to...

as i mentioned the other day, the lucky follower/promoter of my timeless teams blog would fall in at number 7 on the randomizer.  so, come on down, mr. laws.  you can check him out at my sports obsession, by the way.

send me your address again, if you would.

and thanks to everyone who is following, reading, and/or commenting.  keep at it because i'll give away another auto from the set sometime next month.  it's probably one of the best cards from the set in my opinion, as it scores high on the team, player, and photo fronts.  it's petey.

so, if you need some 1981 world series co-mvp in your life, follow timeless teams.  read timeless teams. and if so moved, comment on timeless teams.  thanks!

the outfield wall in blue heaven

first things first - i have updated last week's post on the dodger stadium bullpens to correctly identify the back walls as plastic, not metal. thanks to speigel for reminding me.  i also
added a couple of cards showing the flora that currently adorns those blue walls.  go back and check it out.

now that that is out of the way, we'll visit another part of the stadium that has seen it's share of changes.  you all know i'm not referring to the bathrooms.  no, it's the outfield walls of which i speak.  for most of their existence, the walls were just blue.  a nice blue in contrast to the orange and yellow benches in the pavilions. 

 

(by the way, welcome to the blog, mr. bournigal.  sorry it's taken me so long to feature one of your cards).  see that 1995 topps stadium card?  nice colors make for a pretty card.

i began to notice in the early 90's, although it may have been happening for who knows how long before that, that the dodgers would adorn the outfield wall with championship banners on opening day.  if you look closely at the back of this 2004 upper deck legends timeless teams (shameless plug) card, you can see the big white banners.

there would be six in all - 1955, 1959, 1963, 1965, 1981, and 1988 - evenly spaced from left to right field. 

that was all temporary, though, and the walls would go back to being just blue.  then, in the late 1990's and early 2000's, the dodgers began to use the wall as a canvas for some really great murals.  murals that recognized dodger hall of famers one year, cy young award winners another year, or world championships another, as seen on devon white's 1999 fleer si card.  

the white sox and cardinals and braves have all done something similar.  i think it is permanent at the cell and new busch stadium.  i like that kind of nod to the past.  like a good rug, it can really pull the room together.

in 2003, out of town scoreboards were added to the walls near each bullpen.  here's hee seop choi's 2004 fleer ultra card to provide some proof.

2004, of course, is when frank mccourt got to town, and he had no use for wasting outfield wall space on murals celebrating the history of the franchise or even just providing a nice color backdrop.  no, he needed to sell advertising space.  right julio lugo?

right.  that reebok ad isn't too obnoxious, i guess.  except at night, when the signs are lit.  here's ryan theriot's 2011 topps card to show what i mean.

yes, that's dodger stadium with theriot airbrushed into cardinal red.  at least topps put him in away grays.

i know that revenue is important and that most, if not all, other teams sell space on their outfield walls.  maybe, just maybe, however, the new owner could tone it down a bit.  or at least roll out the banners for old time's sake.

steve yeager finds a home on friday

24 followers (actually 23 since for some reason i am following the timeless teams blog, too) and 3 links hyping the blog (that i know of) prior to january 8.  thanks to everyone for the support.

remember, there's a steve yeager auto at stake!

here's the list of folks as i will enter them into random.org

dan
arpsmith
steelehere
ringo73
matthew r
mariner1
dodgerbobble
hackenbush
mrmopar
james
jeff laws
robert
matthew glidden
captain canuck
section 36
fanofreds
night owl
baseball dad
nick
play at the plate
dante jakupovski
flywheels
tom
stealing home (thanks for the link)
jeff laws (more thanks)
mrmopar (you too)
night owl (and you as well)

if you don't follow publicly, or if you linked to the site prior to the 8th, let me know and i'll add an entry for you.  regardless, the randomness will happen sometime friday afternoon.  in honor of mr. yeager, the 7th name will get the card.

stay tuned, and thank you for your support!