02 August 2010

an infield of none - gcrl in 1988

while three of the four infielders finished their big league careers in 1987 (bill russell played his last game in 1986), dave lopes was the only one to be included in the 1988 topps set.
as such, this card is a 'final tribute' for the primary second baseman of my youth.
for his career, lopes played in 1812 games, scored 1023 runs, stole 557 bases, and had 1671 hits. his batting average was .263 (the same as russell's), fielding percentage was .977, and his ops was .737. he played in 6 national league championship series (hitting .282 in 22 games), 4 world series (winning 1), and 4 all-star games (going 2 for 5).

he is currently ranked 25th all-time in stolen bases, and, as far as the dodgers' franchise leaderboard is concerned, lopes is eighth in franchise history (second in los angeles dodger history) in walks, and second (behind maury wills) in stolen bases. while he trails wills by 72 steals (418 to 490), he was caught stealing far fewer times (85 to 171).

i'll do career wrapups for garvey and cey next month, as i still have to finish the backs of their 1988 topps 'cards that should have been'.

2 comments:

steelehere said...

I've enjoyed the yearly Dodger infield recaps. I don't know if you've thought of it but how about continuing the series with the manager cards of Lopes and Russell (if they exist)?

gcrl said...

thanks for the comment. i have been thinking about how to get to lopes' managerial days (sadly russell does not have any topps cards from his stint at the helm of the dodgers) and i think i have it figured out. stay tuned.