topps or o-pee-chee?

it's time once again to play that age old game - topps or o-pee-chee?  take a look at what i like to call the greg shanahan rookie card from 1974.  dave freisleben (a don martin character's last name if i ever heard one) is shown in a padres uni but is affiliated with 'washington'.

then there is this version, in which freisleben is listed as a padre.

which is topps and which is o-pee-chee?

while you ponder, i will point out that this is shanahan's only card.  he had debuted in september of 1973 against the giants and in his one inning of relief on september 3, he retired all three batters he faced, including striking out willie mccovey for his first career k.  shanahan pitched in 6 other games over the final month of the season, earning his lone career save in his last 1973 appearance.  he also made it to the plate twice.  his first career at-bat resulted in a hit by pitch courtesy of fred norman.  the second time he came to the plate, he struck out against someone named fred snook of the washington nat'l league san diego padres.

shanahan pitched again for the dodgers in 1974, appearing in 4 games over august and september.  he finished on a decent note, but never appeared in the majors again.

back to the cards.  i am sure you are aware  that they are both topps issues.  i guess it was such a sure thing that the padres were going to move to washington dc for the 1974 season that topps printed the cards with the 'washington natl league' moniker instead of 'san diego padres'.  they also issued the cards with the san diego designation, and i believe that the washington cards are considered the variations.

of course, if you've been following the goings on over at my other blog oh my o-pee-chee!, you would know that the only variations in the 1974 o-pee-chee set are the hank aaron specials and the displacement of a few other cards.

anyway, here is the actual o-pee-chee card

i have two copies of the o-pee-chee version.  freisleben is with 'washington' on both because, unlike topps, o-pee-chee did not issue a san diego version.  all of the other padres, however, are listed as such as o-pee-chee did not do washington variants for those cards. confusing at best.