age of ultra

no superheroes here, just humble baseball players on some fleer ultra cards.

here's a 1999 fleer ultra chan ho park

the latter years of ultra feature some nice photography, as evidenced by jeff shaw's card

which features dodger stadium and the three sisters in the background.

a less scenic part of dodger stadium is in the background of antonio osuna's card

but we get charles johnson (i believe) in the foreground

mark grudzielanek is on the road on his card

but ismael valdes is back at home on his

in addition to lots of dodgers and dodger stadium cards, ultra has contributed many double plays to my collection. here are a few that i haven't shown before

2001 fleer ultra edgar renteria

i hope renteria was successful in his giant twin killing

speaking of giants, here's a 2002 fleer ultra rich aurilia card

jeff kent can only stand and watch

2004 fleer ultra orlando cabrera

nice to see the expos now and again

2004 fleer ultra marcus giles

most of the marcus giles dp cards i have seem to show him horizontal.  must not have been much of a jumper.  like placido polanco

or michael young

this is a 2004 fleer ultra update card of giant prospect brian dallimore

who is being taken out by juan pierre.  hopefully dallimore got some lessons in sliding runner evasion from double play professional ray durham, seen here on a 2005 fleer ultra card

it's too bad that fleer went under - we could use more ultra these days.

lurkers are lurking - sometimes in plain sight

one doesn't need to look very far or hard to find the dodger making his way onto joe mccarthy's 1993 conlon collection tsn card

dodger manager burleigh grimes gets some foreground respect in the photo from 1938.  not sure when/where this would have been taken, as mccarthy's yankees faced (and beat) the cubs in the '38 fall classic.

grimes gets a mention on the back of that particular card, but that is usually not the case with lurkers.  take this 1999 fleer ultra jeff bagwell card, for example

tom prince is just as much of the card as is bagwell, but he gets no acknowledgement which is as it should be.

jose offerman finds his way onto kurt stillwell's 1993 donruss card

and eric karros (with a cloud of dust) enhances kevin higgins' 1994 topps card

i don't consider the stillwell card to be a double play turn because i can't verify it as such, even though it looks like it might be one.  offerman didn't get on base a whole lot against the padres in 1992, and when he did, he was often sacrificed to second with stillwell covering first.

now here's a blurry lurker.

that's dodger first base coach john shelby in the background on miguel batista's 2003 topps card.  i wish there were more cards like this featuring manny mota or, these days, davey lopes.

here are a couple of hall of fame lurkers - eddie murray shows up on scott stahoviak's 1996 score card

and we get half of cal ripken jr on rickey henderson's 1983 topps record breaker card

this card would have qualified as a 'classic combo' by topps' 2007 standards.

craig biggio vs. royce clayton in a double play showdown

i can't seem to stop finding cards of craig biggio and royce clayton which feature double play turns.  this post will exhaust the ones from my scanned folder, but i am sure there will be more.

1995 score biggio

i'm not sure biggio got the relay throw off on this one. twice on july 9, 1994 the astros attempted to force mark parent at second (they were successful once), but both times the batter was safe at first.  i will guess, based on the direction that the throw seems to be coming from, that this was the attempted force in the first inning on an anthony young bunt.  both were safe.

i have no idea about the dp shown on royce clayton's 1994 upper deck sp card

other than he definitely made the relay

1996 upper deck biggio

the astros are back at wrigley

1998 pacific omega

as are the cardinals

1998 fleer sports illustrated then and now biggio

and 1998 upper deck collector's choice biggio

pretty sure that's the same play from two different angles

1999 fleer ultra clayton

now he's with the rangers

biggio is back in philly on his 1999 upper deck card

where he's stepping on helmets

clayton wins this round thanks to his 1998 topps stadium club card

that is a double play card nicely done.

a memorial patch for catfish hunter

in 1991, the oakland a's retired uniform number 27 in honor of jim 'catfish' hunter, and sometime after that, they put a jersey on the outfield wall to recognize the number's retirement.  you can see it on rickey henderson's 1993 score select card

it shows up again on miguel tejada's 1999 fleer ultra card - a double play turn at that

so it would be fitting if that were number 27 behind randy velarde on velarde's 2000 fleer impact card (another double play turn!) because velarde is shown wearing a memorial patch for hunter, who passed away in september of 1999

alas, it is not hunter's number, but rather that of fellow hall of famer rollie fingers.

hunter joined the a's in 1965 without stopping in the minor leagues.  he struck out the first batter he ever faced in the major leagues (ken berry), and after the a's moved from kansas city to oakland in 1968, he threw a perfect game against the twins.

hunter would eventually win 161 games for the a's over 10 seasons, including four straight seasons with 20 or more wins (1971-1974), and he helped the a's win three straight world series from 1972 through 1974.  he left oakland after the 1974 season thanks to an arbitration ruling that made him a free agent, and he signed with the yankees.

following his death, the yankees also honored hunter with a memorial.  more on that later on...

roberto alomar and the art of the double play

yes, it's double play dump time, but this post is different.  these are all roberto alomar double play turns that i welcomed into my collection over the past few months.

this 1994 fleer card

might look familiar, as it features the same play shown on his 1994 topps card.  if you ask me, sandy could have slid harder.

here's a 1993 score select card

with george brett sliding in.

i contend that this 1992 fleer ultra alomar award winners (gold glove) insert is, in fact, a double play turn

i base this on the fact that the umpire seems to be looking intently to make sure that roberto has touched second base.  that means that i believe alomar to be airborne on the card, even though it's tough to tell.

this one is much easier - 1992 topps stadium club

as is this 1992 score impact player insert

here we have a couple of cards from 1994 sportflics - first alomar's base card

and second, a starflics subset card

i have no idea whose glove that would be in the foreground.  it's not a second baseman since alomar played second base exclusively as a blue jay.  it's not a first baseman's glove, and if it were the pitcher covering first, i doubt that they would be wearing a batting glove.  very strange.

here's alomar's 1995 sportflix card (i don't know why the went to the 'flix' instead of the 'flics'in '95)

it's nice when these things scan well enough to see what it is that i want to see.  in this case, the double play turn.

this next card is from 1994 upper deck sp.  it's a holo view insert or something like that.

i am guessing that alomar made the pivot before landing on scott cooper on this 1995 bowman card

that's the thing about a lot of dp turns - what goes up must come down.

getting tired of seeing alomar yet?  let's mix things up with a card of alomar turning two as a member of the baltimore orioles.  this is a 1997 score hobby reserve card

it's almost a tatooine card too, if it weren't for that grass in the lower right corner.

this 1997 topps stadium club may not be a dp turn since kenny lofton is sliding headfirst

in fact, based on the game logs i found from '96 when the indians hosted the orioles, i am pretty well convinced that this is not a dp turn.

this one is, though.  from 1999 fleer ultra

as is this 2000 fleer ultra

and this 2001 fleer ultra

good on fleer to produce dp cards three years in a row for collectors like me.  you probably noticed that alomar moved to the indians during that timeframe, essentially replacing carlos baerga (although he was traded from cleveland to the mets in 1996) as omar vizquel's dp partner.  alomar and vizquel made some pretty incredible plays together.

alomar followed in baerga's footsteps once again when the indians dealt him to the mets after the 2001 season.  here's a 2003 fleer focus jersey edition card of alomar turning two in mets gear.

i probably have a few more alomar dp cards yet to share, but that's all the alomar i can handle in one sitting.

jeff shaw through the mail successes!

so, you've just made the all-star team for the second time, saved 43 games (2nd highest total in the league and the 2nd most ever for a dodger reliever in a single season), you're a free agent, and you're just 35 years old.  what do you do?  if you're jeff shaw, you retire.  i can respect that even though i was surprised by it back in 2001.

shaw saved 129 games for the dodgers in three and a half seasons after being acquired from the reds for paul konerko and dennys reyes.  i believe that the first time he wore the dodger uniform was at the 1998 all-star game.  i don't recall whether the dodgers were hoping to re-sign him or whether his announcement came quickly, but his departure did open up the door for eric gagne to close, so it wasn't all bad.

shaw took some time to sign some cards on a few occasions for me a couple of years ago.  i'll start with his fantastic 1999 fleer ultra card, complete with the left field pavilion and the 'three ladies' palms in the background

1999 topps just doesn't compare to that

2000 upper deck is at least in the ballpark

and 2000 upper deck victory gives us a glimpse of the dodgers heroes patch (shaw wore drysdale) and the pee wee reese memorial patch

2001 bowman heritage in black and white (blue sharpie would have looked pretty nice, but ttm requestors can't be choosers)

2001 topps is back in (a near empty) dodger stadium

thankfully there are more people in the stands on his 2002 topps card.

and, since shaw retired following the 2001 season, these 2002 cards (that topps one above, this 2002 topps gallery,

and this 2002 upper deck)

are some of his 'final tributes'.

thanks for signing my cards jeff, and thanks for saving all those games!