a memorial patch for twins' broadcaster herb carneal

here's a 2007 upper deck sp rookie edition alexi casilla card

in addition to casilla turning two, the card is significant because it shows the memorial patch (a microphone with the name 'herb') that the twins wore during the 2007 season for their longtime radio broadcaster herb carneal.  carneal joined the twins' broadcast team in 1962, and worked through the 2006 season although his workload had diminished by that time.  he was the recipient of the ford c. frick award in 1996, and the twins' press box had been named in his honor in 2001.  counting his work with the a's, phillies, and orioles prior to joining the twins, carneal had a 51-year career in baseball broadcasting.  

the 83-year old carneal died of heart failure just a day before the 2007 season began, and the twins wore black armbands in his honor for the opener.  i couldn't find a card with the armband, but here's a getty images photo of justin morneau wearing the armband.

here's a 2008 upper deck sp authentic card of morneau showing the patch that was developed soon after

and here's the other half of the twins' version of the m&m boys, joe mauer, who is also displaying the patch on his 2008 upper deck sp legendary cuts card

during some home games in '07, the twins wore jersey vests, and so the patch moved to the right chest as seen in this getty images photo of casilla

card companies didn't bother to send photographers to the metrodome in 2007, i guess, because there really aren't very many cards of the twins in their home whites outside of spring training that i could find.  anyway, here's the card that sits in my memorials binder for this one - it's torii hunter's 2008 upper deck first edition card

torii's back in minnesota, by the way. it will be interesting to see how that goes.

thoughts of managers and other cards

adam from thoughts of sox sent me some cards a while back, including this 2003 upper deck sp legendary cuts card of hall of fame manager walter alston

he managed the dodgers to 7 pennants and 4 world series titles in 23 years, winning 2040 games and finishing below .500 just 4 times.  he was four games short of managing 23 full seasons, as he abdicated his managerial role late in the 1976 season, allowing tommy lasorda to take over.  that got me thinking, so i pulled my lasorda card from the same set

(which features a photo from the 1998 all-star game - after lasorda had retired from managing), and i scanned the backs of the cards together

these two cards together summarize the dodger franchise performance from 1954 into the 1996 season - 42-plus seasons.  crazy.

back to the cards adam sent, here's a 2005 bowman draft picks and prospects russ martin gold parallel card

that i should have shown on canada day

here are a couple of andy laroche cards from 2007 upper deck sp rookie edition

laroche was last seen in 2013 with the blue jays.  he's still in their system, but hasn't appeared in the majors yet this year.

from 2011 topps chrome, here's a rafael furcal refractor

the many permutations of 2011 topps furcal cards combine for one of my favorite dodger double play cards, even though some of them (including the card above) list furky as an outfielder

also from 2011 topps chrome was this ubaldo jiminez refractor

that was sent along due to the 'ksm' patch on the jersey, just above the glove.  i wrote about the patch here as part of my memorials collection.

thanks for the cards adam!