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.

dodger lurker time

they may not always be the main focus of the card, but i'll take dodgers on cardboard any way i can find them.  sometimes, that means that i have to keep a card of a giant, as is the case with bengie molina's 2009 upper deck card

which features andre ethier lurking in the background while also beating the throw home.

plays at the plate are good places to find lurkers, and tom prince does not disappoint on lance johnson's 1999 fleer tradition card

prince held on to the ball, but i believe johnson was safe, assuming that this is the lone scoring or potential scoring play from the april 26, 1998 game that featured these two guys.  it looks like it was a sunny day in socal that day.

another dodger catcher, mike scioscia, shows up on the back of johnny ray's 1989 upper deck card

thanks to the annual freeway series that precedes every regular season.

here's jeff treadway getting some face-less time on robb nen's 1995 upper deck card

while jeff hamilton finds spike owen waiting for him on owen's 1991 upper deck card

finally, we have raul mondesi trying to beat the throw on brant brown's 1997 topps stadium club card

he did not, but he did get to appear on the card for which i am thankful.

this other time, at dodger stadium...

...the braves came to town in august of 1996.  thanks, upper deck, for doing it right in your 1997 set.  here's the crime dog in dodger stadium

and his teammate marquis grissom, also in chavez ravine

two future dodgers in their future home park!  mcgriff scored a run and was thrown out at home, so if he is indeed rounding third in the photo on his card, it would have come from one of those moments.  grissom is getting a 'bead' on a flyball off the bat of either chad curtis or juan castro, based on the boxscore at baseball reference.
the backs of the cards are also pretty cool

there's tom prince!  i think this brings the total of cards prince appears on as a dodger to two.  the game the previous day went 18 innings, and mike piazza caught 14 of them.  prince relieved him and got the start the next day.

grissom's back is also full of dodger stadium goodness

although there are no lurking dodgers.  man, this is what documentary could have been...

someday my prince will come

back in the day, topps, with their 726 card set, made cards for middle relievers and third string catchers.  the dodger team set from 1978 features three catchers (steve yeager, jerry grote, and johnny oates) and several relievers (terry forster, charlie hough, elias sosa, lance rautzhan, and mike garman).  then, sometime in the 1990's, there was no love for the non-starters, and in many cases, non-stars. 

topps and fleer and donruss and upper deck and everyone else figured i would much rather have multiple mike piazza cards than get a single card of a guy like tom prince.  thankfully, we have 1998 pacific online.

in 1997, prince played in 47 games while piazza starred for the dodgers in what was an mvp-worthy season.  in his 5 seasons as a dodger, that was the greatest number of games in which prince had played, and this pacific card may be the only one produced by any of the card companies.  he played in 3 games at atlanta in '97, but i am too lazy to look them up to see which game may have conjured up the photo used on his card.

i decided to send a copy of this card off to prince c/o the pirates, for whom he works these days as the manager of their gulf coast team.  more about that later.  here are some other gems from the dodger set.
darren hall

hall pitched in 63 games for the dodgers in 1997.  his 2.30 era was second only to antonio osuna's 2.19 that year on the dodger staff.  still, no darren hall cards other than this one.
did you know thomas howard played for the dodgers in 1998? or ever?

i don't blame you if you didn't.  thomas joined the team as a free agent prior to the season but was released at the end of june after hitting a forgettable .184 in 47 games.  thank you pacific for recognizing his service as a dodger, as bad as it was.
scott radinsky

that is a nice looking card, except for the web addresses and all the frivolous pacific glitz.  it's a nice photo i guess is what i am saying.  radinsky did get a 1999 fleer card, but he was on his way to the cardinals on that one.  i also sent a card to radinsky c/o the indians, but haven't heard back.

so, back to prince.  i sent the card to him in september of 2010 after seeing some successes on sports card forum.  almost 13 months later, he returned the card, signed nicely.

awesome.  thanks, pacific, for the backup catcher love.  i miss the old topps.  and topps total.