los angeles dodger commemorative patches through the years

i've been meaning to do this for quite some time, however it was a review of brian's want list at highly subjective and completely arbitrary that proved to be the push i needed to get it done. you see, brian collects cards showing commemorative - not memorial - patches.

the dodgers have worn a few commemorative patches recently, but not nearly as many as some teams for whom there seems to be something worth celebrating pretty much every year.  i'm limiting these posts to the los angeles dodger team, which means there won't be any discussion of the new york world's fair patch worn by the brooklyn dodgers in 1939.

well, aside from that 1961 fleer card, there won't be any discussion.  this list also does not include single game patches, such as the jackie robinson day patch that has been worn on april 15 in some recent seasons.

the task is fairly easy, because the dodgers didn't wear any patches, especially team specific patches for quite some time after moving to the west coast.  here's a year by year rundown.

1958 - none

1959 - none

1960 - none

1961 - none

1962 - none

1963 - none

1964 - none

1965 - none

1966 - none

1967 - none

1968 - none

1969 - major league baseball 100th anniversary (1971 dell's today team stamp maury wills)

1970 - none

1971 - none

1972 - none

1973 - none

1974 - none

1975 - none

1976 - national league centennial (1977 topps manny mota)

1977 - none

1978 - none

1979 - none

1980 - dodger stadium all-star game patch (1982 topps reggie smith)

1981 - city of los angeles bicentennial (1982 fleer bob welch)

1982 - none

1983 - los angeles dodgers 25th anniversary (1984 fleer derrel thomas)

1984 - dodger stadium olympic venue (1985 donruss orel hershiser)

1985 - none

1986 - none

1987 - dodger stadium 25th anniversary (1988 score steve sax)

1988 - none (vero beach 40th anniversary patch during spring training - 1988 donruss baseball's best alfredo griffin)

1989 - none

1990 - dodger national league franchise 100th anniversary (1991 topps debut '90 luis lopez)

1991 - none

1992 - dodger stadium 30th anniversary (1993 donruss triple play brett butler)

1993 - none (don drysdale/roy campanella and tim crews memorial patches)

1994 - major league baseball 125th anniversary patch (1995 fleer henry rodriguez)

1995 - none

1996 - dodger stadium 35th season (1997 upper deck tommy lasorda)

1997 - jackie robinson 50th anniversary patch (1998 topps finest brett butler)

1998 - los angeles dodgers 40th anniversary (1999 fleer brilliants eric karros)

1999 - dodger heroes (1999 keebler dodgers tripp cromer)

2000 - none

2001 - none

2002 - dodger stadium 40th anniversary (2003 topps total david ross)

2003 - none

2004 - none

2005 - none

2006 - none

2007 - none

2008 - los angeles dodgers 50th anniversary (2009 upper deck matt kemp)

2009 - none

2010 - 1955 world championship 55th anniversary (2010 topps update reed johnson)

2011 - none (duke snider memorial patch)

2012 - dodger stadium 50th anniversary (2013 topps josh beckett)

2013 - none

2014 - none

2015 - none

there were several missed opportunities that could have been celebrated - inaugural season on the west coast (1958), defending world champions (1960), opening of dodger stadium (1962), defending world champions (1964), defending world champions (1966), defending world champions (1982), defending world champions (1989), etc. as you can see, there were lots of chances to have worn defending world champions patches in the past, and i'm hoping next year they'll be in a position to wear one (or not) again.

the final active player pages from the steve garvey binders

twenty-five sheets are all i have in my steve garvey binders of cards from his playing days - excluding smaller and larger sized oddballs.  here is sheet 24:

those cards are:

1. 1987 m&m's
2. 1987 o-pee-chee
3. 1987 o-pee-chee stickers
4. 1987 ralston purina
5. 1987 ralston purina cookie crisp
6. 1987 sportflics
7. 1987 sportflics (factory set)
8. 1987 sportflics team preview
9. 1987 topps

the only difference between the 1987 sportflics card and the 1987 sportflics (factory set) card is that the factory set card has a copyright 1986 mark on the back, while the other card does not.

and, here are the backs

1987 sportflics was the first set to have color photos on the back. go figure.

and here is the last page of playing day cards of the garv - sheet 25

those cards are:

1. 1987 topps tiffany
2. 1988 score
3. 1988 score glossy

i recognize that garvey did not play in in 1988, but i include his final tribute card with the playing days cards.

here are the backs:

so, very soon we will start to see some of the way more than 25 sheets of steve garvey cards that have been issued after his retirement.  stay tuned.

a dodger memorial patch for mac

don mcmahon enjoyed an 18-year big league career as a reliever with the milwaukee braves, houston colt .45's, cleveland indians, boston red sox, chicago white sox, detroit tigers, and san francisco giants.  he began his major league service in 1957, and promptly helped the braves win the pennant as they went on to beat the yankees in the world series.  mcmahon pitched well in the fall classic, but the braves  lost all three of the games in which he pitched.  in fact, mcmahon's team lost every postseason game in which he appeared, which included the 1958 world series (the yankees beat mcmahon's braves), the 1968 world series (mcmahon's tigers still won the championship), and the 1971 nlcs (as a giant).  weird.  here's mcmahon's 1966 topps card.

in all, mcmahon pitched in 874 games (872 as a reliever), and had a record of 90-68 with 153 saves and a 2.96 era.  these numbers included service with the giants in 1973 and 1974 when he was also their pitching coach.  mcmahon remained the club's pitching coach through 1975 before taking the same position with the twins for three years.  he was back with the giants in the early 1980's, and then coached the indians from 1983 through 1985.  at that point, mcmahon was hired by the dodgers as their 'eye in the sky' scout who also threw early batting practice.  it was during a bp session at dodger stadium on july 22, 1987 when mcmahon suffered a fatal heart attack.

for the remainder of the season, the dodgers wore a black memorial patch on their right sleeves with mcmahon's nickname 'mac' in white letters.  here's the patch on one of the dodger relievers from that team, tim crews, courtesy of his 1988 donruss card

with a nice dodger stadium backdrop.

mickey hatcher's 1988 donruss card also shows the patch 

as does phil garner's 1988 score card

pedro guerrero (standing next to fernando valenzuela) is wearing the patch on this 1988 topps dodgers leaders card

and it's fernando's turn on this 1988 fleer baseball's exciting stars card

perhaps the best example of the patch is seen on glenn hoffman's 1988 topps card

which was the easy choice for my memorials binder.  until, that is, i came across this orel hershiser card from the same fleer box set as the fernando above.

a card featuring a photo from a dodger batting practice session seems appropriate for mac's memorial.

only 57 when he died, mcmahon was survived by his wife and six children and a mournful dodger organization.

rhoden and john and hough

i consider don sutton to have been the ace of the team of my youth, but the dodgers of the mid to late 1970's had a pretty strong staff.  i got kind of tired of seeing doug rau pitch seemingly every time we trekked to dodger stadium, but it wasn't because he was a bad pitcher - i just would have rather have seen tommy john or rick rhoden or burt hooton more often.  anyway, it's boxing day and things are slow and i don't have any good post ideas, so here are some non-dodger cards of three members of the dodger pitching staff from the team of my youth.

1988 score rick rhoden

and tommy john

rhoden and tj were reunited on the yankees, although this was john's second time around with the club. here's the back of john's 1981 topps card

for no other reason than to show the 'on disabled list' text that defined his 1975 season and his legacy as well.

here's the back of rhoden's 1988 topps big card for no other reason than to note that rhoden was a fan of both bob gibson and hulk hogan

'his' comment in the ping pong cartoon is not entirely true - rhoden did get to hit as the yankees' dh in a game during the 1988 season.  here's the front of that topps big card, by the way

rhoden sports the same mustache on his 1988 leaf card

which is so much better than 1988 donruss.

here's a 1988 fleer superstars card of rhoden

i wonder what he's got in that gatorade cup.

rhoden finished out his career with the astros in 1989.  here's his 1989 fleer update card

tommy john, meanwhile, began his career in cleveland.  here's a 2003 topps retired signature card showing him in indians' attire.

and let's not forget about charlie hough, who was actually the dodgers' closer in 1977, saving 22 games for the nl champs.  he moved on to texas where he became a starter and found some success.  this is a 1987 donruss all-stars card of the knuckleballer

who finished his career with stints with the white sox and then the marlins.  this is a 1993 topps finest card of hough with the fish

as are these 1994 bowman

and 1994 topps stadium club cards

that last one being the rainbow foil parallel.

i did a 'torchbearer' post for sutton, so i'll do something similar for these guys.  i won't go into too much detail, but if you're wondering, the last batter rick rhoden faced in the majors was joe oliver (who hit into a double play). oliver doubled off of jorge julio in his last at bat; julio hit jorge cantu with his last pitch, cantu fouled out against rex brothers for his final appearance in the majots, so brothers (who was still pitching for the rockies in 2014) is carrying rhoden's torch.

john, meanwhile, allowed a single to devon white just before walking off the mound for the last time.  white singled off of albie lopez his last time up; lopez gave up a single to torii hunter with his last pitch, and hunter just signed with the twins for the 2015 season, so he'll continue to be tommy john's torchbearer for one more year.

finally, hough's last big league pitch resulted in a single to kim batiste, who later grounded out against darren holmes in his last big league at bat. with his final pitch, holmes gave up a single to marlon byrd, who is signed to play for the phillies once again in 2015.

there you have it. three pitchers from the team of my youth wearing other teams' uniforms and their torhbearers.  can you tell i'm running out of ideas for posts?

target knew i was coming

i bought all three 100-card repacks that were on display at the local target one day last week.  it was like they knew i was coming, with the cards that were featured in the repack windows.  here are the contents of repack number one:

2002 fleer billy wagner - no, that wasn't the card that drew me in
1991 topps 1990 rookies robin ventura - this looks suspiciously like a recent repack i bought
1991 topps 1990 rookies frank thomas
1991 topps 1990 rookies jose offerman - at least now i have a double to send to night owl
1991 topps 1990 rookies todd zeile
1991 topps 1990 rookies john olerud
1989 upper deck yankee checklist (don mattingly)
1991 donruss jose offerman - rated rookie!
1998 pacific paramount david justice
1989 fleer doug jones
1992 upper deck rick wilkins
1991 classic draft picks jorge fabregas
1991 classic best archie corbin
1990 donruss jim dwyer
1998 upper deck nomar garciaparra

it has a dp turn on the back, but here's the front
1990 topps billy spiers
1991 topps mike stanton
1991 classic best tommy taylor
1992 fleer bernie williams
1992 fleer terry pendleton league leaders
1994 upper deck collector's choice greg w. harris

1992 fleer scott radinsky
1988 donruss bob brenly
1990 topps greg gagne
1991 score lance johnson
1988 topps tom henke
1989 fleer richard dotson
2004 donruss classics angel berroa
1988 donruss vance law
1992 topps benny santiago
1989 fleer scott garrelts
1989 score dave righetti
1990 upper deck tim leary
1988 donruss ray knight
1999 upper deck ryan jackson
1990 fleer jack armstrong
1997 donruss studio brian hunter
1988 topps dave winfield all-star
1988 score tom brookens
1999 upper deck neifi perez - another dp turn
1988 score mike scioscia

1991 topps gary sheffield
1990 topps edgar martinez
1988 score chris bando
2009 upper deck first edition andy pettitte
2009 upper deck first edition aaron harang
2009 upper deck first edition chase headley
2009 upper deck first edition jarrod saltalamacchia
2009 upper deck first edition tim hudson
2010 topps todd helton

that was the end of the first half.  nothing there, really.  here's why i bought this thing - the first card in the other window was this 2013 topps chrome asdrubal cabrera orange refractor

a double play turn that is new to my collection!
2013 topps chrome ian kinsler orange refractor

another one that i believe to be a dp, although not the tradition turn at second base.  and, sure enough, in the top of the 6th inning on june 12, 2012, josh bell hit a ground ball to kinsler who tagged aaron hill who had singled and threw to first to complete the 4-3 double play.  thanks baseball reference!
2000 pacific crown royale geoff jenkins

1990 donruss alan trammell
1988 donruss tim wallach - we all know where this card is going
1988 fleer mark mclemore
1999 topps arturo mcdowell/tony torcato draft picks
1990 fleer charlie o'brien
1992 topps eric king
1989 donruss marvin freeman

pretty sure he's standing in dodger stadium, but i scanned the card because it is the most beat up card i've ever found in a repack. nasty.
1989 fleer mark carreon
2008 topps alex gordon year in review
1988 donruss jim eisenreich
1990 topps bert blyleven
1992 score jeff fassero
1992 upper deck terry steinbach
1995 leaf bob hamelin
1990 donruss sergio valdez
2005 donruss leather & lumber rocco baldelli
1986 topps joe carter
1990 bowman gregg olson sweepstakes card
2006 upper deck adam dunn
2005 fleer classic clippings paul konerko
1996 score sid fernandez
2005 fleer mariano rivera

1988 donruss sam horn
1988 donruss lonnie smith
1992 fleer dave winfield
1998 upper deck sp minors jeff liefer
1991 topps kirt manwaring
1992 score mark leiter
2012 topps rex brothers
2012 topps brad peacock
2012 topps jed lowrie
2012 topps gavin floyd
2012 topps alejandro de aza
2012 topps sean marshall
2012 topps ricky nolasco
2012 topps randy wells
2012 topps rex brothers - again!
2012 topps freddie freeman
2011 topps nyjer morgan
2011 topps logan morrison
2011 topps juan miranda
2011 topps kenley jansen
2011 topps drew storen
2011 topps toronto blue jays
2011 topps brad hawpe
2011 topps ronny cedeno
2011 topps bronson arroyo
2004 fleer greats reggie jackson

last but not least.

some of these cards already have homes - my collection or in trade packages - but if there's something you'd like to have (like a thrashed 1989 donruss marvin freeman card), just let me know!