pee wee's patch

harold henry "pee wee" reese passed away on august 14, 1999 at the age of 81.  the dodgers quickly added a memorial patch to their uniforms, to be worn for the remainder of the season.  the patch, seen below

included the nickname "pee wee" and his retired jersey number, 1.

because it was relatively late in the season, examples of the patch on 2000 cards are fairly limited.  here's a 2000 upper deck mvp eric gagne card that shows the patch

it was placed on the left sleeve, above the dodger heroes patch worn by each player.  pee wee was included in the hero patch series, but i do not have a card of mark grudzielanek (who wore the reese hero patch) showing both patches.

this 2000 upper deck victory jeff shaw card

gives us another look at the memorial patch, including a close-up in the inset photo.

the patch is also visible on adrian beltre's 2000 fleer focus card

and the only other card i have that shows the patch is this 2000 pacific dodgers diamond leaders card

there's grudzielanek, but it's eric karros who is displaying the patch.  if only this getty images photo of chan ho park had found its way onto a card...

for the record, i have both the gagne and the diamond leaders card in my memorials binder.  i couldn't choose between the two, so they are both in there.

here are a couple of cards of pee wee himself, a 1992 ziploc card, 

and a 2003 mlb showdown 

i believe that this card is a promo, based on the foil stamp and the 'p51' numbering.  there's another version in the regular showdown set that lack the foil and is numbered 119.  kudos, by the way, to ziploc for using the older dodger logo on reese's card, although they coupled that brooklyn dodger logo with a photo of reese wearing a los angeles dodger cap.  sigh.

reese was the captain of the dodger teams of the 1950's, but he made his debut in 1940.  the following season, he became the dodgers' regular shortstop, and he helped the club win the pennant for the first time since 1920.  that marked the first of seven world series in which reese would play over the course of his career.  the dodgers faced the yankees in all of them, and won only the 1955 contest.

reese moved west with the dodgers in 1958, and was the starting shortstop for the los angeles dodgers' first game.  he played in only 58 more games that year, however, in what would be his last big league season.  reese was a 10-time all-star with 8 top ten mvp finishes over his 16-year career that spanned 19 years (3 seasons were lost to military service during world war ii).  he finished with 2170 hits and 1210 walks for an on-base percentage of .366.  although he later lamented the number of bases on balls he took ("if i had my career to play over, one thing i'd do differently is swing more. those 1200 walks i got…nobody remembers them."), his 1210 walks were within the top 15 career leaders at the time of his retirement and greatly contributed to his having scored as many runs as he did (1338) during his career. in 1984, reese was inducted into the hall of fame, and the dodgers retired his jersey as they do for their hall of fame players.

in the year 2000

i used to watch conan every once in a while, and i recall the first time i saw his 'in the year 2000' bit.  it was in late 1999 and he predicted that in the year 2000, zombies would feast on human flesh and when they got hungry later, they would go to olive garden.  i found that to be quite funny.

this post has nothing to do with conan or his skits, however.  instead, i give to you a few cards that were produced in the final year of the 20th century.

2000 fleer focus jeff shaw

on which we clearly see the don drysdale hero patch.  i think of cards from this set as fleer's knockoff of 1981 topps.  oddly enough, upper deck would bring the cap design element back to cards in 2006 under the fleer banner.

2000 topps jeff shaw

the first topps gray border set since 1970.  it was a nice break from two years of gold borders.

speaking of gold, 2000 upper deck gold reserve kevin brown

aside from the full bleed, there were some similarities between the topps card design and the upper deck card design in the year 2000.

2000 upper deck sp authentic

there were a heckuva lot of kevin brown cards in the year 2000.

2000 pacific angel pena

pena is wearing the roy campanella patch, as any catcher should.  note that paul loduca wore the mike scioscia patch.

2000 pacific paramount devon white

yes, devon white was a dodger in the year 2000.  and in 1999 as well, when he wore the jackie robinson patch.  here's the back of his 2000 topps stadium club card

looks like devo played his best at dodger stadium.  he finished his career with 34 leadoff home runs, including one hit for the dodgers in the year 2000.

2000 skybox dominion adrian beltre

beltre was 21 in the year 2000, and he hit 20 home runs for the first time.  he's about to turn 35 and is about 600 hits shy of 3000.  i wonder if he will make it.

i really liked that skybox dominion set when it came out, but my favorite set of the year 2000 was the fleer greats of the game release.  fleer had put out the first gotg set in 1999 as a sports illustrated fueled set, complete with an autographed card in every pack.  that was cool, but i really liked the look and feel of the 2000 set over the gloss of the 1999 set.

here are a few of the dodgers from the set - tommy john

al lopez

preacher roe

and fernando valenzuela

the set featured on card autos, too.  not of fernando, unfortunately.  had there been one, it might well have been my favorite card of the year 2000.

the danny thompson memorial armband

danny thompson was drafted by the reds, yankees, and senators before finally signing after being taken by the twins in the first round of the 1968 june draft.  by 1972, he had earned the starting shortstop job for the twinkies.  here's his 1975 o-pee-chee card

following that season, in which he hit .276 in 144 games and even garnered some mvp votes, thompson was diagnosed with leukemia.  doctors estimated that thompson had 5 more years of being able to play baseball before the disease affected him.  he returned to the twins in 1973 and was later traded to the rangers during the 1976 season in the bert blyleven deal.

he finished the season with the rangers, hitting .214 in 64 games.  a couple of months after the season ended, thompson passed away at the mayo clinic in rochester, minnesota due to complications from his disease.  he was only 29 years old.

the following season, the rangers wore a black armband with thompson's number 4 on their left sleeves.  you can see it on adrian devine's 1978 topps card

but the card in my memorials collection is mike hargrove's 1978 o-pee-chee issue

the twins did not wear a memorial for thompson, but his former teammate harmon killebrew organized a fundraising golf tournament in his memory that still operates today - the danny thompson memorial golf tournament (now known as the killebrew-thompson memorial golf tournament) which has raised millions of dollars for cancer research since its inception.

turning two for tuesday

here are a few more double play cards i have picked up in the past few months.  these came mostly by way of browsing comc, the lcs nickel boxes, and maybe even some help from folks like jeff at 2x3 heroes.

let's start with a nice diamond cut 1982 fleer rich dauer, featuring carlton fisk sliding in

sticking with fleer, here is a 1985 glenn hubbard, with dodger mike marshall sliding in

and another 1985 fleer card - ron oester - with no one visibly sliding in

i am not one to do such things, but if there were a 'comeback card of the year' post or contest somewhere, i would vote for that hubbard card given the weirdness that his 1984 fleer card presented.  

here's a 1998 fleer tradition fernando vina card

and his brew crew teammate jose valentin on a 1998 pacific card

also from pacific in 1998 comes this scott spiezio online red parallel release

the a's had a ton of double play cards in the late '90's thanks to spiezio, brent gates, and this next guy, miguel tejada

that's a 2000 fleer focus.  and this is a 2000 fleer ultra gold medallion edition

obviously, tejada is not doing the dp turning there.  instead, nomar is doing the work.  just like on this 2000 fleer tradition card

with bonus (sort of) double play action on the back

nomar's 2003 fleer mystique card also shows him making the turn, or at least prepping for the throw to start the double play.

based on where his right foot is, i am pretty certain the intent there is to turn two, and not just get a force at second.

back to more traditional double play turning with cesar izturis' 2009 upper deck card

and jhonny peralta's 2011 topps card

hooray for double play cards!

bo knows that double play cards are this collector's choice

here's a trade and double play card post for you to read while you're waiting to be seated for brunch with your mom.  happy mother's day.

bo from baseball cards come to life sent me a healthy package of double play cards a while back.  there were quite a few from 1995 upper deck collector's choice.  let's have a look.

pat kelly

kelly's dp card to card ratio may be as high as kurt stillwell's.

royce clayton

and dp combo partner robby thompson

looks like thompson got the worse of the two with david hollins' helmet in his thigh.

jose lind

stands his ground

jeff frye

elevates

and noberto martin

is flyin'.

here's luis sojo with a force out toss

but the good stuff is on the back

how he managed to turn two with his back to first base is a mystery to all.

the back is nice on kurt abbott's card, too

thanks to the dodger stadium locale, but the front is what gets it into the double play binder

1995 udcc wasn't the only card release that bo included in his package.  not by a long shot.  here's a 1995 score select carlos baerga card with a nice play at second on the front

and a dp turn on the back

this 1995 score roberto alomar

is a nice 'tattooine' shot - nothing but dirt to be seen

here's a 2000 fleer focus marlon anderson

(he who hit the fourth home run in the dodgers' 4+1 game against the padres in 2006)

and a 2001 fleer focus ray durham card

last, but not least, for this post is a 2001 fleer premium warren morris card

and that's not the half of what bo sent.  thanks bo!