4 reasons to celebrate today

April 15th is designated as Jackie Robinson Day - the day baseball changed forever and is forever grateful for the courage, sportsmanship and athletic ability of # 42. The barriers of color were removed from the major leagues in 1947 and we do celebrate that !

Twenty five years later another barrier was broken - that of facial hair with Reggie Jackson appearing in a game on this date in 1972 with a mustache. Nowhere equal in its significance as Jackie Robinson but certainly worth celebrating.

Here are my latest mustache finds . . . thanks to Reggie.


April 15th also marks "tax day" - a reason to celebrate if you know any or are an accountant (I am not but do have friends that celebrate the end today)

And lastly today, April 15th, we celebrate a birthday; Woodie Fryman. A two time all-star (1968, 1976) Fryman played for 18 seasons; most notably with the Pirates, Phillies, Tigers and Expos. A career record of 141-155 with 1587 strikeouts, Fryman had a very solid career.
Fryman also played one season with the Chicago Cubs, 1978, going 2 - 4 and appearing in only 13 games. Fryman had four one hitters in his career and is my fourth reason to celebrate today.

April 15th . . . a day to celebrate for many reasons.

more from the show

this being my second (and last) post "showing off" my finds at the card show this past Saturday I want to remind everyone that I did remember my promise to stick to my budget etc . . . and most of my "to do" promises for the wife . . .

For starters, I did pick up several 1970 Topps cards (mostly mid-high numbers) in addition to the ever elusive Al Oliver # 166 (gold trophy topps all-star rookie card). Since I am chronicling this set card by card I will not post any scans . . . yet. I am now at 683 of 720 or 95 % complete; soon I will have to splurge on the Reggie Jackson (#140), Henry Aaron (#500) and the Nolan Ryan (#712). Those are my only missing big ticket cards. Getting closer I am . . .

At the last show I went to I was introduced to the 1995 Flair set with my the one only card, Sammy Sosa #334 - I really like this card / set and added them to my "look for" list. I found a small handful, actually 13 of these heavy card stock cards, in a bargain basket.

These three show off the fronts of my new favorite "modern" set. I really like the horizontal look, double photo, and scripted initials of the players (the scans may not be so clear for that ). Finding a future HOF'er (possibly two in Larkin and Johnson) as well as a Mark Grace was nice.

I also scanned a back for you to see. The backs show a third (different) photo of each player, is the traditional up/down orientation but only shows five or six years of stats (the only down side to these cards). I liked this Ryan Klesko photo . . . each hand holding a batting glove as he seems to be leading off of first base.

I also could not pass up on a few (actually found five) Ken Griffey Jr cards . . .

including two 1991's for my daughters binder and one for me with Griffey Sr and his two sons.

My real "splurge" came from the 1976 Topps set . . . The Sporting News All-Time All Stars !

This small (10 card) sub-set is a real classic. I added these three cards to bring me only one short of completion (missing Babe Ruth # 345). Who can resist these classic black and white photos of when baseball was so different.

I also picked up a few random Cubs cards to fill some gaps; including these two; a 1968 Lee Elia # 561, though more famous for his managerial days / tirade he did appear as a pinch hitting infielder for the Cubs (though appeared in only 15 games) and a 1968 NL Pitching Leaders #5 with Fergie Jenkins.

And I could not pass up three great mustache cards !

So, all in all, I kept all (most) of my promises, had a blast looking around, added cards to several parts of my collection and now Opening Day is here !

Thanks for allowing me to share my limited yet fun additions.