Rolen Elected Into Hall of Fame

1996 Topps #434

1997 Topps #268

1998 Topps #25

1999 Topps #125

2000 Topps #328

2001 Topps #478

2002 Topps #610

2002 Topps #709

On Tuesday evening, and with 76.3% of the votes, Scott Rolen squeaked into the Hall of Fame and will be inducted in Cooperstown on July 23.  It was Rolen's fifth year on the ballot, and he saw a steady ascent since receiving just 10.2% of the votes during his initial year of 2018, when the ballot had been much more crowded.  He's a Hall of Famer on the strength of his combined offensive and defensive output, and his induction hopefully builds the case for Dick Allen, Dale Murphy and eventually Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley.

Rolen was drafted by the Phillies in the 2nd round of the June 1993 amateur player draft, and he'd make his big league debut on August 1, 1996, getting the call after third baseman Todd Zeile was dealt to the Orioles at the trade deadline.  Rolen was the team's opening day third baseman in 1997, ultimately winning the Rookie of the Year in the National League, after batting .283 with 21 home runs and 92 RBIs.  He'd win his first of eight Gold Gloves the following year in 1998.  Rolen was the Phillies' opening day and regular third baseman between 1997 and mid-2002, during some pretty lean years.  Not looking to sign a contract extension, and wanting to play for a winning team, he was dealt to the Cardinals on July 29, 2002 with Doug Nickle and cash for Placido Polanco, Bud Smith and Mike Timlin.

I was disappointed and upset with Rolen when the trade was announced, and I've since gotten over that.

In his seven seasons with the club, he appeared in 884 games, nearly 200 more than he appeared with the Cardinals.  Rolen batted .282 with 150 home runs and 559 RBIs with the Phillies, again surpassing his totals with the Cardinals.  He's not yet decided which hat his plaque will show when he's inducted, and while a Cardinals hat probably makes the most sense, I'm hoping he wears a Phillies hat.  Rolen also seems a natural candidate to be the team's Wall of Fame Inductee in 2023, but no official announcement has been made.

2002 Topps Phillies Team Set

#662 Phillies Team

#294 Larry Bowa MG

#359 Phillies Team UWS

#709 Scott Rolen GG

#13 Bob Abreu

#524 Terry Adams

#269 Marlon Anderson

#83 Ricky Bottalico

#545 Pat Burrell

#155 Omar Daal

#578 Brandon Duckworth

#577 Doug Glanville

#594 Ricky Ledee

#199 Travis Lee

#367 Mike Lieberthal

#184 Jose Mesa

#394 Robert Person

#610 Scott Rolen

#164 Jimmy Rollins

#557 Turk Wendell

#221 Randy Wolf

#675 Taylor Buchholz PROS

#311 Marlon Byrd PROS

#680 Nate Espy PROS

Traded & Rookies

#T77 Jeremy Giambi

#T83 Vicente Padilla

#T16 Dan Plesac

#T62 Placido Polanco

#T31 Mike Timlin

#T228 Ezequiel Astacio PROS

#T166 Carlos Cabrera PROS

#T259 Travis Chapman PROS

#T189 Josh Cisneros PROS

#T130 Gavin Floyd PROS

#T124 Michael Floyd PROS

#T122 Mark Outlaw PROS

#T235 Jorge Padilla PROS

#T136 Elio Serrano PROS

#T126 Pete Zamora PROS

#T271 Curt Schilling WWHT

2001 Topps Phillies Team Set / 2003 Topps Phillies Team Set

Game 31 - 2020 Topps Archives #253 Aaron Nola

Phillies 6, Nationals 0
Game 31 - Tuesday Night, September 1st in Philadelphia
Record - 16-15, Tied for 2nd Place, 3 games behind the Braves

One Sentence Summary:  Aaron Nola pitched a gem and the Phillies offense kept pace in this 6-0 win over the last place Nationals.

What It Means:  For the first time this season, the Phillies have a winning record.  And they're now on the other side of the mathematical second half of this bizarre, shortened season.

What Happened:  Nola improved to 4-2, allowing 2 hits, 3 walks and striking out 9 over his 8 innings of work.  Hector Neris allowed a few base runners in the ninth but was able to preserve the shutout.  Alec Bohm drove in a pair of runs, hitting his first Citizens Bank Park home run in the fifth and then doubling home Didi Gregorius in the sixth.  Andrew McCutchen wrapped up the scoring with a three-run blast to left in the sixth, his 5th home run of the season.

Featured Card:  Nola gets the nod again here over Bohm and McCutchen, as he made it look easy against a confused Nationals line-up.

Transaction:  David Phelps (rhp), acquired from the Brewers on Monday, was added to the active roster and Adam Morgan (lhp) was placed on the injured list with shoulder fatigue.

2020 Virtual Phillies Wall / 2020 Season Summary Index / 2020 Chachi Set Checklist

2002 Topps #359 United We Stand: Braves-Phillies

This post was originally published in February 2013.

I went back through my 2001 and 2002 Topps sets while putting together the recently published 2001 Topps Phillies post and the (hopefully) soon to be published 2002 Topps Phillies post.  In my opinion, one of the best subsets Topps has ever included within its flagship set is the 8-card "America: United We Stand" subset featuring iconic images from the first baseball games following the September 11th terrorist attacks.

Found in series one of the 2002 Topps set, the cards served as a poignant reminder of how much baseball meant to our country (and selfishly me) following the attacks.  I didn't remember this until looking up the set's entry at BaseballCardPedia.com, but the cards were in packs of series one as early as November 2001.

Members of the 2001 Phillies team are featured on card #359, standing solemnly along the first base line at Veterans Stadium, listening to the National Anthem prior to their game against the Braves on September 17th.  A few years ago, when scanning the card for an old post, I really started to look at the players featured on the card and I realized they had probably never been properly identified.  There are 11 Phillies players featured in profile on the card - some of which who would never have a proper Topps card or a proper Phillies baseball card.

Using the team's 2002 Media Guide and 2001 transactions listing, I pieced together the active Phillies roster as of September 17, 2001.  With the recent roster expansions, the Phillies were carrying 32 active players with two more players on the disabled list.  I tried to find video of the pre-game ceremony on-line, to no avail.  So based on my recollection of the team at the time, I think the players featured on the card are as follows, from left to right:

1.  Eddie Oropesa
2.  P.J. Forbes (not Nick Punto as originally believed - see update below)
3.  David Coggin
4.  Doug Nickle - I wasn't sure about this one, but according to Baseball Reference, Nickle's height is 6'4", the same height as Coggin who is standing next to him.
5.  Turk Wendell (not Jose Santiago as originally believed - see update below)
6.  Felipe Crespo - Crespo was acquired from the Giants in late July.
7.  Randy Wolf - I remember Wolf dyed his hair a garish blonde for some inexplicable reason during the summer of 2001.
8.  Brian L. Hunter
9.  Eric Valent
10.  Rheal Cormier
11.  Perhaps Jimmy Rollins?  This one is just too hard to tell.  (UPDATE - I'm going with Steve F. in thinking that this is actually Bobby Abreu.)

Granted, the identification of these players is something that might only be interesting to me but I'm glad I can now (mostly) identify the Phillies featured on one of the more meaningful baseball cards Topps has ever produced.

UPDATE (9/11/15) - Back in April, I received an e-mail from former Phillies pitcher Doug Nickle who confirmed it was indeed him in the photo standing next to David Coggin.  Doug was kind enough to point out that the players to either side of him are P.J. Forbes (and not Nick Punto) and Turk Wendell (not Jose Santiago).  According to the team's 2002 Media Guide, Forbes had his contract purchased from Scranton on September 17th, prior to the this game.  I've updated the listing above to reflect this information.

Thanks again Doug for the e-mail and I'm happy there's now an official record of the Phillies appearing on this important baseball card.