EXPANDED LEAGUE LEADERS: 1974 A.L. STOLEN BASES

On the blog today, we have the next "expanded league leader" card in my on-going thread, this one the 1974 card for the American League stolen base leaders of 1973:

 

We start off with Tommy Harper, who took home his second stolen base crown, now as a member of the Boston Red Sox, with his 54 steals.

Back in 1969 he also led the American League in steals while a member of the one-year Seattle Pilots, with 73.

Harper would finish his 15-year career in 1976 with 408 stolen bases overall, with a 30-30 season in 1970 as a Milwaukee Brewer when he hit 31 homers while stealing 38 bases.

Just one stolen base behind him with 53 is the Oakland A's speedster Billy North, who played his first full season in the Majors in 1973 and didn't disappoint, hitting .285 with those 53 steals, scoring 98 runs while collecting 158 hits.

He would go on to lead the league in steals two time over the next three years, with a high of 75 in 1976, finishing with 395 stolen bases for his career by the time he'd hang them up in 1981.

In third place with 43 steals is the Texas Rangers' Dave Nelson, who also finished in third the previous year.

After swiping 51 bases in 1972 he put in what was his best year as a Big Leaguer, hitting .286 with 165 hits and 71 runs scored, with 24 doubles, four triples and seven homers, all career bests aside from the triples.

So there you go!

The top three stolen base players for the Junior Circuit of 1973!

 

EXPANDED YEARLY LEADER CARDS: 1973 A.L. STOLEN BASES

Rolling along in my on-going "expanded league leaders" card series, we move on to the 1972 American League stolen base leaders:

 

We begging with the top base thief in the Junior Circuit, Oakland A's speedster Bert Campaneris, who led the league with his 52 stolen bases, the sixth and final time during his career he would take that crown.

"Campy" would end his 19-year Big League career with 649 steals, topping 50+ steals seven times, with a high of 62 in both 1968 and 1969.

Next up in the stolen base race, falling just one short of the lead is Dave Nelson of the Texas Rangers, whose 51 steals were easily his career-high.

Nelson played the first full season of his career in 1972, the first in Texas for the relocated Rangers (formerly Washington Senators), and though he'd hit only .226 he made it count, also walking 67 times.

He would steal 43 bases the following season while hitting a career-high .286, making his only All-Star team, but would be out of baseball by 1977 after to abbreviated seasons with the Kansas City Royals.

Speaking of the Royals, the third place finisher in stolen bases that year would be Freddie Patek, who swiped 33 bases after stealing 49 the year before.

Patek would eventually be a league-leader himself in 1977, stealing a career-best 53 to help Kansas City come in first in the West, while finishing up his career with 385 between 1968 and 1981.

There it is folks! The top three stolen base leaders in the American league during the 1972 season, shown in all their glory on an expanded 1973 league-leader card.

Hope you're enjoying this so far!

MISSING IN ACTION- 1977 DAVE NELSON

Here’s a “missing” 1977 card for speedster Dave Nelson, who appeared in 78 games for the A.L. West Champion Kansas City Royals in 1976 but didn’t get a card the following year:

Nelson batted .235 for the Royals over those 78 games, with 36 hits in 153 at-bats along with 24 runs and 15 stolen bases.
It was his first season in Kansas City after a decent six-year run with the Washington Senators/Texas Rangers from 1970-1975.
His best season was easily 1973 when he was named to the A.L. all-star team, as he batted .286 with 43 stolen bases and 71 runs scored.
After just over a couple-dozen games in 1977 Nelson found himself out of the Majors for good, finishing up with a .244 career average and 630 hits with 187 steals over his 10-year career.

ANOTHER AIRBRUSHING CLASSIC: 1976 TOPPS DAVE NELSON

Just wanted to spotlight another airbrushing gem from the 1970’s, the 1976 Topps card for former speedster Dave Nelson, then of the Kansas City Royals:

Man, the work on the uniform is actually really well done, but then you take a gander at that cap and wonder why Topps even bothered doing this.
How do you all feel about the following: would it have been better of Topps just used a photo of the player in his uniform with his prior team, and just went and had the card call out his NEW team?
In other words: why not just have a Royals card with a photo of Nelson still in his Texas Rangers uniform?
I honestly don’t know what I’d prefer, but it could have been a cool way for young kids like myself to see right off the bat the players that changed teams in the off-season.
What do you all think? Topps did the right thing with the airbrushing? Or should they have just used an existing photo and show the “new” team?
Curious to see what everyone feels about this...

(NOT) MISSING IN ACTION- 1976 DAVE NELSON: "1976 PROJECT"

OK, so Dave Nelson wasn't exactly "missing" from the 1976 set, but as I was creating this card for "Reader Jim" in our ongoing "1976 Project", I like it so much I wanted to post it here on the blog:

Although correctly shown as a Kansas City Royals player for the upcoming 1976 season in the set, both Jim and I see a card set as representative of the year before, sort of a "yearbook" of the previous season.

With that, we go and re-do some cards to show the player with the team he contributed to in 1975.

Hence the Nelson card you see here, which came out nicely if I may say so.

Nelson wrapped up his sixth and final season for the franchise before moving on to the Royals for the last two years of his 10-year career.

A speedster, he topped 50 stolen bases in 1972 and 40 stolen bases in 1973 before playing sporadically the final four years of his Major League career.

All told, he posted a .244 career average with 187 steals and 340 runs scored.

He also collected 630 hits over 2578 at-bats, with 77 of them doubles and 19 of them triples.