McPhee, a second baseman, was the Twins' 5th Round pick out of Northeastern University in the June, 1965 draft. (The next player taken was Amos Otis, by the Red Sox.) He had a poor half-season for St. Cloud in the Northern League (A) in 1965, but in 1966, he starred with Wisconsin Rapids in the Midwest League, hitting .305, slugging .524 on 20 HR and (according to
this biography of McPhee; Baseball Reference's stats are incomplete) leading the league in RBI and being named the MVP.
That brought him to Twins camp in 1967, and if the Topps photographer wasn't too sure of McPhee's future with the Twins (who had this rookie 2B named Rod Carew who was breaking in that year, after all), he at least thought McPhee worthy of a "BHNH" picture, possibly for some later "Rookie" card:
(Edit: Okay, so he took a regular pic, too. It just took me a while to find it.)
(Image "clean-up" courtesy of John [Baseball-Birthdays]. [Edit: on the first picture. The second one is all me, for better or worse.])
The Twins sent McPhee to play for the Wilson Tobs of the Carolina League. Probably confused as to what a "Tob" was, McPhee struggled, putting up a mediocre .619 OPS, and was released.
But while this was the end of McPhee's pro career, it was not the end of his baseball career. He went back to Northeastern, got his degree in 1968, his Masters in 1977, and, since 1986, McPhee has been the Huskies' head coach, guiding the college careers of such players as Carlos Pena and Adam Ottavino.
