Gambo and T_Wil1 Photopack

[Cusick]

Originally Posted by Merkle923

His position was irrelevant. The Giants obtained him because he was the best sign-stealer in baseball and they were about to activate the binoculars-and-buzzers system which won them the 1951 pennant.

PS - Schenz went to the Giants on June 30. Between that date and July 14th he appeared six times as a pinch-runner. In the remaining two-and-a-half months of the season he appeared in exactly two games, both as a pinch-runner - and both on the road.

I'd like to make two points here:

1. The original posting of the photo indicated that Hank Schenz was a journeyman catcher. I was simply trying to indicate that to anyone not familiar with Schenz, he was not a catcher. He played more than 150 games in the majors as an infielder. Merkle, you've made your point that with the 1951 Giants, Schenz was used strictly as a pinch runner and as a sign-stealer as part of the team's cheating scheme, and I accept that.

2. I'm not so sure that the Giants acquired him because of his sign-stealing ability. According to a SABR article which goes into an in-depth analysis of the 1951 Giants' sign-stealing activity, Schenz was the one who volunteered to Durocher the information that he had the ability and experience to use a telescope to pick up the opponent catchers' signs and interpret them. This conversation between Schenz and Durocher took place after Hank was already with the Giants. Durocher was intrigued by the idea, and the spying began after that. The article to which I'm referring may be seen at Durocher the Spymaster: How much did the Giants prosper from cheating in 1951? | SABR

[rico43]

Schenz was a major figure in Joshua Prager's incredibly detailed book about the sign-stealing efforts of the Giants, The Echoing Green. Bill Meyeer, his manager at Pittsburgh, said Schenz "could do everything but play regular." He notoriously filed his spikes razor sharp, but seldom a chance to employ them.
Joe Garagiola wrote Schenz, the Giants' foremost bench jockey, "was the best one I ever saw." But he was also a minor league star, named MVP of the Texas League in 1946. Called up to the big leagues by the Cubs, he often found himself in the Wrigley Field scoreboard using his own personal Wollensak telescope to steal signs. He had been a Giant for less than a month when he informed Leo Durocher of his previous experience. It was his telescope that Herman Franks was (allegedly) using when Bobby Thomson hit the Shot Heard 'Round the World.

[Merkle923]

By request. This is one of mine, so, feel free.

[bobb49]

My bad boys..Sorry about calling him a "catcher".....That is why I love this site...there are sufficient bright guys available to catch most of my errors....I obviously had another senior moment....for all of you out there...this will happen to you as well eventually. Regardless of his position...for me he was a hard photo to find as all I had previously were cut from team photos. So this was exciting to me.

[Merkle923]

This might be my favorite obscure player of the 1960's, for the simple reason that when the Yankees announced they were bringing him up to start their game at Minnesota on July 5, 1967, the entire concept of "bringing him up" was new to me.

I was an eight-year old Yankee fan so new to the sport that when the family had gone on vacation to see the Hall of Fame the year before, I was bored beyond belief and remember nothing of the visit (not that the Hall is that exciting today, but still). So the idea that you could add players from some other league was almost impossible for me to conceive, and my assumption was that to make the majors, Perkins must've been a pitcher at least as good as the stories I heard of Whitey Ford or Red Ruffing.

Not quite.

On July 5, New York gave him a 3-1 lead going into the bottom of the second inning, but then Rich Reese hit a three-run homer and when the Yankees pinch-hit for Perkins in the top of the 4th inning, his major league starting career was over. He would make one more relief appearance, would never pitch at Yankee Stadium, and within a year his pro career (697 strikeouts, 405 walks, in 695 innings) would be over.

Meanwhile, fueled by his inclusion in a revised edition of the Yankees' yearbook I awaited a Cecil Perkins baseball card and was genuinely surprised not to find him on the "Yankees Rookies" in the 7th Series of the Topps set.

Perkins finally got his card in TCMA's 1981 second series of players from the 1960's - and he was misidentified as another ill-fated Yankee pitching prospect of the era, Rich Beck (just as the Beck card actually shows Perkins). There is a later Yankees/WIZ card of Perkins, but it uses the same team publicity photo that they stuck in the yearbook in '67. And just to make it a little worse, a fan photo of Perkins in the Yankee Stadium bullpen turned up in 2012...and his back was to the camera.

So imagine my delight when the aforementioned collection produced not one but two photo shoots with Perkins. There's a 1968 set in home pinstripes, clearly the session from which the TCMA card was produced. But there's also one in road grays from 1967, the best of which I publish here:

[Merkle923]

Never seen him before in the '72 softball shirts:

[Merkle923]

Another possible new-in-this-uniform list. Well-traveled outfielder spent the first half of 1979 with the Cubs.

Next search here is Mejias with the Brewers, whose opening day roster he was on in 1975, though he never played a game for them.

[Merkle923]

The poster boy for good-field/no-hit infielders of the '70s played for three big league clubs in his brief career, but was owned by four others and shows up in all sorts of uniforms that don't match his career dossier.

One of them was the 1980 Giants, with whom he spent exactly three Spring Training weeks (evidently wearing an enormous cap later assigned to Bruce Bochy):

[cheech411]

[Terry D]

Tim Drummond was a right-handed reliever of the late 1980s. He had 12 saves at AA Prince William in the Pirates chain in 1986 and 10 saves and a 2.97 ERA in the PCL in 1987, so the Pirates gave him 5 major league innings that year (4.50 ERA). Drummond was not really a terribly good prospect, so the Pirates sent him and Mackey Sasser on to the Mets for Randy Milligan. The Mets, in turn, sent him on to the Twins in 1989 as part of the Frank Viola--Rick Aguilera trade. The Twins gave Drummond a couple more cups in 89-90, and then that was it. Drummond made a couple of card sets with the Twins, but I had never seen him with the Pirates until I found a 1987 yearbook for sale online. Here he is.

[FatJack]

Sad to say, Gus Gil passed away on December 8. Gus was an original member of the Seattle Pilots (thus my interest), but he was also responsible for getting Cesar Tovar signed. The Reds wanted Gil badly and Gil said he wouldn't sign unless they also signed his friend (Tovar). Gil later admitted that he was bluffing, but Tovar ended up having the better major league career anyway.

Gil debuted in the majors with the Indians in 1967 (their second baseman and shortstop positions in 1966 combining for 23 errors). Gil had a nice day at the plate in his first game--a hit, a walk, and 2 runs scored--but it was all downhill from there. To the Cleveland fans, he came to symbolize everything that was wrong with the team and they couldn't wait to see him shuffled off to Seattle. He played his final season in Mexico in 1976 and then was a minor league manager for a number of teams, and eventually a Brewers scout. Gus was inducted into the Venezuelan Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008.

[Merkle923]

If the threshold for Hall of Fame eligibility were five years rather than ten, Mack Jones would be a fringe candidate for Cooperstown. He had three seasons with a WAR of 3.7 or better, cleared an .800 OPS four times (ending his career at .790), and one year he fell exactly one homer shy of finishing in a three-way tie for his team's lead in homers (the two guys who beat him by one blast were named Aaron and Mathews).

But he was denigrated in his time because he was essentially a platoon bat against righties (today we'd call him a multi-millionaire) who didn't have an exceptional throwing arm and was almost literally an average outfielder. It was so bad that after one punchless season in Cincinnati during The Year of The Pitcher, the Reds made him available in the expansion draft just as he turned 30.

All of which is a long way of introducing the first good shot I've seen of Jones in a Reds' uniform. I believe there's a Brace image of him, and there's a nice but tiny and grainy shot on his Kahn's Hot Dogs 1968 card, but nothing to compare to this:

[keonleafs]

Originally Posted by Merkle923

If the threshold for Hall of Fame eligibility were five years rather than ten, Mack Jones would be a fringe candidate for Cooperstown. He had three seasons with a WAR of 3.7 or better, cleared an .800 OPS four times (ending his career at .790), and one year he fell exactly one homer shy of finishing in a three-way tie for his team's lead in homers (the two guys who beat him by one blast were named Aaron and Mathews).

But he was denigrated in his time because he was essentially a platoon bat against righties (today we'd call him a multi-millionaire) who didn't have an exceptional throwing arm and was almost literally an average outfielder. It was so bad that after one punchless season in Cincinnati during The Year of The Pitcher, the Reds made him available in the expansion draft just as he turned 30.

All of which is a long way of introducing the first good shot I've seen of Jones in a Reds' uniform. I believe there's a Brace image of him, and there's a nice but tiny and grainy shot on his Kahn's Hot Dogs 1968 card, but nothing to compare to this:

Thanks for this great photo (and all the others, by the way), of Mack, our Expos's Mayor of Jonesville (Jarry Park's left field).

[Merkle923]

Here's another well-traveled quality outfielder of the '60s who played for one more team than he was widely photographed with.

Davalillo went from Cleveland to the Angels in June, 1968 and then from the Angels to St. Louis in May, 1969. Topps never got him with California and Brace only offered one shot of him, and it was blurred. This isn't as good as a nice portrait but it's A1 for a 1969 color action photo!

At 5'7" and not being able to crack the majors until he was 26, Davalillo is largely remembered as a pinch-hitter on four World Series teams. Before all that he actually produced three .300 seasons and three years of a 3.0 WAR or better.

PS 'the collection' actually included at least one set of game action images of an umpire - they're posted in that thread

[rico43]

One game, one inning. That was Mike Mendoza's entire major league career, with the 1979 Houston Astros. To date, no one (around here, at least) has come up with a color photo of the big right-hander with the Astros. A colorized head shot was used in a custom card set we've seen, but this up close and personal shot is definitely Mendoza -- who never pitched for the Mariners, majors or minors.
Now a successful realtor, his bio page indicates he retired from baseball in 1983. He had a decent season in the Mexican League in '82 (9-10, 2.72), so this figures to be a spring shot in either season. He was in camp with the Astros from 1974-80, with the Mets in '81.

[Merkle923]

His non-roster year with Seattle was 1983.

A simple google search produced this from United Press International, 3/2/83:

"The Mariners also announced they have invited pitcher Mike Mendoza to camp.

"Mendoza, who pitched in the Houston and New York Mets organizations, spent last summer with the Yucatan Leones of the Mexican League, where he compiled a 9-10 record with a 2.72 ERA and one save.

"He came to the Mariners on the recommendation of former coach Cananea Reyes, who managed the Coatzacoalcos team in the Mexican League last year."

[FatJack]

Butch Metzger with the Mets from 1978. Someone kindly shared a capless Butch a while back from one of those Mets photo giveaways, but here is in with a cap courtesy of the Vault. He came to New York on waivers at the beginning of the season (so no Spring Training shots) and was sold to Philly in July.

Butch didn't pitch for the Phillies in the majors, but we get one of those, as well.

[Merkle923]

Better still, they also posted him with the team with which he broke in with 10 appearances in 1974 - the Giants.

These would be the first publicly available color images of him with San Francisco.

[Merkle923]

Somebody was looking for some clean images of this former outfielder with Detroit - and up he pops.

These seem to match the photo of Meyer on a '75 rookie card, which dates them to Shea Stadium, September 1974. The Mariners image is clearly from their first year, 1977, at Yankee Stadium...aaaaaaand he didn't straighten his cap first.

[hobbs11]

Originally Posted by Merkle923

Somebody was looking for some clean images of this former outfielder with Detroit - and up he pops.

These seem to match the photo of Meyer on a '75 rookie card, which dates them to Shea Stadium, September 1974. The Mariners image is clearly from their first year, 1977, at Yankee Stadium...aaaaaaand he didn't straighten his cap first.

That was probably me. I think way back when, you were kind enough to share a scan of the sheet from the 1977 Topps template that had "alternate" card images for Meyer as a Tiger, Dave Duncan as an Oriole, Wayne Garland, and others.

http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...ml#post3769273