Thursday, November 11, 2010

1980 TCMA Baseball All-Time Tigers #5, Al Kaline

Congratulations to 2010's Gold Glove winners, among them 10-timer Ichiro Suzuki. He joins an exclusive double-digit club that includes former teammate Ken Griffey, Jr. and active White Sock Omar Vizquel. (Full list at Baseball-Reference.com, naturally.)

Card front

Ichiro and "A.L." Kaline serve as the junior circuit's only 10-time outfield Gold Glove winners. They both split time between CF and RF, where the "real" glove men play. (Barry Bonds remains the top winner in left, with 8.) Suzuki seems likely to break this record, but can't hope to match Al's career slugging numbers.

Note than Kaline played prior to the award's creation and won its only combined ML award (1957), so could've had more. Hard to say who would've taken it back in the 30s and 40s. Any opinions?

Card back

As with other TCMA All-Time sets, the Tigers get a manager, 3 pitchers, and 8 position players for 12 total. Here's the full checklist.
  1. George Kell
  2. Billy Rogell
  3. Ty Cobb
  4. Hank Greenberg
  5. Al Kaline
  6. Charlie Gehringer
  7. Harry Heilmann
  8. Hal Newhouser
  9. Steve O'Neill (MGR)
  10. Denny McLain
  11. Mickey Cochrane
  12. John Hiller

Value: Didn't find many of the cards at CheckOutMyCards.com, but what they had is under $1. Kaline and the other HOFers might cost a few dollars.

Fakes / reprints: Haven't seen any in the market.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I have this set in excellent condition. Where could I sell it?

Matthew Glidden said...

Roger, eBay is your best bet, with Amazon a possible option. The caveat is that cards this recent (and as collectible cards go, 1980 is "recent"), a full set sells for $5-10 and might take patience before you find a buyer. Hope that helps to know.