Generations.

       Forty-five years ago today, Ken Griffey, Jr. was born in Donora PA. 


As most folks my age are wont to do, I got suckered in to loving Junior early and that adoration never really went away.  All through the early and mid 90's, my Mets really sucked and didn't have many players worth rooting for, so Griffey was an out-of-town escape from my hometown doldrums.



I always liked the way Griffey looked in a Reds uniform; oh how I wish things worked out better for him there.



Griffey has some of the most iconic cards of all-time but one that slips through the cracks is that bubble gum 1995 Pinnacle shot.  Maybe because it isn't the best bubble card of all time?  I think it deserves more love, the look on his face is priceless.



I have a bunch of Griffey inserts as well, but you will just have to be satisfied with the six(!) pages I have of him.  This was whittled down from many more years ago when I decided to not collect every single player I liked in mass quantities.  Of all the player collections I pared down, Junior's was probably the hardest one to do.  Six pages is the most I have of any player in either the retired or hall of fame binders. 



And of course, here is the obligatory page with his dad, Ken Griffey, Sr.  Did you know at one point Ken Griffey, Jr. Lee May, Jr. and Pete Rose, Jr. (and Eduardo Perez, who is a combo-breaker) all played on the same traveling team?  That seems, um, unfair.



       Ninety-four years ago today, Stan Musial was born in Donora PA. 


Opinions obviously vary wildly about who the most basebally baseball player who ever baseballed is, but gun to my head, I'd have to go with Stan.  He looked the part, he acted the part, and he was, well, The Man.


With apologies to Tom McCraw, Freddie Lindstrom, Dick Schofield, Bill Almon, Hank Blalock, Mark Eichhorn, and Tripp Cromer (amongst others) who never ever get mentioned as having a birthday today because they had the karmic misfortune to be born on the same day as two of the greatest baseball players of all time. 

Sixty-six years ago today, my mother was born in beautiful downtown Jersey City.  As far as I know, she has never been to Donora PA. 

My mom has spent the last month or so in New Orleans, going to games and following the players around.  She is sort of a stalker who doesn't "stalk" or perhaps a groupie who doesn't actually sleep with the players - she is old enough to be the grandmother of some of them, after all.   But in between drinking and eating, she loves to go see the players in public (see above) and she does make the rounds, believe me.

Since I can't be there to do it in person, here is Akiem Hicks to give you a great big hug.  Happy Birthday Mom!

Freedom.

       As every media outlet in the universe has no doubt let you know, today is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

You will be inundated with remembrances, retrospectives, theories, and conspiracies about every aspect of this event.  As I have said before, I do not want to lament anyone's death, I would rather celebrate how they lived.  And boy, did JFK live.  Plus, what gets lost most of all in the canonization of the man and the lunatic myth-making of his death is all the actual stuff he did.  I think if you asked the average American about any of the legislation his presidency passed, most would give you a look akin to a dog being shown a card trick.

        One thing JFK actually did was set the standard for the current Presidential Medal of Freedom. This is the highest civilian award in the United States.  Earlier this week, President Obama awarded this year's recipients and one of them was Mr. Cub Ernie Banks.  He is the ninth Major League baseball player to receive this medal.  As a change of pace today, let's look at all those winners, shall we?

Ernie Banks 2013

Poor Ernie not only never got to play in the postseason, he had to receive his medal from a White Sox fan...he probably deserved better than that. 

Stan Musial 2011

Musial was in the navy in WWII (as you can see in the card in the middle first row) and you would be hard pressed to find a better ambassador for baseball than The Man. 

Buck O'Neil 2006

OK, I take that back, Buck O'Neil might be the best ambassador for baseball ever.  He played in the Negro Leagues from 1937 until basically the Negro Leagues stopped being a thing.  He then was a scout for the Cubs (and helped them sign the aforementioned Ernie Banks) and was even the first African-American coach in the majors.  But Buck O'Neil became an icon late in life thanks to Ken Burns' documentary series Baseball.  If a 20+ hour film can have a star, Buck was it.  His knowledge and enthusiasm for baseball permeate the whole project and every moment he is on the screen is a joy. 

Frank Robinson 2005

Frank Robinson is simply the most underrated baseball player of all time.  His numbers somehow get lost in the shuffle, even though they are gargantuan.  He also was the first African American manager in the majors when he took the reins of the Indians in 1975.  Plus, if you ever want to ask a tricky trivia question, hit them with "Who was the first black manager in the National League?" because the answer is also Frank Robinson.

Roberto Clemente 2003

I have covered Roberto Clemente before on this blog.  If you don't understand why Roberto would get this award, you don't understand either.

Hank Aaron 2002

For all the scrutiny today's athletes say they have to endure, did any man have to put up with more nonsense while just trying to play a game than Hank Aaron?  And given those circumstances, could he have acted more humble and classy?  I think not.  America owes a huge apology to Hank Aaron and I like to think this award was part of that.

Ted Williams 1991

I snarkily celebrated Teddy Ballgame recently but really, to be honest, there is no way to overstate Williams' credentials as an American Badass: Maybe the greatest hitter of all time.  Maybe the greatest fly fisherman of all time.  Flew combat missions in two different wars.  Used his Hall of Fame speech as a call to have Negro League players enshrined.  I mean, John Wayne based his voice and cadence after him for crying out loud.  What is more American than that?

Jackie Robinson 1984

That it took until 1984 to give Jackie Robinson this honor is kind of outrageous, don't you think?  Shouldn't he have been on the short list, like, the very first year? 

Joe DiMaggio 1977

It proves that people were always kinda overestimating the value of Joe DiMaggio as he was the first baseball player to receive the Medal of Freedom.  That said, you have to remember that sometimes the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.  Dividing The Myth, The Man, and The Player out of Joe D is almost impossible, so you kinda just have to go with it - and it seems history and pop culture always have when it comes to him.  Plus, you gotta figure since he was married to Marilyn Monroe for a short time, he and JFK had a lot more in common than we'd all care to think about. 

The Man.

Stan Musial.

November 21, 1920 – January 19, 2013.

"Here stands baseball's perfect warrior. Here stands baseball's perfect knight."

My favorite useless statistic in all of baseball history?  Stan Musial had 3,630 hits - 1,815 of them at home and 1,815 on the road.

RIP.

Aesthetics.

       I was going to call this post "A for Aesthetics" but I want to keep this thing simple (and I would never want to endorse Sue Grafton novels, directly or otherwise).  Everyone seems to be down with the concept of this blog and I appreciate all the well wishes and encouragement.  But I also want to assure you all, there is more to all this than just slapping nine cards in a page and calling it a day.  Each page needs to not only represent the player, set, or concept, but it has to look good doing it.  At least, that is the goal.


Here is a page of Stan Musial modern retro vintage cards:
 
All very different looking cards; some are very busy and modern, some are more staid designs and/or reprints.  All of them live together well on the page.  All the photos make sense where they are placed. 


Here is a page of Wally Joyner that illustrates this concept even better.  Different sets and photos all arranged well:


If he's looking up, he's on the bottom.  If he's looking right, he's on the left, and so on.  To look good is to feel good. Its got a couple of rookie cards and some OG Upper Deck in there too.  So in my binders, at least, Wally Joyner is the equal of Stan Musial, if not greater.


I do like the break up the monotony of page after page of player after player with some themes.  


Nomar is one of my favorite players of all time.  He has an astounding four pages in my retired binder.  I went with an all fielding page here:


I really like to do this with catchers.  As a failed former catcher myself (with the bad joints to prove it), I like to highlight the tools of ignorance, behold the recently retired Jason Varitek.


I do have binders that collect sets as well as players.  I find Allen and Ginter to be both awesome to rip open and collect, yet hard to work with in my nine card structure.


I mean, these '09s look nice, but page after page of similar looking A&G cards gets tiresome, so I tried to break it up with some bat-on-shoulder solidarity in '06...

...and some horizontally-oriented '07s.




I'll do this with players too.  I have two or three pages of Cal Ripken Jr. and since he has a little under a bazllion cards, I was able to cobble together a longways page:



I am certainly the demographic Topps is after with all their old timey sets and players, because I can't get enough of them:
 
Though it is a sad statement that this is the least busy of all the Topps Triple Threads sets.

While I am on the subject, it is soapbox time.  I try not to complain too much about cards since this is my hobby and all, but I cannot ignore Topps and their recent quality slip.  It is not just the monopoly that has led to this sad state, they were well on their way down before that.  I have a fantastic example here.  These are the 2002 Topps 206s:


Great pictures, well colored, the subject pops off the background, high quality stuff, pays homage to the original set, looks great.


And these are the 2009 Topps 206s, a mere 7 years later:
 
Mediocre pictures, horrible photoshop effects, awful over saturated backgrounds, inconsistent and lazy coloring of subjects, looks like a high school art project...and what the hell is going on with that Lou Gehrig?  He had ALS, not Down's Syndrome. Whatever happened in those seven years, design and quality control took a long looooooong step down. 
 
/soapbox


As a palate cleanser, here's one more good example, from the HoF binder; Goose Gossage in all his goosey-ness, lots of teams represented, lots of sets represented, mustache very well represented, the pictures all nicely arranged:



And here...well, here is one of my Hank Aaron pages, it's all over the place...

...it needs a little work, though Night Owl should appreciate the original well-loved 1975 cards from my brother's collection.  

       And to those who asked, I will be working on the wantlists and gotlists sometime this weekend, or next month, I am in no rush, but thanks for inquiring, I am aware they need to be posted.  And once again, thanks to everyone who has come to look at my little blog and especially those who have taken the time to comment.