Great Box from Shane

Here's a little lesson for you. Sometimes, it pays to comment on other people's trade posts. It was comments on trade posts by Night Owl and Nachos Grande that led to an email from Shane. He noticed my comments, started following my blog and asked if I would be interested in some Rangers. Let me think about it...yes!! I sent over some cards off one of his wantlists and he sent me a little box loaded with pre-1981 Rangers plus plenty of more current cards.

This is my first 2004 Topps Cracker Jack card. Sure, it's a Mark Teixeira card, but it's a near priceless white swatch of jersey. This is sort of a "mini" card.

This 2005 Donruss Throwback Threads Michael Young is another new addition to the collection. I hope the Rangers can keep Michael a Ranger his whole career.

Here we have an early Tom Henke, 1984 Donruss edition. Tom, big glasses and all, started his career in Texas in 1982. He left to play for the Blue Jays in 1985 and came back to get 40 saves for Texas in 1993, 15 saves in 1994 and finish his career with the Cardinals in 1995.

Recent postings by Night Owl and the Collective Troll, both excellent bloggers, got me wondering if there were any Rangers in the Drake's series. Without ever asking the question, I find the answer with this 1981 Drake's Al Oliver. You can see their great posts on the subject by clicking on their names above.

This is the third or fourth 1975 SSPC Texas Ranger Card I've gotten via trade. It's my first Jim Sundberg and I must say I really like these. They look really clean and uncluttered and would be great for TTM's.

Shane also sent over three TTM or in person autos he got from Rangers. These kinds of cards in trade packages are always much appreciated because someone had to go to some kind of effort to get these signed.

2000 Upper Deck Doug Davis--my first Doug Davis auto of any kind.

1986 Fleer Bobby Witt

One of my top 5 all-time favorite Rangers, Rusty Greer on a 1997 Fleer card. Very nice.

Now on to the "vintage", or pre-1981 Rangers. When your favorite team has only been in existence since 1972, you define your own vintage era. The upside is I don't need any 1950's Topps cards for the Team Collection.

1980 Topps Pat Putnam. Pat played 8 years in the Majors, 6 with Texas. His best year was actually in the minors for Asheville in 1976 when he hit .361 with 24 homeruns and 142! rbis in 138 games. The numbers didn't translate to the Show where he had 63 career homers and 255 rbis in his 8 seasons.

I would love to feature each of these cards individually because they deserve it, but I really want to leave the epic posts to the Troll. He does them so much better than I do...that's not a shot at him either, his long posts have helped me through many a long, boring night at work. Featured here are Al Oliver, Len Barker, Toby Harrah, Juan Beniquez, Jon Matlack and Bobby Bonds, circa 1979 Topps.



Here we have a couple of 1978 Topps Rangers. Manager Billy Hunter was the fourth of four Rangers managers in the 1977 season. Frank Lucchesi (31-31), Eddie Stanky (1-0), Connie Ryan (2-4) preceded him and Hunter finished the season 60-33 for 2nd place. He led the Rangers to a 86-75 record in 1978, good enough for 2nd place. Pat Corrales managed one game in 1978, going 1-0 and replaced Billy Hunter as manager for the 1979 season.

This is a fine trio of 1977 Topps Rangers. Mike Hargrove has the normal cap on. The Bert Campaneris cap is one of the worst airbrush jobs I've ever seen. At least until I saw the Bump Wills Rookie card. The hat is airbrushed and it looks like his face is too. Weird. I still love having these cards in my collection now.

This colorful 1975 Topps Toby Harrah will soon be featured on this far out 1975 Topps blog. I can't wait.

Finally, we get to three 1974 Topps Rangers. It looks like Jeff Burroughs is questioning a call, Dave Nelson looks like he's looking to Heaven for an answer to his hitting woes. Toby Harrah just looks annoyed at having to pose in front of the batting cage. If you've read this far, bless you, and I'm sorry. I actually left out a number of cards I wanted to post. I didn't send Shane nearly enough cards for what he sent me. Thanks Shane!