This odd Monster Card comes to us from Rich Ozz Selg who shared it on Facebook. It’s Sparky Lyle’s card from 1981 (is it me or did a lot of strange cards come from that season set?). His pitching skills had started to deteriorate by then but apparently his base stealing skills may have just started to warm up.
That year, he stole the only base of his career. Not only that, he garnered two hits in 5 at-bats. For those wondering, his other two plate appearances were a walk and a sacrifice hit.
| Split | G | GS | PA | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | SB | CS | BB | SO | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1981 Totals | 48 | 0 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | .400 | .500 | .400 |
To be honest, I’m surprised APBA didn’t use the 14* with Sparky Lyle’s card here. The 14* came into existence in 1975 (the 6* and 42* came later in 1982). Lyle does have two 14s that would come in useful with. As a result though, we get a rather unusual APBA card with a rather Wills-esque 55-11 and 44-10.
With the five 11s comes steals but of course, they also mean hits, too. Assuming that the hit value of 11 roughly equals a 7, Lyle’s card is the equivalent of a batter with a 25-7. Fortunately, the card works since Lyle hit .400 in 5 at-bats for 1981. Plus, I haven’t even mentioned that Lyle is rated as Slow. This happened to fellow closer Bruce Sutter in 1979, I believe. Sutter, also rated Slow, received a first column 11.
Lyle’s five 14s are a bonus as well. This gives him 13 chances to reach base against an A pitcher with the bases empty not even counting the 53-21. Not bad for an aging reliever.
Yes, a lot of strange cards came out of the set because of the 56-day gap in the middle of the season. (My wife claims that we might not have become engaged in the summer of ’81 but for the strike, because my baseball fandom would have come to the surface.)
Consider Gossage and Fingers as A&B*s, for example. Neither player got hammered during the middle of the summer and both were monsters. Then, of course, there’s the 1-1-1 Mickey Klutts – just the card to lay down beside Mantle, Aaron and Bonds.
I am in the middle(?) of a 1979 replay. Current series- Cubs and Astros. So Sutter features prominently in the first two games. (2G, 2I, 1 hit, 1 run 1 BB and 1 K. He is indeed an ‘S’. If only I could figure out how to attach a picture. By. The way, t he Cubs broke on top 2-0 and 3-0 after the first inning of games one and two. They lost both – 5-2 and 4-3.
1979 replay? Awesome! you should like my Terrible Tuesday entry then…
just posted it..
Yup. I only own two sets so was looking forward to someone from one of my sets getting 15 minutes of Nelshoppen fame. :-).
A slow base stealer. Reminds me of my 1976 Sal Bando and my 1998 Jose Canseco