Doug Schuyler passed on this juicy (no pun intended) APBA card. It’s Dante Bichette’s APBA card of 1995.
Bichette played for the Colorado Rockies in Denver where the air was thin and the balls were flying over the fence. At least, Dante’s were. He led the NL with 40 homers and 128 rbis as well as a .620 slugging percentage.
He wasn’t just a power guy though. He topped the league with 197 hits and batted .340 in 1995. He even stole 13 bases (though he was caught 9 times as well).
Bichette came in second in NL MVP voting to Cincinnati’s Barry Larkin in a pretty close vote (281 votes to 251).
| Split | G | PA | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | SB | BB | SO | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1995 Totals | 139 | 612 | 579 | 102 | 197 | 38 | 2 | 40 | 128 | 13 | 22 | 96 | .340 | .364 | .620 |
There are just two things that Bichette doesn’t have. His defense is subpar (OF-1) and his on-base numbers would have been superior had he had more than one 14. That said, he still had a decent .364 OBP but his was bound to decent when you start with a .340 batting average.
But OTHER than that, this card has power (1-1-0-0-0) and average (a 25-7 and a 64-9). His nine steals translates to a 15-10 and three second column 11s.
Fun numbers: 44-0, 35-8, 25-7
APBA put the 12 at 52 and moved the 27 to 23 presumably for all the players for the 1995 season.
“Beach” is abbreviated to “Bch” in “Palm Beach”. I’m not sure why.
thanks, Doug!
Hey Tom,
While I admit that Colorado numbers are somewhat inflated but I was at a game when he was still a newb in Anaheim playing the White Sox and he hit a scorcher off the facing of the upper deck in left field with a pretty big dent, so the power was legit.
That said he was a butcher in the field and should have stayed in the AL as a DH.