- Official Card Set Name and Card Number: 1977 Topps #423.
- Player Name, position, team: Gary Lavelle, pitcher, San Francisco Giants.
- Major League Debut: September 10, 1974.
- Last Line of Statistics: 1976 stats (Giants): 65 G, 110 IP, 10-6, 37 R, 33 ER, 71 SO, 52 BB, 2.70 ERA.
- Any special information about player: Drafted by the Giants #20th, June 1967. Bats: both, Throws: left.
- Any special information about this specific card: Lavelle's third regular Topps card (total includes regular and traded cards only). The aspects of the design leave much to be desired. The team logo above, the little flag with the position, the facsimile autograph, the plain picture. Not one of Topps' best efforts, but it's the late 70's, and after a fantastically iconic design used the year before, this design must have been met with a lot of dropped jaws, wondering, "This is it???" This card indicates that Gary was drafted in the 17th round in the 1967 draft. Actually, he was the 17th PLAYER selected in the 20th ROUND of that year's draft. Meaning that this card is an ERROR CARD!!! Lavelle became the closer for the Giants in the late 70's-early 80's, and was even named to the All-Star team in 1977. Love the glasses though. Not in the style of Kent Tekulve, but again...IT'S THE LATE 70's!!! The blurb on the back, indicates that Gary "was 3-0 at Candlestick Park, 1975." Meaning that he went 3-3 outside of San Francisco. The thing is that this card doesn't include stats for games started or saves, so unless you look at the actual number of games pitched, (in 1976, he showed up 65 times), you wouldn't know if he was a starter or a reliever (or both). The cartoon on the back is green with blue ink, and shows two boys playing catch along a fence. The caption indicates that "Joe Garagiola and Yogi Berra were neighbors as kids." Who'd have thought???
- Lo-Hi Beckett value: $0.10-$0.30.
- How many cards of this player do I own?: 12 cards.
Sincerely,
JayBee Anama
3 comments:
Love the aviators. Everyone had them back then. I guess contacts have taken over these days.
Actually, showing saves would not help much to determine status as starter or reliever, has only a select few guys on a staff ever get a shot at a save.
Fast fact: Yogi Berra didn't sign with the Cardinals because they didn't offer him the same amount as Joe...On the surface, the Cardinals seemed to think Garagiola the superior prospect—but team president Branch Rickey actually had an ulterior motive: knowing he was soon to leave St. Louis to take over the operation of the Brooklyn Dodgers and more impressed with Berra than he let on, Rickey apparently planned to hold Berra off until he could sign him for the Dodgers. The plan was ruined when the Yankees got to him first, signing him for the same $500 bonus the Cardinals offered Garagiola.
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