Random Topps Card of the Day: 1962 Topps #324 Joe McClain

It's Retro Sunday!!! Thanks to the Topps Card Randomizer, introducing the Random Topps Card of the Day for Sunday, February 21, 2010:

• Official Card Set Name and Card Number: 1962 Topps #324.
• Player Name, position, team: Joe McClain, pitcher, Washington Senators.
• Major League Debut: April 14, 1961.
• Last Line of Statistics: 1961 stats (Senators): 33 G, 212 IP, 8-18, .308 PCT, 220 H, 105 R, 91 ER, 76 SO, 48 BB, 3.86 ERA.
• Any special information about player: Signed by Cardinals a Free Agent before 1953 season. Drafted by the Senators from Charleston of the American Association 12/14/1960. Bats: right, Throws: right.
• Any special information about this specific card: McClain's second regular Topps card. Before the 1987 set, with it's wood grain borders, there was the 1962 set. Like looking at pictures over a freshly stained piece of maple wood, the 1962 Topps cards were classy, even down to where it looks like they rolled up the bottom right corner of the picture to let the player's name, team name, and position make an appearance. Joe was drafted by the newly formed Senators in time for the 1961 season (the original Senators left for Minnesota prior to this re-incarnation). The back of his card states that McClain, in his rookie season, led the team in innings pitched 212. Prior to that, he won 13 games in Peoria in 1956 and posted a 2.06 ERA in the Sally (South Atlantic League) the following year. There is a cartoon included on the card, with the caption "King for a Day," explaining that Joe pitched 6.1 innings of a 7 inning no hitter in 1957. Either Topps couldn't get a new picture of the man, or they decided to save a bit of money by using the exact same picture you see above for the following year's set.
• Lo-Hi Beckett value: $2.50-$5.00.
• How many cards of this player do I own?: 0 cards.

In case you're actually wondering, I don't own this card. And this time I was not able to get a crystal clean copy of the image from the Baseball Card Cyber Museum. However, thanks to Topps' new promotion, the Million Card Giveaway, and after figuring out how to find a card by it's numeric ID, I was able to snag the image you see above. For the record, the card in Topps' baseball card library is #5151. And all three of McClain's cards (the above card, along with his 1961 and 1963 cards) have been redeemed.

Well, it's back to normal on Monday. And in honor of the Million Card Giveaway, I'm giving the randomizer the week off, and the blog will feature seven cards that I "won" from Topps' site. Tomorrow's card will be: 1987 Topps #430. Post will arrive at 1:00 PM CST.

Sincerely,

JayBee Anama