Random Topps Card of the Day: 1970 Topps #254 Camilo Pascual

It's Retro Sunday!!! Thanks to the Topps Card Randomizer, introducing the Random Topps Card of the Day for Sunday, November 25, 2012:

• Official Card Set Name and Card Number: 1970 Topps #254.
• Player Name, position, team: Camilo Pascual, pitcher, Cincinnati Reds.
• Major League Debut: April 15, 1954.
• Last Line of Statistics: 1969 stats (Reds): 5 G, 7 IP, 0-0, .000 PCT, 3 SO, 4 BB, 9.00 ERA.
• Any special information about player: Signed with the Senators as a Free Agent before the 1952 season. Contract purchased by the Reds 07/07/1969. Bats: right. Throws: left.
• Number of regular Topps Cards (includes regular and traded cards only): 16 (not counting the 1959 Topps Ralph Lumenti #316 card that actually pictures Pascual). This is his sixteenth and final Topps card.
• Blurb on the back: "Camilo tied major mark for hurlers with 3 sacrifices, 05/27/1956."
• Commentary: The grey-bordered 1970 Topps set, I found out, uses a whiter card stock than what we were accustomed to seeing throughout the 70's and 80's (up until 1991).  Unfortunately, many of the cards that I've also seen are miscut (like the card above), so finding cards with decent centering is a challenge to say the least.  There was a stretch during the early years of Camilo's career with the Senators (then Twins...he moved with the team) that he was one of Major League Baseball's best pitchers.  From 1959 through 1964, he was a five-time All-Star, a three-time MVP candidate, and had a combined record of 100-66 with a 3.04 ERA, 1170 strikeouts, and a WHIP of 1.195.  He started 185 of the 194 games he appeared in and completed 90 of them, 26 were shutouts.  On the heels of a dominating 21-9 record with 18 complete games in 1963 (ironically, the only year in this six season stretch in which he did NOT make the All- Star Team), Topps assigned card #500 to him for their 1964 Topps set, the first pitcher bestowed with the milestone card number.  In 1967, he returned to Washington, DC, to pitch for the second incarnation of the Senators.  He was still an effective starter, although not as dominant as he had been just a few years ago.  He was released by the Senators after going 2-5 with a 7.04 ERA and had his contract purchased by the Reds.  In 1970, Pascual signed on with the Dodgers, but was released after appearing in 10 games.  He finished his major league career with the Indians in 1971.  He was named the pitching coach for the Twins in 1978 (job lasted through the 1980 season), and has sinced worked as an international scout for a number of teams.  He is credited for signing (and perhaps unleashing to the world) Jose Canseco when he was a scout for the Athletics.  Camilo Pascual is also a Hall of Famer.  Although he failed to be enshrined into Cooperstown (two attempts with only 4 votes of support combined), he was inducted into the Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame (1983), the Latino Baseball Hall of Fame (2010, inaugural class), and in 2012, was the 24th player to be inducted into the Twins Hall of Fame.  His cards have been used in Topps Heritage Buyback programs since 2008.
• Lo-Hi Beckett value: $0.40-$1.00.
• How many cards of this player do I own?: 0.

In case you're actually wondering, I don't own this card, but was able to get a crystal clean copy of the image from the from the Baseball Card Cyber Museum. So thank you Joe McAnally and the folks at the BCCM..

Well, it's back to normal on Monday. Tomorrow's card will be: 2000 Topps #42. Post will arrive at 1:00 PM CST. Come on back then to see what the Topps Card Randomizer gets us to look at then.

Sincerely,

JayBee Anama