Warm Thoughts for a Cold Winter: Topps’ Photo Retouching Skills

A recent post at Mets Guy in Michigan concentrated on what may be the worst Mets-related baseball card of all time (and perhaps the worst baseball card of all time, period): a Hostess-produced card for Rusty Staub in which the photo retouching is abysmal. I won’t recount the story here; just click on this link and marvel at how horrible it is (and the interesting hypothesis forwarded to explain its hideousness).

The post also touched on a longtime feature of baseball cards: the hastily altered player photo. Back in the days of no Photoshop and longer production schedules, it wasn’t always possible for the baseball card people to get a picture of a player in his new duds if he was traded in the offseason. Or even if he was traded the year before, since back then, most baseball card photos were taken during the previous season. And by my own amateur sleuthing, most of them were taken in either New York or LA. So if were swapped midseason and never made another trip to either coast, there might be no pics of you in your current uni.

69_rusty.jpgFor a good chunk of the 1960s, Topps (the biggest baseball card producer) didn’t much care for verisimiltude. If a player was suddenly traded before the cards were made, they just used a generic, hatless picture, or blacked out his hat entirely, as evidenced by Rusty Staub’s 1969 Topps card (seen to your right). Rusty went from the Astros to the Expos in a very late offseason trade (January 22), and since Montreal had yet to play a game, Topps–rather than find out what the Expos’ uniforms might look like–scraped away the Houston logo on his helmet and called it a day.

Beginning in the early 1970s, Topps either decided this method was not worthy of their standards or hired some very ambitious/anal art directors. Because at this time, they began to document a player’s new home to the best of their abilities–as ham-fisted and transparent as those efforts might appear.

When I was a kid and mired in a baseball card obsession, I bought a whole box of cards from 1977 for like five bucks. Why 1977? Because (a) that’s the year I was born, and (b) it was the first year the Blue Jays and Mariners played, which at the time was the last MLB expansion. This historical fact fascinated me for dumb little kid reasons.

Topps wanted to document the freshman year for those two teams, of course. But since neither had yet taken the field, they had to improvise. In some cases, they did so admirably. In others, not so much.

Even as a young’un, I could tell something was off about some of these cards. I even recognized bad paint jobs on some of these unfortunate players. It was necessary for the aforementioned Toronto and Seattle squads, since this was their inaugural year, but they weren’t the only teams treated to some paintbrushery.
Continue reading Warm Thoughts for a Cold Winter: Topps’ Photo Retouching Skills

Retro-rage: The Worst Job Interview Ever

jobinterview.jpgI wish there was one long, Teutonic word for this feeling: a memory that infuriates you, even though it has no bearing on your life as it is lived now. I don’t mean someone mistreating or betraying you, because that has a continued, negative impact on your existence. I mean something that is ancient history, something that has zero influence on your day-to-day life, yet still irks you whenever you think about it.

I’m going to call this sensation Retro-rage. I’m thinking about this concept because recently, I heard a friend of mine was looking to bolt his current place of employ. This piece of info reminded me that I once interviewed at the same company. And that memory stirred up another memory that enraged me, even though I’m gainfully and happily employed elsewhere.

Two-plus years ago, I was laid off from my job (another angry memory for another angry time). I had about a month before this lack-of-jobitude would seriously hit my family (including a one-year-old baby) in the pocketbook. Needless to say, I was quite anxious to find something, anything, very soon.
Continue reading Retro-rage: The Worst Job Interview Ever

Warm Thoughts for a Cold Winter: Bullpen Carts

mets_cart.jpgYesterday, I wrote about stadium organists, a feature of the game that is quickly dying out. Another aspect that’s already dead is one that probably shouldn’t have lived to begin with: bullpen carts. Yes, once upon a time, relievers were shuttled from the bullpen to the mound in vehicles of varying size–sometimes a full-sized automobile, but more often golf cart-type contraptions.

In a weird way, the bullpen cart feels like it should be a more recent innovation. After all, today’s athlete is supposed to be spoiled rotten, so it would stand to reason they would insist on being chauffeured to the mound like the fancy boys they are. But no, it was the supposedly blue collar relievers of yesteryear who were slowly puttered onto the field in embarrassingly tiny go-carts.

Paul Lukas of Uni-Watch wrote an exhaustive history of the bullpen cart a few years ago. My favorite tidbit:

1986: With happy fans spilling onto the field after the Mets’
division-clinching victory on Sept. 17, Mets fan and former Shea
Stadium vendor Eric Bennett heads straight to the bullpen, where he hijacks the team’s bullpen buggy. He takes it for a brief outfield joyride before the engine conks out.