Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Matty Alou Calbee Card

Matty Alou is arguably one of the best foreign players to ever come to Japan, though for some reason he isn`t often mentioned in most lists of the greats of his generation to make the trip like Frank Howard, Clete Boyer or Willie Davis.  He had a long and successful MLB career that included an NL batting crown, a couple of all star selections and the fame that went along with being a member of arguably the most talented baseball family in history.

He played for three years with Taiheiyo in the mid 70s at the tail end of his career, and he appears in the monster 1975-76 Calbee set.  I finally picked up one of his cards from that set, #542, which features him batting against a Hankyu pitcher named Ashikaga on April 28, 1976 in Nishinomiya Stadium (the runner on second is Masahiro Doi, who appears on another card from that set which I have written about before). 

Frustratingly the back of the card, while telling us that Taiheiyo won a come from behind victory, doesn`t actually tell us what the outcome of this at bat was, though it might be inferred that Alou drove the runner in.  Its kind of a cool in-game picture, with the funky Taiheiyo uniforms and Nishinomiya Stadium looking characteristically under-packed - you can count exactly 3 people sitting in the stands in right field.  The all dirt infield looks cool, I wish more stadiums today had them.

4 comments:

  1. I love the uniforms. I can't even imagine chasing all those cards to build a set.

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  2. Yeah, the set is a monster, but I am now about 1/3 of the way there! Which of course means that about 500 cards in I still need most of them.....

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  3. Hi Sean, came across your posts and noticed it states on one of your post you had a bad dealing with YAJ. Is it still the same or can i go ahead and buy a product without worrying if it will ever arrive or it will be the product i want. Am from the uk and i wanted to order a pair of 1997 4runner / hilux surf tail lights. Can you give me any advice or tips that would make the process some what easier? Will really appreciate it.
    Regards
    Sid

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    1. Yahoo Auctions itself doesn`t offer much buyer protection still. 99.9% of the time everything works fine, so in general its a safe market, but there are a few dodgy sellers so be sure to check their feedback. If you are buying from overseas I assume you are using a proxy service and it is advisable to check what their policies are as well.

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