frankendodger sheet 40 (cards 352-360) - bookended by a pair of 31 hall of famers...

i've updated this page since the original post ran.

here's sheet number 40 of my dodger frankenset - cards numbered 352-360:

and the back:

here's what the page originally looked like:

these cards are:

352. 2001 topps archives hoyt wilhelm
353. 1992 classic best ken huckaby 1994 pinnacle ramon martinez
354. 2005 donruss diamond kings kazuhisa ishii
355. 1994 upper deck orel hershiser
356. 1989 score jesse orosco
357. 2012 topps aaron harang
358. 1962 topps tommy davis
359. 2003 topps chrome dave roberts
360. 1996 upper deck mike piazza

the "no brainer" of the day:

hoyt wilhelm has just one card from his playing days as a dodger, and it's his 1972 topps card.  this reprint of that card issued as part of the 2001 topps archives set was a no brainer to make the set.

about the cards:

another thing about the wilhelm card, his 1972 topps card was numbered 777 (as you can see in the above scan) which puts it outside the parameters of this set.  so, i was happy that the archives reprint numbered it at 352.  i won't blow up the back of the card to show you the number as i did with the 1952 jackie robinson reprint from the same set - you'll just have to trust me.  wilhelm made his debut in 1952 against the dodgers, facing pee wee reese, billy cox, roy campanella, jackie robinson, and duke snider in his initial inning of work, and finished his hall of fame career as a dodger 20 years later. in between, he appeared in a record 1,070 games as a pitcher. as implied by the title of this post, wilhelm wore number 31 during his stint as a dodger.

ken huckaby was a dodger catching prospect who was in the dodger organization through the 1997 season. he didn't make his big league debut until 2001, nine years after this 1992 classic best minor league card was issued.  he never suited up for the dodgers, but i like this card and the holman stadium seats in the background.  really, the only criteria for a card being eligible for this set is that its number is less than 727 and it be considered a dodger card.  huckaby's card meets both.

ken huckaby's 1992 classic best card has given way to ramon martinez's 1994 pinnacle card. aside from being a major league card of a player that actually played for the dodgers, it features a fairly unique photo of martinez studying a slide. it also makes the top two rows of the sheet an exclusively pitcher's zone.

kaz ishii was no longer with the dodgers when this 2005 diamond kings card came out, having been traded to the mets for jason phillips straight up.  ishii went 13-8 in 2004, his third season with the dodgers, but his era had jumped almost a full run to 4.71, and his k/9 ratio had gone from just under 9 to just over 5.  it was time to cut bait.

while ishii was banished to flushing meadows, the 1994 upper deck set banished players to the phantom zone with the skewed photo on the side bar.  bowman used a similar technique in their 1995 set, but upper deck does it better.  i liked this set a lot and it was the first upper deck set that i set out to complete.  it was also the smallest upper deck set to date.  anyway, i really like the hershiser card here because it features the old corrugated fiberglass walls of the dodger stadium bullpens that my brother and i used to stand above and watch the likes of don sutton, burt hooton, and (far too often) doug rau warm up before games.  i mean that it seemed like rau was the starting pitcher for a lot of the games we attended, not that he was used too often.

speaking of being used often, jesse orosco who appears here on a 1989 score card currently holds the record for most games pitched at 1,252.  he wasn't the one who broke wilhelm's record (that was dennis eckersley who pitched in 1,071 games), but he sure did pass it. the closest active pitcher is francisco rodriguez, who has appeared in 887 games.  aaron harang appeared in only 387 games during his career which may or may not have ended last season, and only 6 of those appearances were in relief.  we were given this 2012 topps card during his 10-10 season with the dodgers in 2011 (his only season with the dodgers).  in his second start for the club, harang set a dodger record by striking out 9 consecutive batters. he k'd 13 total that night, and dodger pitchers tied a team record for a ninie inning game by striking out their opponent 18 times.  of course, they almost lost the game.

tommy davis's 1962 topps card is one of my favorite dodgers from the set, due in large part to the way his pose fits the image space.  speaking of which, he's got the same pose as gino cimoli had on his 1958 topps card, but topps let davis keep his bat.  as an aside, i am ashamed to mention how long it took me to really look at the 1962 design and see that it was supposed to reflect a rectangular photo posted on a piece of wood (fence?). i had not noticed the curl as part of the image until the late 1990's.

the page's penultimate card features the current dodger manager not looking at his base coach while running on a 2003 topps chrome card.  that's ok because it looks like the play is in front of him, and we all know that dave roberts was ok on the basepaths.  the final card features one of this year's hall of fame inductees taking a cut on his 1996 upper deck card.  again, as the title of the post implies, mike piazza wore the same number as hoyt wilhelm, 31.  this is not the first time that two hall of famers wore the same number for the dodgers (both frank robinson and greg maddux wore number 36, for example), but the number still won't be retired by the club until joc pederson gets voted in to the hall.  hey, it could happen.

cards that didn't make the cut:

1983 topps mike scioscia at number 352, 1992 classic best ken huckaby

at number 353, 1996 upper deck ramon martinez at number 354, 2007 upper deck chad billingsley at number 355, 1991 upper deck jose offerman at number 356, 1991 score jim poole

at number 357, 1997 fleer roger cedeno at number 358, 2005 topps chrome jd drew at number 359, and 2005 upper deck jayson werth

at number 360.

my favorite card on the page:

the 1994 upper deck hershiser card wins for this page, thanks to the blue bullpen background and despite the phantom zone card design.

final thoughts:

looking at this sheet now, i am pretty sure that huckaby is not long for the set.  as i mentioned above, pretty much the only requisite to be eligible for this set is to be on a card that is considered a dodger card, and while the huckaby card fits that description as far as i am concerned, there will likely be a change. not that i am opposed to minor league sets - they are part of my dodger collection, after all - but that pinnacle martinez card is a pretty good one.

yep, so good that i've made the switch from huckaby to martinez.

frankendodger sheet 21 (cards 181-189) - a hero for all-time...

here's sheet number 21 of my dodger frankenset - cards numbered 181-189:

and the back:

these cards are:

181. 2014 bowman chrome dan haren
182. 1991 donruss studio gary carter
183. 2012 bowman james loney
184. 2001 bowman's best joe thurston
185. 1994 upper deck all-time heroes steve garvey
186. 1986 leaf tom niedenfuer
187. 2002 fleer platinum jeff shaw
188. 1971 topps bob valentine/mike strahler
189. 2004 upper deck dave roberts

the "no brainer" of the day:

of all of these cards, the 1971 topps valentine/strahler card was the one that slotted in on this page first.  maybe not a true no brainer, but everything else here fit in around it. still, it was enough of a no brainer to block a different jeff shaw card from the set - more on that below.

about the cards:

three bowman cards and a studio card start the sheet off.  i wonder what drives the decision for card manufacturers to use either the interlocking 'la' logo versus the flying ball logo.  anyway, i don't care for the logo placement on haren's card, and if you were to remove the logo from carter's studio card, you would see that it is a card that panini could (and does) make today.

loney and thurston strike similar poses, while upper deck gave me a new steve garvey card in 1994 using a photo from the 1974 world series.  i was pretty happy when i found out about this set, which happened later in the decade. i am glad that the inset photo they used was also a dodger photo instead of a padre photo - upper deck pulled that kind of swap on a few cards, such as manny mota's and charlie neal's.

being a leaf card rather than a donruss card doesn't make tom niedenfuer's card any more interesting.  i will once again take a moment to tell the tale of perhaps my favorite letter to the editor ever.  it must have been in 1985 when some fine person wrote a poem to the la times' sports editor that went something like this:  "i am a true blue dodger fan, so i won't be naming names. but there is a certain pitcher, we niedenfuer games." genius.

jeff shaw's 2002 fleer platinum card is obviously from a 'heritage' type set that honors the 1987 fleer design.  not sure why fleer put the orange bar on the bottom (dodger cards in 1987 had a darker blue bar).  the orange makes it look like a padre card.  next up is the first multi-player rookie card in the set. both strahler and valentine would be sent to the angels with frank robinson a couple years after this card came out.

last, but not least, is a card of the current dodger manager, dave roberts. i am not a fan of the blue jerseys as game jerseys (even though i own one), but i do like roberts' card.  also, from 2002-2005, i was only buying topps stuff, so upper deck cards from that timeframe are relatively new and interesting to me.

cards that didn't make the cut:

some of the cards considered but not chosen for this sheet include 2009 upper deck o-pee-chee cory wade at number 181, 1971 o-pee-chee al downing

at number 182, 1998 bowman ted lilly at number 183, 2003 (or 2004) upper deck shawn green

at number 184, 1996 upper deck collector's choice mike piazza at number 185, 1996 sp hideo nomo at number 186, 2003 (or 2004) upper deck andy ashby at number 187, 1999 fleer ultra jeff shaw

at number 188 (that is a great card, but the valentine/strahler card held its own), 2003 upper deck dave roberts at number 189 (yes, roberts, green, and ashby all held the same numbers in two consecutive upper deck flagship sets).

my favorite card on the page:

just to be a bit unpredictable, i won't choose the garvey card (it's nice, but fairly dark). the thurston is a cool looking card, but my favorite here is the dave roberts card.  i chose his 2004 card over his 2003 card for this spot because of its blue-ness despite my aversion to the blue jerseys as mentioned above.

final thoughts:

chances were pretty good that i was going to have to repeat a set or player at 185, so i figured it might as well be my baseball hero, steve garvey, who had the honors.  i could have gone with a 2015 bowman chrome mini erisbel arruebarrena card there, but i didn't have a double, and limiting the card selection for the first 20 pages seemed like a nice number to stop on.