#107 -- Jose Cruz

Jose Cruz








Guys don't put tape on tehir bats much anymore. However, in the days before everyone used 2 batting gloves, that was the way to keep your hands on the bat. I remember doing this some as a kid. I also remember callouses from swinging a bat a lot in the vacant lot next door. Jose looks like he's not needing the batting gloves here.


A lot of people forget that Jose came up with the Cardinals and that he finished with the Yankees. After the 1974 season he was sold to the Astros. The Cardinals were so-so at the time, but with an outfield of Lou Brock, Reggie Smith and Bake McBride there wasn't any room for Jose. That deal sure didn't work out for the Cardinals, because he went on to have 14 good years with the Astros.


In 1972, Jose was platooning with Luis Melendez in the outfield. The Cards were trying to find playing time in center and right for Jose, Melendez, Bernie Carbo and Matty Alou. Jose still got to play about half the time. But with the emergence of Bake McBride, he was out.


What I remember most about Jose was the Cardinal organization was ga-ga about the prospect of 3 Cruz brothers in the majors, kind of like the Alous. However, his brothers -- Tommy and Hector -- never really made it big. Hector lasted a few years (after failing miserably to replace Ken Reitz at 3rd) and Tommy bounced around.


Jose is still coaching with the Astros. He'll never make the Hall of Fame, but he was a solid player for a very long time.


1972 Feature
There were only 2 games on June 5, 1972. Both ended with 3-2 scores. My Game of the Day will be the A's over the Indians in 10 innings. They scored 2 early runs on Gaylor Perry, who then shut the A's down until the Indians scored in the 7th and 8th to send it to extra innings. Bert Campaneris hit a 2 out homer in the top of the 10th. Blue Moon Odom and Darold Knowles put down the Indians in the 10th to close out the win.


June 5, 1972 was also the day Mike Coolbaugh was born. He died on the field in Little Rock almost 2 years ago after being hit by a batted ball. Now, all field coaches wear batting helmets. It was a horrible loss of what everyone has said is a great guy.

#101 -- Astros Rookies (Greif, Richard, Busse)

Bill Greif

J.R. Richard

Ray Busse

None of these 3 guys provided any production for the Astros in 1972. Therefore, we should just consider this an example of Topps getting it wrong for its Rookie Prospects. The Astros went with a very set lineup of vets in 1972 and didn't have room for any rookies to break in. The Astros lineup was so set in 1972 it's a little difficult to play Strat-O-Matic because they just didn't have very many at bats to bench players. If somebody gets injured, the only infield replacements you've got are Bobby Fenwick and Jimmy Stewart.

Back to the Rookies on this card. I misspell Bill Greif's name all the time. I give myself a lot of "grief" over that. I guess perhaps I'll use that to learn to spell it properly. Bill's most known as a losing pitcher with the Padres. The Astros got more out of Bill in 1972 than anyone else on this card, as he and Derrel Thomas were the big parts of a trade to the Padres for Dave Roberts (the lefty pitcher). Bill proceded to go 5-16, 10-17 and 9-19 before the Padres decided to turn him into a reliever. Bill didn't do much better as a reliever. His 1977 card has achieved some fame as he never played with the Expos, despite what Topps made us believe.

J.R. Richard is the centerpiece of this card. I loved J. R. Richard in the late 70's and into 1980. He was big and fierce and looked it in the Astro rainbow uniforms. He threw hard and for several years didn't really know where it was going. In 1971 he pitched at Oklahoma City and averaged 10.5 K/9IP. Unfortunately, he also walked 105, which was almost 5.5/9IP. He wasn't a regular in the big leagues until 1975. His career really was only from 1975-1980 and in those 6 years he went 96-65 with 1339 strikeouts. That's in 5 1/2 years.

I remember 1980 very well. I was rooting for the Astros because of a good pitching staff, Bill Virdon was the manager (he lives in the same area I do), the cool uniforms, and the Cardinals were still kind of sucking. The Astros had picked up Nolan Ryan, so they had 2 guys who'd been striking out 300/year and a 20-game winning knuckleballer to sandwich between the two. J.R. got off to a great start and looked like a Cy Young for sure until he started complaining of a dead arm. Nobody believed him until he collapsed with a stroke in July. I remember a "Sporting News" cover with him and "Who Shot JR's Arm?" on the cover. He tried to come back through the minors, but he couldn't do it. He ended up losing a lot of money to an oil scheme and a couple of divorces and was living under a bridge in the mid-90's. He's got things back together now, thanks in large part to friends in baseball and his faith. One of my favorite autographed cards is a 1977 J.R. Richard. I don't know if it's real or not, but it's good enough for me.

I'd like to know what would happen if J.R. hadn't had a stroke end his career at age 30. If he had another 5 1/2 years like the preceeding 5 1/2 years, he'd be looking at roughly 200 wins, 3000 strikeouts and a Cy Young or 2. I think the Astros would have pushed by the Phils in the 1980 NLCS (the best LCS in history) if he was there, so he might have even had a World Series ring. I don't think he would have retired voluntarily at age 36, so he might have hung around to rack up stats like a lot of guys do, but for the prime 10-11 years, he'd have a great start on Cooperstown numbers. What a shame.

I actually knew who Ray Busse was without having to look him up. That's because the Cardinal announcers in the 1970's made every young player out to be the next great Cardinal Hall of Famer. Therefore, I have memories of guys like Ray Busse, Tom Heintzelman, Hector Cruz, Skip Jutze, Stan Papi, and so on. What I remember about Ray was, "at 6'4", he's a little tall to be a good shortstop." I think it was Mike Shannon who said that. A guy named Ripken came along about 10 years later..... However, Busse wasn't going to be the great 6'4" shortstop. He had a career batting average of .148 over 155 at bats. (The record for lowest career batting average by a non-pitcher with 155 at bats or more is Dick Smith's .134.) Ray did hit 2 homers in his 70 Cardinal at bats. They came off Rich Reuschel and Sam McDowell, who were a couple of pretty good pitchers. Perhaps Mike Shannon's comment about 6'4" shortstops had some basis in reality: Ray had a lifetime fielding percentage of .898 in his 23 games for the Cardinals in 1973. That's really bad. What's even worse is that the Cards trotted him out there as their starting shortstop 20 times in 1973, a year they finished only 1 1/2 games out of first. Man, if only Mike Tyson had been available more.

1972 Feature

On this date (May 31) in 1972, there were 10 games played in the big leagues and 8 of them were 1-run games. That would have been an exciting night on Baseball Tonight if such a thing existed then. The Angels came back with 1 in the 8th and 1 in the 9th to beat the White Sox (2nd major league win for Lloyd Allen, who's coming up next). Detroit beat the Indians 5-4 in 10, but not before the Indians tied the game in the 9th when Jim Northrup dropped a fly ball that would have been a sac fly. Dodgers beat the Giants 5-4 in 10 on a Manny Mota triple (he was then caught stealing home). In the pitching duel of the day, Bob Gibson and the Cardinals beat Ferguson Jenkins and the Cubs 1-0.

Also on May 31, 1972, Red Sox fans everywhere rejoiced (at least those who had been in 2004 and then got in Dr. Brown's DeLorean) as Dave Roberts was born. This is for all of Chowd Nation.

#65 -- Cesar Cedeno

Cesar Cedeno







Cesar was one of my favorite players in the 70's. The back of his card says it all, "Hailed as NL's next superstar...." He had a breakout season in 1971 and was one of the players that scouts drooled over. He had all 5 tools. He started the 1973 All-Star Game for the NL in centerfield and won 5 consecutive Gold Gloves. The Astrodome was long known as a pitchers' park and a hitters' nightmare, but the Astros of that day had quite a bit of power with Cedeno, Jimmy Wynn, Lee May and Doug Rader.



Cesar was going to be the next Willie Mays, just like Bobby Murcer was going to be the next Mickey Mantle. Unfortunately Cesar had some run-ins with the law and the Astrodome held him down. Still, despite the precipitous decline in his power numbers following the 1974 season, he still had OPS+ well above league average almost every season.



Cesar's Astro teams weren't very good. There always seemed to be something missing or the Reds and Dodgers were just too good. They had decent pitching, but no real Cy Young candidates until the late 70's. The hitting was strong in the early 70's, but then Wynn, Rader and May were traded away and not really replaced, leaving Cedeno in the lineup with Jose Cruz and Bob Watson, but it wasn't the same.

Finally the Astros improved, largely because of a monster pitching staff, and won the West in 1980. Cesar was a big part of their lineup and carried them. However, he didn't produce in the playoffs. I still think that series with the Phillies is the best post-season series I've ever seen. At this time, Cesar was still a veteran force, although in decline. He was only 29 years old.

When Cesar went to the Reds for Ray Knight, he wasn't the same. You could still see the talent, but he wasn't producing. Finally the Reds gave up on him after a subpar 1985 and let the Cardinals pick him up in late August for a minor leaguer. It looked like his last hurrah, but the Cardinals needed some firepower with Jack Clark out.

Somehow, Cesar summoned up his "next Willie Mays" talent and put the Cardinals on his back. In 28 games he had 6 homers, 19 RBI, 5/6 in stolen bases and .434/.463/.750 in average/on-base/slugging. He hit .476 in his first 22 games with the Cards as they took control of the East. His 6 homers were good for 6th on the team that year and he was only with them for about 1/8 of the season.

He cooled the last 7 games of the season and went into the deep freeze in the post-season, hitting only 4-27 with 1 RBI. He did draw a walk in the 8th inning of Game 6 to move Terry Pendleton into scoring position for Brian Harper to knock him in and give the Cards a 1-0 lead. Every Cardinal fan knows what happened after that.....

Cesar tried to come back in 1986 and had nothing in the tank. For a while in the 90's, if anyone came along with the name "Cedeno" it was thought he'd be a can't miss prospect. At least that's the only way I know to justify the hype given to the late Andujar Cedeno.

Last year Cesar was a coach for the Nationals' Gulf Coast League affiliate. He had a great career. Bill James ranked him as the #21 all-time centerfielder in baseball history. That may not be the "next Willie Mays", but Cesar had a great career and is fondly remembered.

#56 -- Rich Chiles

Rich Chiles

There isn't much to write about Rich's career. This is his rookie card. He got some time with the Astros in 1971 and was their top pinch hitter, although he only hit .227. In his rookie year he set the team record for pinch hits (since broken) with 11. He didn't really get any other playing time to speak of until he joined the Twins in 1977. He hit in the .260s with the Twins in 1977-78 before being released at the beginning of Spring Training 1979.

Hard to tell much about where this picture is. About the only place Topps was taking NL pictures with turf was Candlestick, but this doesn't have a Candlestick feel to me. The guys in the background are wearing Houston road uniforms (these were the boring uniforms before the great stripes that started around 1975). Also, I don't know why, but when I saw his photo it just screamed, "I didn't know John Schneider hit left-handed." (Disclaimer: You can now see why I'm a lawyer and not in graphic arts. I verily stinketh at photoshop/paint. That's supposed to be an Astro hat I drew on John Schneider/Rich Chiles.)

There are two other things I've found about Rich that are more interesting than his playing career. His cousin was Hall of Famer George Kelly, a first baseman with the New York Baseball Giants. I'd have to admit that would have been cool growing up to know you were going to have Christmas and Thanksgiving with a former big league ballplayer (Kelly didn't make the HOF until 1973). It also would have made a cool cartoon on the back of his card, with Rich looking at Kelly (with a pillbox style hat) and having a word balloon saying, "Hi, Cuz!" (I'll not try to draw the cartoon in Paint.)

I'd read in a geneology article (ain't Google great!) that Rich was managing the family farm after his baseball career. Then a September 2008 Boston Globe article credited Rich with being one of Dustin Pedroia's first hitting coaches, when Pedroia was about 7. Again, wouldn't it be kind of cool that an MVP's family would remember you as the child's instructor.

# 20 -- Don Wilson

Don Wilson

I like to see Don Wilson smiling. You see baseball gave him a lot to smile about. He was the ace of the Astros staff. He threw 2 no-hitters and was working on a third in 1974 when lifted for a pinch-hitter trailing 2-1 (walks and an error in the 5th). After that game, Don only pitched 4 more times, his last start a 2-hit shutout over the Braves.

There are some cards I hate to write about. This is the first. That's because Don's career ended when he was found dead in the passenger seat of his Thunderbird in the garage with the engine running. Cause of death was officially listed as accidental. As if this isn't enough, another tragic note to the story is that the garage was attached to the house and the carbon monoxide killed his son and put his daughter in a coma. Their bedrooms were above the garage. He was one of the first ballplayers I was familiar with that died during his career. I remember thinking the 10-11 year old equivalent of "Damn."

Don had several more good years left. One can only imagine what the Astros could have done if Don had been around to tandem with J.R. Richard through the late 70's and early 80's........There would have definitely been a lot of smiling.

1972 Feature

Harry Truman may be the most famous person from Missouri, unless you're a big fan of Yogi Berra, Samuel Clemens, Walt Disney or Bob Barker. He's certainly had the most historical significance of any Missourians. He ended World War II by having the guts to make a tough decision to drop the A-bomb on Japan, forcing their surrender.

He was the last President who didn't have a college education. Can you imagine that happening now. His education came in working under a political machine in Kansas City and rising through the ranks. There would usually be two reasons you'd rise through the ranks. One would be because you were talented. Just like today, the other reason would be because you were an obsequious butt kisser.

Truman died in 1972 at his home in Independence, Mo. The Truman Library is still a big tourist attraction in the K.C. area. I've been there and heartily recommend it to anyone in the area with even a passing interest in history. I do have to admit it's not as cool as the Ronald Reagan Library, where you can tour an actual Air Force One.

I remember watching Truman's funeral when I was a kid and listening to the commentary. Lyndon Johnson died in early 1973, so there were two big state funerals in a short time, but after that we didn't have any presidential funerals until President Nixon died. However, watching Truman's funeral fascinated me and the memory of it was enough to make me want to tune in to watch the funerals of Nixon, Reagan and Ford. When the next happens (it could be a while...although we have 2 ex-Presidents in their 80's, both Bush and Carter appear to be very strong and active. Clinton may be the most vulnerable, but that would be more because of a jealous husband's shotgun instead of his heart), tune in and watch, not just for the fawning and respect shown to whatever that President did, but to see the pagentry and respect given to the Office of the President of the United States.