Mets Baseball Cards Like They Ought To Be!: 1967 Topps

Zvon

From 2014 with some updates:

Merry Christmas everybody. Happy Chanukah too. And happy holidays to those who have a problem with good 'ol seasons greetings.

Wasn't planning on a Christmas post but I just learned Mets Fantazy Cards Like They Ought To Be hit 100,000 (now app. 500,000) views last week. That is absolutely amazin' and deserves a celebration in it's own right.

So for the holidays lets get a peek at some future cards. Or past cards. To you, new cards. :)

This post goes out to Pat Scalzo @Christmas, who twisted my arm and said," make more cards you slowpoke!" My New Years resolution is to post more frequently Pat.
(I've really tailed off recently, sorry)

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1983 Topps was one of my favorite designs. Pretty much a more modern rehash of the 1963 design.
But George Foster was not one of my favorite Mets. Actually, I hated him (as a player) and his acquisition. But still, he was a Met so he gets a card. I'm like Oprah with the cards. Everybody gets a card! You get a card, and you get a card, and...

I liked Kevin Elster. I liked him even better after he left the Mets and had a great season with Texas, launching 24 long balls and driving in 99 (his only full season apart from the New York). I didn't like that he wasn't a Mets player anymore, but I wished him well on departure and he didn't suck.

An mfc card in memory of Ray Sadecki. This card won't make the '77 pages. It's an alt that did not make the cut. I have made many alt cards for many players that did not make the cut for some reason (pictured in the wrong year is common), and they have not, and for the most part, will not be seen. I don't want to thin down the mfc collection (1 reg card per player for each year with some special exceptions) or use up all the pics and over saturate the project. I did make the horizontal 77 border for Sadecki's card, and that won't go to waste. The picture used on this will be applied to his '75 mfc card.

Since deGrom won ROY (AND NOW A CY YOUNG!!!) I will display an alt card in celebration. At least I think I only posted one of these here..

deGROMs 2019 mfc card v.1

Someday I'll finish Tom Seaver's tribute page (I suppose I better start it first) and this next card will be used. I added the RC symbol, then removed it, because the MLB 100th yr anniversary logo had not been created yet in 1967.

When Topps first added the RC symbol they said that it would be restricted for use on only one version of a players card, denoting his one and only actual Topps rookie card. But recently they seem to throw that symbol on anything close to first year cards, and on more than one card of the same player. Shame on them for that.

So what if they did add a RC rookie symbol on the '67 Topps card, what might it have looked like? I figure something like the one pictured in the card.

What should this be called?

Tom Seaver '67 mfc Update Set card?

'67mfc Seaver/Westrum SP card

Tom gets the ball in 1967 from Mets manager Wes Westrum. Behind Tom you get a glimpse of the 1967 off-white OF wall. The wall was this color the day Tom pitched his first MLB game. Could this picture have been taken on that day? A week or two later the wall was changed to the dark green that it wore throughout the late 60's and early 70's.

Zvon

Batmagadanleadoff of the Crane Pool Forum recently shared some amazing & rare photographs of Shea Stadium during the first week of the 1967 season. The subject was not Greg Goossen, but Shea Stadium's outfield wall, which can be seen in the background.

What is going on with that outfield wall?

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From 1964 through to the end of the '66 baseball season, Shea's outfield walls were a lighter green than in the 1970's. The distance markers (371,410,etc.) on the walls were white (see below). The plexi-glass bullpen sections were yet to be added.

Shea Stadium outfield wall 1964

From early 1967 up until the 1980 rebuild the outfield walls were a dark green, sometimes appearing to be a greenish blue.

Starting the '67 season, the walls were much lighter and the distance markers were no longer white, but black. This was only during the seasons opening homestand. These photographs were taken on April 20th, 1967, as Tom Seaver took to the mound to make his very first career start.

When the Mets returned from their first road trip of the season the walls had been re-painted the darker green many of us became familiar with.

So, what's the story? Were the Mets trying a new color scheme? It's certainly possible. Were the walls not ready for the season and this is a temporary primer coat before they applied the darker green? That's my theory but it's purely speculation.

What's the big deal & who cares? This is part of Shea's history and I want the story. The truth is out there (X-Files is returning-WOOT). Does anyone know exactly what was going on with the OF wall in early '67?

Oh, btw, as soon as I saw the Shea photo with Goossen I knew I had to make a card for it. What an amazin' picture. Goose gets a '67t mfc card, thanks to Batmags for sharing these wonderful & rare shots.

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Blog News ALERT!!!::::::::::::

The Kidnapping Of A Wallet Card

The following story is true. The names have not been used because nobody is guilty of anything.

So we had a little birthday dinner for my fathers 87th birthday the end last month. During a delicious dinner that my sister in law had prepared (and brought over) I told my brothers about The Wallet Card, and how Defgav of Baseball Card Breakdown introduced the concept to the blogisphere.

I had chosen a 1990 Dunruss (ugly card design or ugliest card design ever?) David Cone and I brought the card out from its designated section of my wallet. The card didn't look much worse for the wear as it was passed around the table just like a dish of potatos. When it came back to me I laid it aside and got back to the feast. Little did I know I had sealed Cones fate and set in motion the events leading up to...THE KIDNAPPING OF A WALLET CARD!!!!

Sad part is after everyone left I didn't even notice the card was missing. I thought I had returned it to my wallet since it was no longer on the counter where I put it. I had opened my wallet a number of times since that dinner but It didn't dawn on me that Cone was not there, looking up at me like he had every day for the last few weeks. Out of sight, out of mind. I had no idea that not only was David Cone not in my wallet, he was no longer even in the house!

I should have been more aware! I should have been out searching for him! I should have been wracked with guilt! I was none of these things. Not even when my brother called me 3 or 4 days later with an inquiry that I was not expecting. "How's your wallet card doing?," my brother asked. I leaned forward in my chair, thinking, wow, my brother's actually concerned about my wallet card. "It's doing fine, I guess." I reached for my wallet, opened it and my least fears were realized. Cone was gone! "Shit, it's gone. Where's my wallet card?"

I had to sit through close to a minute of laughter before he was able to communicate further. "Your wallet card is right here in my hand. My wife found it on the floor of her car. lol!" "What?! How'd that happen?" The last I could recall I had laid it down on the kitchen counter.

Well, it seems that my brother's wife had taken a tray of leftovers in plastic Handi-Wrap and put it down on the counter on top of the card. When she was leaving she took the tray, not knowing that David Cone was stuck to the bottom, the plastic wrap trapping him like a web, unwilling to let go.

He must have become unstuck during the trip home and fallen to the floor of the vehicle, where he would stay for some 72 hours, silently suffering. My sister in law found it and was gonna toss it, but then thought it might belong to my brother so she brought it in and showed it to him. I think he then proceeded to laugh for 24 hours straight before he called me.

The following day he came over, returning the card to me, and I returned it to its proper place in my wallet. It got a lil' dog eared on it's adventure, but I have to say the card still looks pretty good. The design might suck but that's some pretty sturdy cardboard they used.

Zvon