MLB Showdown Obsession

  Hundley had a wonderful chart in the 2000 set, but my God, his on-base was hard to swallow. Back in1996, however, he had his career year that makes for a much better card. I've said it before, and here it continues, reduce the homers on a chart (14-20 on the Showdown card vs the 16-20 on this card) in exchange for a better on-base (6 vs 8) will always lead to more homers for a player. Also helps that his defense gets a touch better here. Speed sucks here, but he is a Catcher after all... Hansen had a great on-base in Showdown (a perfect 10) but absolutely no chart to go with it. He had nice infield coverage (1B/3B) but no defense to go with it (+0 for both positions). Speed was also poor at a C. Hansen wasn't a terrible card, but only for a pinch-hit situation where you need to get on base and don't care how, then immediately get him out of there for a defensive replacement. *This* version of Hansen is still slow (but a C11 speed is a touch better than a standard C10) and...

 The 2023 HoF vote gave us one regular addition and one addition from the new "Contemporary Era" selection. Scott Rolen took 7 tries to get that phone call while the Crime Dog McGriff needed to wait beyond the standard time, feel rejected, then get a 2nd look over his fellow overlook peers and finally get the nod for himself. Enjoy their special HoF cards with a choice selection of their seasons...

 Baseball history contains some perfect games pitched by some pretty incredible individuals. And then there are some far less accomplished men who have retired 27 straight men in a game. Charlie Robertson ranks as one of those lesser known men. On April 30, 1922, Robertson was given the ball in his fourth ever start in the big leagues, and took to the hill against the Tigers in Detroit. The White Sox rookie had the highlight of his life that afternoon as he baffled the Tigers hitters, so much so that manager Ty Cobb, ever the gracious loser, was constantly crying that Charlie was cheating. It was the first true perfect game pitched by someone on the road. Robertson's season was pretty pedestrian after that, going 14-15. 1922 turned out to be his best year, as he would never get that close to a winning record again, going 49-80 for his career. In the Michael Coffey book "27 Men Out" he was referred to as "Hands down, Robertson is the least-accomplished pitcher to have...