MLB Showdown Obsession

 The arguments are over. New York had entered it's awkward 4 year gap where there was the Yankees and nothing else. The Giants and Dodgers are gone to the west coast, another city claims the title of baseballs best team, New Yorkers don't know what to think. Willie Mays and Duke Snider are wearing mostly the same uniforms, it's the caps that only seem wrong. The familiar overlapping NY on Mays is now an SF, while the classic B on Snider is now an interlocking LA. Utter chaos! No doubt Snider has had better cards but Mays has taken the transition to California in stride. Mantle remains the top option, even if he took a small step back from his back-to-back MVP seasons. While the National League has a completely different look for 1958, the end result was the same as last year, as was the American League; the pennant winners were once again the Braves and Yankees. The NYC dynasty was over, but there was still one team in the city determined not to let some other location domi...

 There was a huge injustice in the 2024 Hall of Fame election. An unbelievable oversight happened. A player who was far more deserving of votes got robbed. Sheffield? Wagner? Utley? No. I'm talking about the Showdown legend himself, Bartolo Colon! Anyway, Cooperstown did get to add 4 new plaques to the hallowed halls in 2024. And while they're not as beloved as Big Sexy was, there were pretty damn notable in their own right. Funny thing I noticed was I tried making some cards in the 2001 Showdown format, but that does something that the other variations don't do and allow a team logo on the card. For Helton and Mauer, that isn't such a problem, but I prefer when I make Hall of Fame cards that the only logo is the Cooperstown Collection logo, so the 2000 format (the best one anyway) will be the norm for modern era players. Also inducted: Jim Leyland (Manager - Pittsburgh Pirates / Detroit Tigers / Florida Marlins)

 I just happened to notice as I was prepping for the 2024 Hall of Fame cards that I was about to hit 100 posts on this project. That's a pretty cool milestone and calls for a form of celebration, so instead of continuing one of my ongoing series sets or stating something new, I figure we can get a little bit self-indulgent. I'm a big baseball fan, and as I was growing up, I sought out to get as many autographs of players as I could. There were numerous ways to accomplish that task. My personal favorite way to get autographs was to hit up a Minor League game and thrust a baseball or autograph book at a player among a mass of fellow fans and hope my offering was chosen to be signed. Some guys turned out to be nobodies, others turned out to be stars, which should make for a fun assortment of cards to make now. So, using the random assortment of nobodies and stars as a guide for the Bot , let's see some of the men who gave me their autographs... Pat Kelly was my first autograph...

 The west coast was calling. Both the Dodgers and Giants were fed up with their aging home parks and wanted fresh fields. Queens tried to seduce them, but ultimately LA and SF won out, allowing the Dodgers and Giants maintain their regional rivalry. Not that the championship count left things in doubt, but the two NY franchises were conceding supremacy to the Yankees. There was still one more season to play, however. As elite as Snider and Mays are, don't get me wrong, the gap was widening with Mantle putting up another MVP season and standing above all peers. Even if the Giants and Dodgers would stay, there was no longer any doubt who was the top tier Centerfielder in NY, Mantle being alone next year was just a visual confirmation. Perhaps there was a sense of "what's the point" or perhaps the Braves were just that good, but the Milwaukee Braves stood on top of the NL, so the Giants and Dodgers close out their stays in NY without postseason play. The Yankees, of cour...