5 Baseball Cards that Can Handle the Glare

All of them are (kinda) the same...Yahtzee!

Welcome to December and, more importantly for our purposes, to George Foster’s 76th birthday.

Foster was one of those Big Red Machine legends who had left the Riverfront behind by the time I started following baseball in 1983, but whose impact continued to echo throughout Reds-dom.

He was also another guy (like Pete Rose) whom I first learned about from my dad, a football guy who only ever tolerated baseball to get to the gum and throw away the cards…and later, to spend time with me.

So pulling a George Foster card was always a special treat for me, even though he was wearing the “wrong” uniform every time. That was true right up through Yahtzee’s last cards, issued in 1986.

In fact, his last Topps card was so cool, it had to wear shades. And it also inspired this edition of Sunday Sillies.

Here, then, are five baseball cards worthy of an invite to George Foster’s birthday party and well-equipped to withstand the glare from his cake.

1986 Topps George Foster (#680)

Foster has more swagger on this one card than I’ve crammed into more than half a century on this rock. He was 36 in that pic (likely taken in 1985), too, not a young baseball man. Pretty much a baseball geezer, in fact, but still tough enough to hit 21 home runs in 129 games for the Mets.

The next season wouldn’t be as kind to Foster, as Mets manager Davey Johnson benched him in favor of a young Kevin Mitchell. The bad blood and sound bytes that followed clouded Foster’s remaining time in New York, and he finished the season — and his career — with a 15-game wind-down with the White Sox.

Today, most old fans rightly remember Foster for his amazing MVP season in 1977, when he hit 52 home runs. That made him the only 50-homer man between Willie Mays in 1965 and Cecil Fielder in 1990.

That bought him a lifetime pass to the “Sunglasses Whenever and Wherever I Want Club.”

1970 Topps Lowell Palmer (#252)

I waffled back and forth between this rookie card and Palmer’s 1971 Topps card for this slot. That one is (a bit) more action-packed and has more of a 70s feel, and of course those black borders set off the Roy Orbison effect to good, well, effect.

This one, meanwhile, is all Men-in-Black intrigue, along with the old-school Phillies jersey that makes you want to lace up a pair of Chuck Taylor All-Stars. Palmer’s 1972 card is even more “period,” complete with skewed photo, longer hair, and psychedelic borders. His shades game is not quite as strong on that one, though.

As for Palmer’s on-field game, he spent parts of five seasons in the majors from 1969 through 1974, going 5-18 with a 5.29 ERA in 106 appearances for the Phillies, Cardinals, Indians, and Padres.

One of the hallmarks of his game was wildness, which manifested in 202 walks in 316 2/3 innings and two seasons with double-digit wild pitches despite topping 100 innings just once.

Couple all that with the dark glasses, and stepping into the box against him must have been an unsettling experience.

1978 Topps Henry Cruz (#316)

Not sure what the name for this style of glasses is, but they’re pretty much the eyewear equivalent of a mullet or the El Camino. I mean, where else can you get the buttoned-down reliability of an accountant combined with the promise of an afterwork soiree at the local discotheque all rolled up into one package? The wide, wide White Sox lapel adds to the promise of late night splendor.

Cruz spent parts of four seasons in the majors, two each with the Dodgers and White Sox. In all, he hit .227 with eight home runs and 34 RBI in 171 games as an outfielder and pinch hitter. He did manage to steal one base…and to get caught four times.

After his playing days, Cruz then embarked on a long run as a scout and director of the Dodgers’ academy in the Dominican Republic. We can only hope that he passed along his ocular fashion sense to some impressionable young players along the way.

1979 Topps Reggie Jackson (#700)

The evidence (read, “the internet”) suggests that sunglasses have been around for centuries. But Reggie in shades almost seems like a chicken-and-egg situation.

Were there really sunglasses before Reggie, or did the delivery-room doctor cobble something together to help the bambino cope with the spotlight that was destined to follow him around all his life?

Or maybe Reggie came pre-adorned with a pair of Ray-Bans?

Whatever the case, few ballplayers seem as perfectly suited to be perpetually photographed wearing dark glasses as Reggie. His swagger — and swing — have been larger than life for as long as most of us can remember, and the diamond exploits of Mr. October keep him a hobby favorite nearly four decades after his retirement.

There are no shortage of baseball cards showing Reggie in his shades, so you can take your pick: the 1975 Topps, 1976 Topps, (sorta) 1977 Topps, 1981 Fleer, 1982 Topps Traded, 1982 Donruss, and 1982 Fleer sets — among others — all put offerings on the showroom table.

1984 Topps Kent Tekulve (#754)

Like Reggie, Tekulve offers many chances to catch him wearing sunglasses on cardboard. One of my favorites is his 1978 Topps card, which shows him pitching in Pirates pinstripes, with a sundrenched crowd in the background.

The specs are a little tougher to see on that card than they are on this one, though, and 1984 Topps not only gives us two doses of the effect we’re looking for, it also gives us Teke’s trademark goofy smile.

As for his exploits on the mound, Tekulve ranked second all-time with 1050 appearances when he retired in 1989. Only Hoyt Wilhelm (1070) stood ahead of him then, and Tekulve still holds down ninth place today.

Teke’s peak came just before the closer revolution of the 1980s, but he did pick up 184 saves in his career. He also racked up a tidy 2.85 ERA over more than 1400 innings pitched.

What’s more, you can always count on Tekulve to win the “Early Career Donald Sutherland Look-alike Contest” at the annual reunion of the 1970 Salem Rebels.

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Seeing as how we’re in the last month of the year now, feel free to recast all these picks as “snow glasses” cards if you like. No matter how you cut it, though, these were and are some fun baseball cards.

Which, of course, is a bit like saying a particular ice cream cone tastes good. Peak redundancy, in other words.

Thanks for reading.

—Adam