5 Baseball Cards that Really NEED Spring Training

Nothing a few wind sprints and some scissors can't fix

According to my sources, the first round of pitchers and catchers report (or actually workout) today — thank you, Chicago Cubs!

To celebrate this momentous occasion, here are five baseball cards of guys that look like they really need Spring Training, in some way or another.

1957 Topps Smoky Burgess (#228)

Smoky Burgess split his best years among three teams.

To wit…

He played the most seasons with the Pirates.

He hit more homers with the Reds than with any other team.

He was at his most potent offensively during four years with the Phillies early in his career.

And Burgess began (Cubs) and finished (White Sox) his playing days in Chicago.

No matter where he was, though, and in every one of those seasons, from 1949 through 1967, he looked like what he was — a catcher.

The fetching 1957 Topps card above is a great example, showing him at (probably) age 29 with my Reds in 1956. He’s bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in this pic, but hiking that belt up to his armpits didn’t fool anyone.

No, if you had been a coach in camp with no knowledge of who Burgess was, you might have been inclined to tell him to take a few more laps. In the interest of burning off that accumulated holiday cheer, you understand.

Of course, that probably didn’t happen too often for a nine-time All-Star who also finished his career as the most prolific pinch hitter in major league history. His 144 pinch hits were the standard from 1967 until Manny Mota passed him late in the 1979 season.

1980 Topps Ross Grimsley (#375)

Grimsley underwent quite the style transformation from his early days with the Reds through his wild and woolly romps with the Orioles, Expos, and Indians later in his career. We ran through the complete dossier of card-photographic evidence once upon a time right here.

For our purposes today, this 1980 Topps beauty shows Grimsley near the peak of his career and of his Grizzly Adams phase . In 1978, he went 20-11 with a 3.05 ERA for the Expos and garnered his only All-Star selection and Cy Young votes. And, though he was never quite the same after pitching 263 innings that year, he maintained peak wooliness for at least another couple of years.

Here, Grimsley looks like he stumbled into an preseason baseball game on his way back from a winter’s-long mammoth hunt. Maybe a Spring Training trim was in the works?

Given his hirsute track record, and in the words of my childhood oracle, my sources say no.

1982 Fleer Woodie Fryman (#189)

By the time this card was issued, Woodie Fryman was on the cusp of his 42nd birthday. I know now that 42 is still young, and for many/most of us, the best is yet to come at that age.

But 42 was and still is pretty ancient for a baseball player, especially a pitcher with 16 seasons and more than 2300 innings under his hard-working belt entering a new season. So it’s not too surprising that Fryman would need a breather every now and then. And, indeed, Fryman had a run of cards late in his career showing him taking a load off in various fashions — criss-cross applesauce, propped up on a stool in the bullpen, casual leg-cross conversation repose in the dugout.

But even in those same last years, some Fryman cards also show him bringing the goods from the mound in live game action. So you gotta figure the old man is just starting to work on his stamina in this shot.

Give him a couple of spring outings to get his game legs under him, and Fryman is a sure bet to have enough endurance to stand for a card photo shoot.

1987 Fleer Bob Horner (#632)

If somehow you’re not old enough to remember Bob Horner, you might look at this card and wonder why John Daly is holding four baseballs. And if you’re not old enough to know who Daly is, then I have no idea how you made it this far into these ramblings.

But back to Horner…

The Braves slugger hit baseballs like a sledgehammer as the 20-year-old first overall draft pick in 1978, stepping right into the Atlanta lineup without stopping off in the minors. He won the National League Rookie of the Year award thanks to 23 home runs and 63 RBI even though he played just 89 games with the Braves that summer.

As you might expect, Horner drew comparisons to the game’s greats right off the bat — why, this young man was going to be the next Babe Ruth! Unfortunately, Horner’s likeness to the Bambino extended out of the batter’s box and to the dinner table. Horner even had a clause in one of his contracts that paid him bonuses for keeping his weight below a fairly generous limit.

So this pic seems to fit perfectly with the narrative that Horner was always too heavy and never conditioned enough. Looks like he just came out on the wrong side of some wind sprints, right?

In reality, though, this card commemorates Horner’s four-homer game in 1986. So it’s not really fair to include it here to illustrate the slugger as a man in need of a tune-up, but the visuals fit.

And besides, baseball cards aren’t always fair. Just ask Chuck Cottier.

1989 Donruss Ron Washington (#468)

Or Ron Washington. I’ve written about this card in some detail before, right here, but it’s not hard to imagine how it fits in with our theme here…right?

You’ve been at home all winter, up north somewhere — Cleveland, maybe, if you believe Sweet’s card. You roll out of bed on the first morning of Spring Training, rumble into the ballpark, and bam! The sunlight knocks your socks off and seers your eyes like a hot poker.

After months of clouds and darkness, it’s almost too much to bear.

(Sure, Washington’s from Louisiana, but that doesn’t fit the narrative quite as well. Roll with it.)

So Wash will be fine after a day or two of taking grounders in the dirt and hacks at the plate. His eyes just need to adjust. He just needs the spring breeze to blow the icy cobwebs from the corners of his mind.

Of course, there’s another story arc here that involves too much frivolity celebrating the opening of camp the night before this pic was snapped. I’ll let you fill in the blanks for that one.

—

Hard to believe we’re finally standing on the brink of Spring Training! I can only hope my own winter prep won’t leave me embarrassed when my next baseball card starts showing up in wax packs.

Typing is cardio, right?

Thanks for reading, and hold on tight. We’ve got nine months of diamond bliss (and silliness) in front of us!

—Adam

The 2025 Spring Training Baseball Card Challenge - Jump In!

Starting today (or sort of yesterday), I’ll be tackling a themed baseball card each day over in the Baseball Cards Daily Newsletter. Check out all the details right here, and then jump into the fray…play ball!