5 Slugging Baseball Cards that Still Stir the Summer Breeze

Unless you're standing in Downtown Cooperstown

Do you know what today is?

Yeah, sure, it’s the halfway point between Christmases.

But that means it’s also Carlos Delgado’s birthday. The former Blue Jays (and Marlins and Mets) slugger turns 51 today.

Cool age. Just saying.

And, when I stumbled onto the one-time catching prospect’s birthday, I was also reminded just how good he was. Like, if-you-want-a-guy-who-hits-.300-with-40-home-runs-and-120-RBI-every-year-he’s-your-guy kinda good.

Delgado ended up with 473 career home runs, too. That’s a big number, even if it doesn’t seem all that huge in the context of his era.

But, for as good as he was, I realize Delgado will never get into the Hall of Fame. Part of it is that era of his again, and part of it is his fewer-than-45 WAR.

He was super fun to watch, though, and gives me the perfect segway to talk about some big-slugger baseball cards that I’ve always loved.

Yeah, even though the guys pictured won’t make the Cooperstown cut, either. Probably.

1977 Topps Dave Kingman (#500)

This is one of the greatest cards in the 1977 Topps set, and one of the most dramatic.

Even though Kingman himself looks typically chill, with his eyes half open.

But, man, it feels like he either just hit a ball all the way to Archie Bunker’s house or spawned a tornado inside Shea Stadium.

Somehow, Kingman managed to hit 442 home runs while collecting just 300 total hits (slight exaggeration), which only adds to the Kong mystique.

This card helps, too.

Kingman won’t make the Hall of Fame, but if Christian Bale gets off his butt before he gets too old and gray, Kong just might make the big screen.

1978 Topps Darrell Evans (#215)

Darrell Evans hit 40 home runs for the Detroit Tigers to lead the American League at age 38 in 1985.

That big-mash performance came 12 years after Howdy Doody’s only other 40-dinger season, when he was Hank Aaron’s teammate with the 1973 Braves.

Evans would have a few more big big-fly seasons for the Tigers before he was done, too.

Between his stints with Atlanta and Detroit, though, Evans played for some mediocre (and worse) Giants teams.

On his 1978 Topps card, he appears to be staring at the ball that’s just landed in a Pirate catcher’s mitt, perhaps wondering why it betrayed him.

A year later, he completes the scene by breaking the fourth wall to ask us if we can even believe that his 1979 Giants slid backward 18 games from 1978.

1981 Fleer C. Nettles (#87)

Graig Nettles is arguably the best third baseman not in the Hall of Fame.

That, thanks to nearly 68 WAR, 390 home runs, and a couple of Gold Gloves.

Many observers think he should have won more of those last baubles during his 22-year major league career.

But Craig Nettles? Now that dude is already a Hall of Famer, at least from a hobby standpoint.

You want to see Patient Zero for the 1980s error card pandemic? You’re looking at him, bub…

1983 Topps Dwight Evans (#135)

Another Evans!

This one has some pretty nifty earlier cards that might have fit nicely in this slot. But this is the way I found him when I started following baseball in 1983, so this is the one for me.

And besides, the ‘stache didn’t start appearing on cardboard until 1982. So those early cards sorta don’t count, anyway — Dewey ain’t Dewey with a bare upper lip.

As for the player himself, he probably has the best HOF case on this list.

With 2400+ hits, 385 home runs, and 67+ WAR, he looks pretty good next to some actual enshrinees. That includes a former teammate with a remarkably similar batting line.

1986 Donruss Jose Canseco (#39)

Of course, this card ruled the hobby for a good hunk of the late 1980s. And it was one of the key players in making Rookie Card a proper noun.

Canseco was making big waves in the minors in 1985, smacking 36 homers between Double- and Triple-A stops.

He clubbed 5 more for the big league A’s in September and also hit .302.

Jose was going to be the next big thing … and then he actually was.

This was a $3 card out of the pack the next spring and it didn’t really look back until 1989 — fast cars, guns, Madonna, a broken wrist.

Jose eventually mostly self-destructed from a baseball standpoint, but this card maintains a lot of its mystique for us oldsters.

It’s also sorta fun to make fun of in retrospect…

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So there you go — five classic sluggers who probably won’t make the Hall of Fame.

But five (OK, seven) baseball cards that are hobby legends and worthy of a plaque of their own.

You can hang their hardware right there on your wall next to the exotic and extinct “Batting Leaders” section and the “Keith Hernandez Commemorative GWRBI” trophy perched atop the table made of fungo bats.

Thanks for reading.

—Adam