5 Terrifying Baseball Cards of Bespectacled Hurlers

I dare you to step into the batter's box

The late, sometimes great Paul Splittorff was born on October 8, 1946. That makes today the 77th anniversary of his birth — the Royals’ hurler died of cancer in 2011.

Splittorff had a long and distinguished career for Kansas City and was an important part of some awesome teams. But he pitched his last game in June of 1984, just a few months before K.C. made the playoffs for the first time during my fandom.

But I did get a decent dose of Splittorff baseball cards in my wax packs in both 1983 and 1984.

He made an immediate impression on me because of 1) his unusual name (“Paul” is pretty wild, huh?), 2) his glasses, and — when I turned the cards over — 3) he was born in Evansville.

Hoosier in da house!

But it was #2 that really made Splittorff stick in my mind. There’s just something, uh, unsettling about a pitcher in specs. And if I feel that way sitting here behind my keyboard, imagine how opposing hitters must feel?

So, to celebrate Paul and his eyesight and his birthday, here are 5 fun baseball cards of pitchers wearing glasses. Dig in if you dare.

1960 Topps Ryne Duren (#204)

This is the pitching equivalent of that 1957 Topps card showing Ted Kluszewski with his pitcher-killing pythons unleashed and ready to strike. Or, squeeze, I guess.

Look at Duren’s Wikipedia entry, and you’ll read right upfront that he had a reputation for …

A blazing fastball.

Poor eyesight.

You wouldn’t necessarily know about the heat by looking at this card, but you might be able to guess about the eyesight.

You gotta figure Duren’s managers and pitching coaches handed out copies of his baseball cards to opposing batters before his appearances.

1978 Topps Greg Minton (#312)

This card is spectacular in its heinosity, but the garish, Hall-of-Fame-level airbrush job usually overshadows many of the other amazing attributes of this pasteboard.

The Bugs Bunny treatment of Minton’s teeth is pretty over-the-top. Look at his other cards, and you’ll see a prominent smile, but not quite to this Crest Generation level.

And you might not have noticed how much, beneath the Giants cap and double-willy-worm mustache, Minton looks like Gunny from Major Dad. Look it up, Skippy.

And then there are the glasses, crafted from ‘57 Chevy bumpers and complete with a reflection of some far away light source. Probably one of Sy Berger’s bright ideas poofing into existence.

Lost in all this is that Minton turned in a few astounding relief seasons for San Francisco while setting a record for the most consecutive innings pitched without allowing a home run.

1981 Topps Tom Hume (#419)

Tom Hume was my first favorite baseball player, and he’s still right up there.

Even before I was sentenced to a life wearing glasses, his Clark Kent — OK, more like Radar O’Reilly — demeanor really spoke to me.

So, for years, when I was throwing tattered baseballs against the target my dad painted on the back of an old barn, I was Tom Hume.

Instead of, “Game 7, bottom of the ninth, down by three, bases loaded, 3-2 count, Casey at the bat” it was “Tom Hume just needs to throw 10 more strikes in a row to be anointed the greatest pitcher of all time.”

Yes, Tom Hume the GOAT. I said it, and I’ll stick by it.

At least on summer evenings, when the hustle and bustle of the day is done, and the air is thick and hot, and the sweat on the outside of the lemonade glass feels like the cool touch of an arctic angel against my forehead.

When the only sounds are crickets and rustling leaves and maybe a night creature starting to coo or howl in the distance.

And my fastballs — Tom Hume’s fastballs — crashing into the old, beaten plywood, a thunder crack guiding the way to immortality.

Then, definitely, Tom Hume is the greatest.

1983 Topps Paul Splittorff (#316)

Splittorff, you already know about. And, really, his glasses weren’t all that much to write home about compared to the other guys here.

But this is a great card, like most 1983 Topps cards are.

First, you have the interesting motion, with the ball hanging out there in the space between the ground and Splittorff’s, uh, backside.

The ball looks pretty precarious, if you ask me, and the shot is giving me Leon Lett flashbacks.

And then there is the blazing, eye-bleeding death-by-blue brightness of the card design, the Royals uniforms, and even the perfect sky in the inset. Pretty sure that’s what Heaven looks like, with apologies to that cornfield in Iowa.

1993 Action Packed Kent Tekulve (#167)

There’s a term in certain circles that’s used to describe a sort of spiritual experience that’s hard to come by through the ho-hum means presented by everyday life.

To hear those who have “achieved” this state, you usually have to take a kind of trip to get there.

And when you do, the story goes, you’ll see things you never thought you would. Or could.

Sometimes, though, the experience goes bad. And when your trip to find said experience goes bad, the things you see on the other side are, well, frightening.

Kent Tekulve appeared on some pretty amazing baseball cards over the years. His 1979 Topps is a sunny masterpiece that might eventually be implicated in the polar ice shrinkage.

Tekulve’s submarine delivery made several cardboard appearances, and that in itself made for some amazing cards. He’s throwing overhanded here, though, and it’s not all that masterful of a pose for him.

Sorta reminds me of someone.

Add in the black and gold of the old Pirates uniforms, and the tight-cropped, tilted image, and you can feel the uneasiness creeping up in your throat.

And then you remember that actual live batters had to stand in against skinny little shade-wearing Donald Sutherland here, and the scary shakes start squirming up your thighs.

And then, well, Action Packed went all Action Packed on the thing and popped Tekulve out of the card here and there and gave him, like, some sort of white chin strap thing.

Is that really a chin strap? Did Tekulve just come off a shift as a palace guard?

Finally, you realize this card was issued in 1993, four years after he finished his career … with the Reds.

You can’t unsee this, and I apologize for that. But not really. You had to see this card, and you’d have kicked yourself if you missed out.

Bad trip or not.

—

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go clean my glasses and maybe look for some Charlie Kerfeld cards in that box of once-were phenoms that I still check a few times a year to see if any of them broke out again.

And, definitely, I have to find a piece of plywood so I can try to keep my elbow together while I deliver Tom Hume to the pitching promised land.

He’s the greatest, after all.

Thanks for reading.

—Adam