I was rummaging through cards the other day and was really focusing
on players I had no clue about. As I was flipping through the last
series in the 1970 set I came across a Lou Marone card (#703).
Now, me being an Italian, I always take a second look at a
player with a name that's something out of my own neighborhood, so I
checked his career out on Baseball-Reference.com and found exactly what I was
looking for: one of those players who got a heck
of a lot more life out of his baseball card than his own career.
By the time his 1970 card came around, Marone's career was pretty
much already done. He appeared in only one game for the Pirates that
year, going 2.1 innings and giving up a homer. And that was it. Not just
for the year, but for his career.
In 1969 he posted some pretty solid stats, appearing in 29 games
out of the 'pen and sporting a split 1-1 record with a nifty 2.55 E.R.A.
in 35.1 innings. He also had 25 K's while only giving up 24 hits. Not
too bad at all.
I couldn't find much else on his career, other than he finally hung
them up in 1972 after some Minor League action in the Pirates
organization.
I've always had a soft-spot for guys that appeared on cards, only
to be out of the game by the time their little claim to fame on
cardboard was out there for kids to gawk at when they ripped open packs
come Spring the following year.
Here's to you Lou. Hope you found better success outside the game later on!
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| Card #703 in the 1970 Topps set. |