Sunday, May 4, 2014

REVISITING PITCHER BOB GARIBALDI- THIS TIME HIS 1970 LATE SERIES TOPPS CARD

Back in August of last year I profiled pitcher Bob Garibaldi and his 1971 Topps card (#701) because it showed him as a Kansas City Royal player even though he  never appeared in a single game for them in his career.
As a matter of fact, Garibaldi would never appear in another Major League game after the 1969 season, leaving us with a pretty cool mystery as to how he was photographed in a Royals uniform since he never suited up for them (I suspect it was a Spring training shot during the 1971 pre-season).
But it was only after I profiled this card that I realized that he was also given a high-numbered card in the 1970 Topps set (#681), even though he only appeared in ONE game during the 1969 season, good for only five innings!
Here's the card:


It's wild to think that this guy got a card in BOTH the 1970 and 1971 set based on one game and five innings!
For his career Garibaldi totaled 15 games and 26.1 innings over four sparse years pitching for the San Francisco Giants, finishing with an 0-2 record and a 3.08 E.R.A.
He pitched in the bulk of his games during his rookie year in 1962 with 9, then got into four games in 1963, a game in 1966 and that final game in 1969.
I'm sure it's little or no consolation to him, but at least he walked away from the game with TWO baseball cards as a Big Leaguer.
"Half-full" right?!