Here's a "traded" card I designed for the eventual 1978 Cy Young
Award winner, Gaylord Perry, shown with the proper team he played for
that year, the San Diego Padres.
Take a look:
Perry was coming off of some decent years for the Rangers before he was traded to the Padres in January of 1978.
He posted two consecutive years of 15 wins, and at the age of 38, you couldn't ask for much more than that in 1978.
But he far surpassed everyone's expectations and put in one of his
best years as a big league pitcher, going 21-6 with a 2.75 earned run
average, a couple of shutouts and 154 strikeouts.
Those numbers would eventually make Perry the first pitcher ever to
win the Cy in both leagues, as he was the American League's winner six
years earlier in 1972 with the Cleveland Indians.
Because of the January trade, Topps still had him as a Texas Ranger when the (awesome) 1978 set came out.
The 1978 season would NOT be Perry's last "big" hurrah, as he'd
stick around until 1983, winning his 300th game and overtaking Walter
Johnson on the all-time strikeout list along the way, finishing up with
314 lifetime wins and 3534 strikeouts over 777
games, with 690 of them starts.
He also tallied 53 career shutouts, 303 complete games, and a 3.11 E.R.A.
All of that got him inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1991, getting named on 342 of 443 ballots.
