Friday, January 20, 2017

SPECIAL REQUEST: 1973 "MISSING" JIM BIBBY

I had a “special request” recently to create a 1973 card for Jim Bibby, as a Texas Ranger, though he actually started the season as a St. Louis Cardinal.
Nevertheless, here you go:


If this was something I would have created for myself it would have been a Cardinals card, but to be honest I never even realized he wasn’t in the 1973 set to begin with. So let’s consider this a “traded” card of sorts.
After six appearances with the Cardinals to start off the 1973 season, Bibby found himself down in Texas, and would soon go on to throw a no-hitter for his new team on July 30th against the eventual World Champion Oakland A’s.
He would go on to have a nice 12-year career that saw him go 111-101 with a 3.76 earned run average over 340 appearances, 239 of which were starts.
His bests seasons would be his back-to-back years with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1979 and 1980 that saw him go 31-10, leading the league in winning percentage both times, while being named to the National League all-star team in ’80 while finishing third in the Cy Young race.