Leon was traded from the Cleveland Indians over to the Chicago White Sox for Walt “No Neck” Williams on October 19th, 1972, necessitating the art you see here.
Leon had a couple of seasons under his belt as a starter for Cleveland early in the decade, appearing in 152 and 131 games in 1970 and 1971 respectively before getting in a half season in 1972.
For Chicago, he was back to full-time, appearing in 127 games for the White Sox, batting .228 with 91 hits over 399 at-bats.
1974 saw him only play in 31 games, before getting traded in December of that year to the New York Yankees, where he’d play one single game during the 1975 before being released in May.
He would go on to play in the Mexican League in 1976 before retiring as a player, finishing his MLB career with a .236 batting average wit 440 hits in 1862 at-bats in 601 games.
Always fun to see how Topps would crop an airbrushed image, in this case you can see the very top of the “Cleveland” across his chest on the released card, with the crayon-like paint job on his hat.
