Monday, July 8, 2019

NOT REALLY MISSING IN ACTION- AN UNEXPECTED DEDICATED ROOKIE: 1974 TOM HEINTZELMAN

I was originally going to create a “not so missing” 1975 card for former St. Louis Cardinal Tom Heintzelman, until I realized I already did one a while back.
So not to waste an airbrushing job on the image I already had set up, I decided to use it for a 1974 edition, even though he was on a multi-player rookie card in the set.
So for no other reason than laziness to work on another image of another player, consider this a “dedicated rookie”:


After a brief cup-of-coffee in 1973 that saw him hit .310 over 29 at-bats, he would be back in 1974 with the St. Louis Cardinals, appearing in 38 games, batting .230 with 17 hits over 74 at-bats.
He also had 10 runs scored and nine walks in that brief period of play, but would find himself spending the next few seasons in the Minor Leagues, putting up some nice numbers.
In 1977 he’d be back, albeit for only two games with the San Francisco Giants where he went 0-for-2 at the plate as a pinch-hitter before playing the last 27 games of his career the following season, batting .229 with eight hits in 35 at-bats, generally as a pinch-hitter.
All told he played four brief seasons, batting .243 with 34 hits in 140 at-bats spread out over 90 games with the Cardinals and Giants.