Friday, April 23, 2021

TRADED- 1975 WILLIE DAVIS

Up on the blog today we have a nifty 1975 "traded" card for "3-Dog" Willie Davis, who was heading South from the Montreal Expos to the Texas Rangers:


Coming off of a very nice 1974 season that saw him collect 180 hits and bat .295 with 89 runs batted in for the Expos, Davis was traded to the Rangers on December 5th of '74 for Pete Mackanin and Dan Stanhouse.
He would end up playing in only 42 games for Texas before being traded yet again on June 4th to the St. Louis Cardinals for Ed Brinkman and Tommy Moore.
Back in the National League, he'd hit .291 the rest of the way, driving in 50 runs over his 98 games there.
What an underrated career for the three-time Gold Glove outfielder: 2561 hits, 1217 runs scored, 182 home runs, 398 stolen bases and 1053 runs batted in over 18 seasons, 14 of which were with Los Angeles.
His best year in the Big Leagues was arguably his finest, collecting 198 hits and batting .309 while collecting the first of his three straight Gold Gloves.
Of course, being a National League outfielder through the 1960’s in the age of Mays, Aaron, Clemente and Robinson kept him from All-Star nods, and he only made two of them, in 1971 and 1973.
Nevertheless, by the time he retired he had quite the Major League resume, including leading the league in triples twice, 13 seasons of 20+ stolen bases, and two World Championships (1963 and 1965).