The next card profiled here on the blog from my recent custom "1960s In-Action" set is my 1969 card for the all-time hit king, Pete Rose:
Great evening shot of the young rose, who was the reigning N.L. batting champ when this card would have come out.
Rose was was also about to take home his second straight batting title, hitting .348 after a league-leading .335 in 1968.
He would also reach 200+ hits for the fourth of what would end up being a record ten such seasons, with 218 in 1969.
Those
numbers got him a fourth place finish in the MVP race at season's end,
along with a Gold Glove for his work in the outfield after coming up as a
second baseman.
Growing up in the 1970's as a baseball nut, Pete Rose was an almost
mythic figure. Even though his Reds steamrolled through "my" Yankees in
the 1976 World Series, Rose, along with his all-star teammates, seemed
like something made-up, not real.
I guess a part of that could be that the very first Pete Rose
baseball card I ever saw, at the age of seven, was his 1976 Topps
masterpiece, which had that glare of his, staring down the camera,
showing that intensity that created the "Charlie Hustle"
legend.
What a player, a Hall of Fame player. But I won't get into THAT here.
The "Player of the Decade" for the 1970's, Rose etched his name into the history of the game many times over.
Really, along with guys like Tom Seaver and Reggie Jackson, you just
can't have too many Pete Rose cards from the 1970's in my eyes.