AIRBRUSHING THROUGH THE 1970'S- 1973 KEN REYNOLDS

Here's a fun one for the blog, the airbrushed image used for former pitcher Ken Reynolds' 1973 card, a paint-job that ended up being all for nothing:

After playing his first three Big League seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies, Reynolds was traded over to the Minnesota Twins on November 30th of 1972.

The folks at Topps had just enough time to try and get him shown with his new team so they went ahead and created the airbrushed image you see here.

Only problem was that on March 27th of 1973, the Twins went ahead and traded Reynolds to the Milwaukee Brewers, so the card was already outdated before the 1973 season even began!

As for his Major League career, the bulk of his playing time were the 1971 and 1972 seasons with the Phillies, where he was a regular starter, throwing 162.1 and 154.1 innings respectively, winning seven games while losing 24 combined for those “second-division” teams.
By the time he retired from Big League play after 19 games with the San Diego Padres in 1976, Reynolds ended up with a record of 7-29, with an ERA of 4.46 over 103 appearances and 375.2 innings, with 51 of those appearances starts.

 

NOT REALLY MISSING IN ACTION- 1977 KEN REYNOLDS

Here’s a “not so missing” 1977 card for former pitcher Ken Reynolds, who finished up a six-year Major League career with 19 appearances with the San Diego Padres in 1976:

Reynolds, who originally came up with the Philadelphia Phillies in 1970, came to San Diego after one season with the St. Louis Cardinals, where he appeared in 10 games in 1975 where he posted a record of 0-1 with an ERA at 1.59 over 17 innings of work.
In 1976 with San Diego he ended up at 0-3, with a rough 6.40 ERA over 32.1 innings, starting two games while finishing six, with a save thrown in.
The bulk of his MLB playing time were the 1971 and 1972 seasons with the Phillies, where he was a regular starter, throwing 162.1 and 154.1 innings respectively, winning seven games while losing 24 combined for those “second-division” teams.
By the time he retired from Big League play, Reynolds ended up with a record of 7-29, with an ERA of 4.46 over 103 appearances and 375.2 innings, with 51 of those appearances starts.

THE STRANGE COINCIDENCES AND QUIRKS OF BASEBALL CARDS... TOPPS 1971 #664 PITCHING PROSPECTS CARD

When you have a rookie card depicting three players, and you go on to see that in the end they combined to sport a not-so-nifty 21-53 career record, you tend to forgot about it and never look back.

However, today I'd like to examine an interesting card from the 1971 Topps set, #664 "Rookie Star Pitchers", which featured three future prospects, all with the same last name: Reynolds: Archie, Bob and Ken.

All three aspiring pitchers just happened to be coming up at the same time for three different Major League teams: the Angels, Expos and Phillies respectively, but sadly, as I stated before, never really found the success they were hoping for. But hey, at least they are part of a strange little bit of baseball card history: three players on the same card with the same surname. A little out of the ordinary, don't you think?

You KNOW Topps had to be having a little fun with this card, and in doing so gave the card-collecting world one of those little "quirks" that make it all so entertaining.

Let's have a look at the players on the card…

First we have Archie Reynolds, shown with an airbrush job as a member of the Angels. Previously a member of the Cubs, he appeared in only 16 games for the North siders before being traded to California for Juan Pizarro in June of 1970.

Sad to say things didn't get any better for him, as he proceeded to so 0-3 over 15 games before being traded to the Brewers for Curt Motton in 1972.

Overall he finished with a career of 36 game appearances, and an 0-8 record with a 5.73 E.R.A. 

Secondly, we have Bon Reynolds, the most "successful" of the three Reynolds players, who is shown as an Expo, who up until this card was issued appeared in only one game in his Major League career, in 1969.

Funny enough, he never appeared in another game again as an Expo, being traded to the Cardinals in June of 1971 for Mike Torrez. After appearing in only 4 games for the Cardinals, he went on to the Milwaukee Brewers where he played in only 3 more games before the most succesful stage of his career, a 3+ year stint as a member of the Orioles where he went 14-11 before closing out his career with stops in Detroit and Cleveland for a career tally of 14-16 with a 3.15 E.R.A. over 140 games.

Last but not least, we have Ken, who is shown as a member of the Phillies. While he posted a career E.R.A. of 4.46 over 103 total Major League games, he ended up with a 7-29 record over the course of 6 years, with stops in Philadelphia, Milwaukee, St. Louis and San Diego. 

1972 was a particularly rough year for him, as he posted more than half his career losses with a 2-15 record for the Phillies to go along with a not-so-bad E.R.A. Of 4.26 in 33 games, 23 of which were starts.

One last coincidence stemming from this card is that all three players appeared for the Brewers in consecutive years: Bob appeared in a few games in 1971, Archie in 1972, and Ken in 1973. What are the odds of that!?

You "gotta" love stuff like this!

Reynolds, Reynolds and Reynolds.