WTHBALLS CUSTOM SET SPOTLIGHT: 1960S STARS OF THE GAME: ROGER MARIS

On the blog today, we spotlight my "1960 Stars of the Game" custom card of Roger Maris, from my custom set released in 2018:

Of course his Yankee tenure resulted in that historic 1961 season that saw him hit "61 in '61", setting a new Major League record with 61 home runs, leading to what was his second straight MVP Award after a wonderful 1960 season that saw him 39 homers and a league-leading 112 RBIs.

He spent the last two years of his career with the Cardinals after his historic tenure with the New York Yankees.

Talk about "right place at the right time", Maris came to the Cardinals just as they put together a World Championship in 1967, and a return to the World Series in 1968, though that resulted in a loss to the Detroit Tigers.

By the time he hung them up in 1968, he hit 275 homers with 850 RBIs and 826 runs scored, hitting .260 over 1463 games between 1957 and 1968.

It's easy to forget that he retired very young, at only 33 years of age.

Would have been cool if he got to play into the mid-70's, just as I was getting into baseball...

 

1963 FLEER EXTENSION SET: ROGER MARIS

A super fun card to add to my 1963 Fleer extension set, this one of two-time A.L. MVP Roger Maris, at the time owner of the all-time single-season home run record of 61, hit in 1961:

Of course his Yankee tenure resulted in that historic 1961 season that saw him hit "61 in '61", setting a new Major League record with 61 home runs, leading to what was his second straight MVP Award after a wonderful 1960 season that saw him 39 homers and a league-leading 112 RBIs.

By the time he hung them up in 1968, he hit 275 homers with 850 RBIs and 826 runs scored, hitting .260 over 1463 games between 1957 and 1968.

He spent the last two years of his career with the Cardinals after his historic tenure with the New York Yankees.

Talk about "right place at the right time", Maris came to the Cardinals just as they put together a World Championship in 1967, and a return to the World Series in 1968, though that resulted in a loss to the Detroit Tigers.

It's easy to forget that he retired very young, at only 33 years of age.

Would have been cool if he got to play into the mid-70's, just as I was getting into baseball...

 

1960'S CAREER-CAPPERS: 1969 ROGER MARIS

On the blog today, we have my 1969 "Career-capper for Roger Maris, who wrapped up a nice 12-year Major League career in 1968 as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals:

Maris appeared in 100 games for the N.L. champs, hitting .255 with 5 homers and 45 RBIs in the "Year of the Pitcher".

He spent the last two years of his career with the Cardinals after his historic tenure with the New York Yankees.

Talk about "right place at the right time", Maris came to the Cardinals just as they put together a World Championship in 1967, and a return to the World Series in 1968, though that resulted in a loss to the Detroit Tigers.

Of course his Yankee tenure resulted in that historic 1961 season that saw him hit "61 in '61", setting a new Major League record with 61 home runs, leading to what was his second straight MVP Award after a wonderful 1960 season that saw him 39 homers and a league-leading 112 RBIs.

By the time he hung them up in 1968, he hit 275 homers with 850 RBIs and 826 runs scored, hitting .260 over 1463 games between 1957 and 1968.

It's easy to forget that he retired very young, at only 33 years of age.

Would have been cool if he got to play into the mid-70's, just as I was getting into baseball...

1960'S SEASONAL LEADERS- RUNS

The next category up for the 1960’s “seasonal Leaders” sub-set is runs, which were led in each league by two heavy-weights, Frank Robinson and Roger Maris:

Robinson could have easily led BOTH leagues in runs scored in a season for the decade, but in this case he paced the National League with his league-leading 134 runs in 1962.
What a monster year for the reigning N.L. M.V.P., as he also led the league in doubles (51), OBP (.421) and Slugging (.624) while also hitting 39 homers with 136 runs batted in!
And to think that was only good enough for fourth in the M.V.P. Race that year!
Over in the American League we had Roger Maris, who scored 132 runs in his record breaking 1961 season when he slammed 61 homers to set a new Major League mark.
Ironically it would be the only time in his 12-year Major League career that Maris would top 100 runs scored in any season, coming closest the year before when he scored 98.
Nevertheless not a bad combo here for this card!

SEASONAL LEADERS OF THE 1960¹s- RUNS BATTED IN

Next up for the 1960’s high-water mark leader’s sub-set in the 1970 set is Runs Batted In, which gives us our first tie in a statistical category.
Take a look:

First off we have the high-mark in RBI’s for the Majors during the 1960’s, and it was a doozy, with the 153 runs batted in that Tommy Davis had in 1962 while also leading the league in batting.
A monster year for the Los Angeles Dodger that, sadly for him, was lost with the performances of teammate Maury Wills, who would take home the Most Valuable Player Award that season.
Heck, he didn’t even finish SECOND in voting that year, having to also take a back seat to legend Willie Mays, who took the second slot behind the record-breaking speedster Wills.
As for the American high-mark, it was a tie between New York Yankees slugger Roger Maris, who notched 141 RBI’s during his record-breaking 1961 season, as well as Baltimore Orioles slugger Jim Gentile, who drove in the same amount to share the leader slot that very same season.
Ironically, for YEARS Roger Maris was credited as the A.L. leader with 142 RBI’s, one more than Gentile.
But some 20 years ago it was found that Maris was credited with an extra RBI so the number was “fixed” to 141, giving Gentile equal share of the leader position for not just the year, but 1960’s.

1960'S SEASONAL LEAGUE LEADERS: HOME RUNS

Today I wanted to start a somewhat short sub-set theme for the 1970 set, a “Decade’s League Leader” celebrating the high mark in each big-time stat during the decade of the 1960’s.
Just like in the multi-league league leader cards of later in the 1970’s Topps created, this one will have the American and National League player who achieved the best figure in that particular category, such as today’s statistic, home runs:

Of course we all know that Roger Maris hit those 61 home runs in 1961 to have the highest seasonal total of the decade.
Over in the National League we have the great Willie Mays who slammed 52 homers during his MVP 1965 season to top the league for the 1960’s.
If you haven’t figured it out already, I’m really big on the whole “end-of-decade” thing and love looking back and recapping the previous ten years, such as “Player of the Decade”, etc.
I’ll just be covering the big triple crown stats for both pitching and hitting, as well as saves and stolen bases, maybe even runs scored, so if you’re into this type of thing as much as I am keep an eye out for them.

TURN BACK THE CLOCK- 1961 ROGER MARIS 10TH ANNIVERSARY

Next up in my ongoing “Turn Back the Clock” series is a “10th Anniversary” card for the record-breaking year Roger Maris had for the awesome 1961 New York Yankees team, who dominated baseball and stampeded straight to a World Championship:

A big part of the Yankees march towards greatness was the incredible tandem Roger Maris, the previous year’s Most Valuable Player, and legend Mickey Mantle who took home the MVP in 1956 and 1957.

Together they would go on to hit 115 home runs between them, a record at the time, along with the rest of the team hitting another 125 homers for a record 240 homers for one team in any given season (again, since broken).

As we all know by now, the drama surrounding what should have been a wonderful time got to the point where the league stepped in and declared that should Maris break the record AFTER his 154th game, it would go down with an asterisk, since the current record holder at the time, Babe Ruth, hit 60 homers in eight less games.

I remember reading how the pressure got so bad for Maris that he began losing hair as he dealt with not only the league, but hardcore fans who felt that Mantle should have been the one to break the record and not him, since Mantle was a NYC idol to so many.

Nevertheless, after Mantle was hobbled by injuries, curtailing his own home run record pursuit (ending up with 54 homers), Maris became the focus and on October 1st, against the Boston Red Sox and pitcher Tracy Stallard on the final game of the season, he connected for the record, unmatched in Major League ball until both Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa both passed him in 1998.

It’s still somewhat of an oddity that Maris did break the record when you look at his career overall. Although a very good player in his prime between 1958 through 1964, that 1961 season was truly a break-out year that he never managed to come close to again.