NOT REALLY MISSING IN ACTION- 1971 TOM HILGENDORF

Up on the blog today, we have a “not so missing” 1971 card for former pitcher Tom Hilgendorf of the St. Louis Cardinals:

Hilgendorf just completed his second season as a Big Leaguer, appearing in 23 games for the Cards and posting a record of 0-4 with an earned run average of 3.92, all out of the bullpen.
He’d spend the 1971 season in the Kansas City Royals Minor League system before making it back to a Big League mound in 1972 as a member of the Cleveland Indians.
For the ‘72 season Hilgendorf appeared in 19 games, five of which were starts, while posting a 3-1 record with a nice 2.68 earned run average over 47 innings pitched.
Those three wins would be the first of his career after starting off 0-4 while with ther St. Louis Cardinals in 1969/1970, and he would go on to collect 16 more wins before his brief career was up after the 1975 season with the Philadelphia Phillies.
All told Hilgendorf finished with a 19-14 record, with a 3.04 ERA and 173 strikeouts in 184 appearances and 313.2 innings, with 14 saves thrown in, very nice numbers for the short amount of time he had in the big leagues.

MISSING IN ACTION- 1973 TOM HILGENDORF

Here’s a “missing” 1973 card for former Cleveland Indians pitcher Tom Hilgendorf, who put together a nice 1972 season for the Tribe yet didn’t get a slot in Topps’ set the following year:

For the ‘72 season Hilgendorf appeared in 19 games, five of which were starts, while posting a 3-1 record with a nice 2.68 earned run average over 47 innings pitched.
Those three wins would be the first of his career after starting off 0-4 while with ther St. Louis Cardinals in 1969/1970, and he would go on to collect 16 more wins before his brief career was up after the 1975 season with the Philadelphia Phillies.
All told Hilgendorf finished with a 19-14 record, with a 3.04 ERA and 173 strikeouts in 184 appearances and 313.2 innings, with 14 saves thrown in, very nice numbers for the short amount of time he had in the big leagues.