Monday, October 14, 2013

"CAREER CAPPER" # 14: 1975 ORLANDO CEPEDA

Today I want to cap off the career of Hall of Famer Orlando Cepeda, the "Baby Bull".
His last "official" card has him in a Boston Red Sox uniform in the 1974 set (#83). However by the time the season opened up Cepeda was released and didn't sign with another team until August, when he hooked up with Kansas City.
He only appeared in 33 games for the Royals, hitting .215 with a homer and 18 runs batted in before finally retiring for good. So I went and designed a "final" card for him in a Royals uniform, "photoshopped" from a shot of him in '73 with Boston.
Would have been nice to have a card for Cepeda in that awesome 1975 set (I'm a sucker for the 1975 & 76 sets)!
Anyway, hope you enjoy it.

One last card for the "Baby Bull".

While Cepeda's career was productive enough to get into Cooperstown, it's well known that if not for his bad knees, his final statistics could have been mind blowing.
Nevertheless, by the time he retired, he posted final numbers of: 379 homers, 1365 runs batted in, 2351 hits and a .297 average, with a Rookie of the Year (1958) and M.V.P. award (1967) thrown in.
It took a little while, but he was finally inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1999 after being selected by the Veteran's Committee.
What a power trio San Francisco had in Cepeda, Willie Mays and Willie McCovey! Power to the ultimate degree!

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