Here's one that almost slipped by me: Bob Meyer and his five years between baseball cards.
He appeared in the 1965 Topps set, shown here:
Then would find himself in baseball "limbo" until the 1970 set came out, when he appeared as a Seattle Pilot, shown here:
Well it was all for good reason, as Meyer first came up as a 24
year old in 1964, playing for three different Major League franchises
that season, the Yankees, Angels and Athletics, for whom he was pictured
on his 1965 card (Though I suspect that's a Yankee
pinstripe jersey he has on in the photo).
But it turned out he wouldn't appear in another Major League game
until the 1969 season, the inaugural such season for the one-year
franchise, thus culminating in the card you see above (funny enough
sporting a Kansas City Athletics uniform in THIS photo!).
In 1964 Meyer posted a 2-8 record and 4.37 earned run average
spread out among the three teams and 22 games, 13 of which were as a
starter.
After toiling in the Minors between 1965 and 1968, Meyer managed to
make it back onto a Major League mound in '69, going 0-3 with a 3.31
E.R.A. in just six games, five of which were starts.
He hung on with the team for the next season, though now they were
the Milwaukee Brewers, and went 0-1 over ten games, all in relief, with a
6.38 E.R.A.
That would be the last big league action he'd taste, ending his
career with a 2-12 record along with a 4.38 E.R.A. over 129.1 innings
pitched.
Three years, five "different" franchises, two Topps cards, relived 44 years later…
