On the blog today we have a clear-cut "late-season" not so missing 1977 update card for former speedster Miguel Dilone of the Pittsburgh Pirates, who appeared in a handful of games in each season 1974 through 1977:
Dilone
appeared in 16 games for the Pirates in 1976, then on to 29 games for
them in 1977, the latter number enough to get him a spot on a
multi-player rookie card in the 1978 Topps set.
Of
course, the reason I mention "update 1977 set" earlier is because his
uniform is clearly from 1977, so it wouldn't be possible to have this
photo for the base 1977 set.
Nevertheless, it
wasn't until 1978 when he found himself playing with the Oakland A's
that he'd see any amount of playing time, appearing in 135 games though
only collecting 292 plate appearances, stealing 50 bases and scoring 34
runs while only collecting 59 hits.
After a 1979 season that
saw him suit up for the A's and Chicago Cubs, for a combined 73 games,
he had his best Major League season in 1980 when he hit an impressive
.341 with 61 stolen bases, collecting 180 hits over 528 at-bats for the
Cleveland Indians, even getting some MVP attention at the end of the
year.
In 1981 he did hit .290 for the Indians during the strike year, appearing in 72 games for the Tribe,
but
between 1982 and 1985 he would play parts of each season for no less
than five teams: Indians, White Sox, Pirates, Expos and Padres, never
getting a full-time gig again.
All told, between 1974 and 1985 Dilone appeared in 800 games, hitting .265 with 530 hits over 2000 at-bats, stealing 267 bases while scoring 314 runs.
