Up on the blog today, we have a "not so missing" 1979 card for three year Major League outfielder Jim Lentine, who made his Big League debut with eight games for the St. Louis Cardinals during the 1978 season:
Lentine was 23-years-old when he broke
into the Majors, going 2-for-11 at the plate for a batting average of
.182, with a run scored and an RBI.
He'd be back in 1979,
albeit for only 11 games, hitting a blistering .391 with nine hits in 23
at-bats, collecting his first extra-base-hit with a double.
In
1980, he'd start the year with St. Louis, appearing in nine games and
hitting .100 before he was shipped off to the Detroit Tigers in a trade
for Al Greene and John Martin.
Over the rest of the season he
played in 67 games for the Tigers, hitting a respectable .261 with 42
hits in 161 at-bats, scoring 19 runs while driving in 17.
Sadly
for him however, he was released by Detroit and spent all of 1981 in
the Cleveland Indians organization, playing for Charleston of the
International League, before retiring after a year playing in the
Mexican League in 1982.
All told, he finished his brief Big
League career with 95 games played, hitting .263 with 54 hits in 205
at-bats, scoring 23 runs and driving in 20.
