On the blog today, a closer look at the (slightly) airbrushed image Topps used for Bob Aspromonte and his 1971 card, designating him a New York Met after a couple of seasons with the Atlanta Braves:
Aspromonte,
who by the way comes from the same neighborhood in Brooklyn as yours
truly, found himself traded to the Mets for pitcher Ron Herbel on
December 1st of 1970, thus the attempt by Topps to have him with his
"current" team.
Didn't
take much work to just blacken out the "A" of the Atlanta Braves
batting helmet, so it certainly does not fall into one of the classic
airbrush cards of the 1970's.
Aspromonte wrapped up a decent 13-year career in
1971, playing for the Dodgers, Colt .45's/Astros, Braves and Mets.
For
the Mets in his final season, he appeared in 104 games, hitting .225
with 77 hits over 342 at-bats, driving in 33 runs while scoring 21
himself.
In 1324 games played for his career, he collected 1103 hits over 4369
at-bats, good for a .252 average with 60 homers and 457 runs batted in.
His brother Ken was also a long time Major League player as well as
manager. He even appears in the 1972 set on a card I profiled a while
ago because it looks like the photo was taken in the middle of the
street in my old neighborhood. I kid you not. (Look
it up. So odd).
