BASEBALL BROTHERS- ED AND CHUCK BRINKMAN

I haven’t done a “Baseball Brothers” card in a while, so let’s kick-start it again with a 1974 card for the Brinkmans, Ed and Chuck:

Older brother Ed made it to the big leagues first when he made the “big show” as a nineteen-year-old third baseman with the Washington Senators in 1961, eventually carving out a nice 15-year career that closed out with 45 games as a New York Yankee in 1975.
Though he came up as a third baseman he’d make his mark as a slick-fielding shortstop, leading the league in various defensive stats in the mid-60’s to early 1970’s, even taking home a Gold Glove in 1972 while with the Detroit Tigers.
Younger brother Chuck put together a six-year Major League career as a catcher, playing for the Chicago White Sox for all but the last four games of his Big League tenure.
Never really getting the chance to play full-time, the most action he’d see in any MLB season was in 1973 when he appeared in 63 games with Chicago, backing up Ed Herrmann.
All told, by the time he retired after the 1974 season he finished with a .172 career average, collecting 46 hits in 267 at-bats in 148 games.

"HEY BUDDY, CAN YOU SPARE SOME NECK?"- THE THINGS YOU NOTICE AS A KID...

First off, I mean no disrespect to the two guys I'm about to talk about.
As a matter of fact, it's nothing BUT respect why I still remember the quirky things I do about certain players from over 35 years ago that, quite honestly, would have faded away into the deep corners of my mind by the time the '80's hit.
But, here we are in June, 2013 and I STILL remember Walt "No Neck" Williams and Ed Brinkman.
Why would I still remember these two players all these years later? Sure, they put together respectable careers and managed to get themselves on a good number of baseball cards along the way. But why them two as opposed to a Skip Jutze or Steve Arlin?
Well, I always got a kick out of the fact that Walt truly had NO neck, while Brinkman had the longest neck I ever saw on a player in my life!
Put cards of these two players together, and you have a funny sight for a kid who memorized every card that touched his hand!
Walt, who looked like a Paul Bunyon-sized fullback, was actually a small 5'6", barely tipping the scales at 175lbs! But he managed to forge a decent 10-year career which ended after the 1975 season as a member of the Yankees. He hit .270 for his career, which wasn't bad in a light-hitting era that was the late 60's/early 70's.
Nevertheless he always left a big impression on me back then because of the "no-neck" photos on his cards. Hilarious!
At the same time Walt was manning outfields around the Majors, you had Ed Brinkman, a shortstop who put together a 15-year career that, ironically enough, also ended in 1975 for the very same team, the Yankees.
Brinkman, a notoriously light-hitting infielder if there ever was one, still garnered a Gold Glove AND even finished in the Top-10 in MVP voting for the Tigers in 1972 while hitting .203/.259/.279!
Ahh, baseball during the modern "dead"-era. Imagine a guy hitting under .210 today and getting THAT much respect?
Anyway, while I had Walt Williams and his "no-neck" screaming out at me from his baseball cards, I also remember Brinkman and his giraffe-neck cracking me up every year!
Just look at it! It's quite impressive isn't it? Take a look:

"No-Neck" keepin' it cool in 1974

Seriously! How long is that thing? Brinkman on HIS '74 card

Not to get all "preachey" here, but this is a good example of one of the things I miss so much about baseball back then. No matter what you'd always have players that really did look like someone you'd run into at the schoolyard or at the store. Guys that looked "human". Guys that didn't look like the perfectly proportioned  6'4"/ 225lb. "professional athlete" that we see High Schools and Colleges pumping out of their programs every year.
Ah well. Progress I guess.