REVISIT: MISSING IN ACTION 1975 KURT BEVACQUA

Good day everyone!

On the blog today, we revisit a ten-year-old post, that of a "missing" 1975 card for Kurt Bevacqua, who split the 1974 season between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Kansas City Royals:

Bevacqua played in 57 games in 1974, hitting .184 with 23 hits over 125 at-bats while DH-ing and playing both the infield and outfield.
He would end up playing 15 seasons as a Major League player, the highlight for him being his heroics in the 1984 World Series as a member of the San Diego Padres, giving them their only win against the eventual World Champion Detroit Tigers.
All told he’d hit .236 over his career, with 499 hits in 2117 official at-bats while playing every position but pitcher and catcher.
And let’s not forget he won that Bubble-Gum blowing contest, leading to one of the quirkier cards in the Topps stable in the 1970’s...

 

NOT REALLY MISSING IN ACTION- 1973 KURT BEVACQUA

Let’s go and give 15-year Major League veteran Kurt Bevacqua a “not so missing” 1973 card today on the blog based on his 19 games played with the Cleveland Indians during the 1972 season:

Bevacqua was in his second year as a Big Leaguer in 1972, hitting only .114 with four hits over 35 at-bats with the Tribe while picking up both infield and outfield duties along the way as a 25-year-old.
He would go on to put in a solid career in the Major Leagues as a guy off the bench through the 1985 season, playing for six teams and playing all positions except for catcher and centerfield.
By the time he retired as a player, he finished with a career .236 batting average with 499 hits over 2117 at-bats in 970 games, hitting 27 homers and driving in 275 runs.
While with the San Diego Padres he had perhaps the highlight of his career when he hit .412 in the 1984 World Series against the Detroit Tigers, hitting two homers with four RBIs and easily would have been the series MVP had they upset the heavily favored Tiger team who steam-rolled through the season as wire-to-wire beasts.
As a card-collector of course, I’d say the highlight of Bevacqua’s career was that sweet 1976 Topps card celebrating his win as the Bubble-gum bubble-blowing champion!
I started collecting cards a year after that, but got many 1976 cards and as an eight-year old I loved that card. Still do!

1977 MARINERS REDONE- KURT BEVACQUA

Today we look at a great card, the 1977 Kurt Bevacqua, which is an airbrushed image so Topps could show him, as all others in this thread, as members of the new clubs in town, the Seattle Mariners (or Toronto Blue Jays):

Interesting thing is, Bevacqua would end up never playing an inning of ball for the Mariners, getting released by the team before the season even started after being purchased from the Milwaukee Brewers just a few months earlier.
Nevertheless, Topps managed to get some “real” images of him in a Mariners uni before he was let go, so I re-did the original, so here you go:

Bevacqua managed to sigh with a new team less than a month after being released by Seattle, the Texas Rangers, where he’d play for the next couple of seasons before moving on to the San Diego Padres in 1979.
He’d be on the move once again in 1980, getting traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates for, among others, the ever wonderfully-named Rick Lancellotti, before making it back to the Padres in 1982.
Of course, that last stint in the Majors, with the Padres from 1982 through 1985 would give him his the most memorable moment in the Majors (well unless you consider that sweet 1976 Topps bubble-blowing card the peak of his career), when he hit a three-run home run in Game Two of the 1984 World Series against the eventual World Champion Detroit Tigers, giving the Padres their only win in the series.
Overall, he’d end up playing 15-years in the Majors, mainly as a platoon or part-time player, batting .236 over 970 games with 499 hits over 2117 at-bats for six teams.

MISSING IN ACTION- 1975 KURT BEVACQUA

Here’s a “missing” 1975 card for Kurt Bevacqua, who suited up for both the Pittsburgh Pirates and Kansas City Royals during the 1974 season:

Bevacqua played in 57 games in 1974, hitting .184 with 23 hits over 125 at-bats while DH-ing and playing both the infield and outfield.
He would end up playing 15 seasons as a Major League player, the highlight for him being his heroics in the 1984 World Series as a member of the San Diego Padres, giving them their only win against the eventual World Champion Detroit Tigers.
All told he’d hit .236 over his career, with 499 hits in 2117 official at-bats while playing every position but pitcher and catcher.
And let’s not forget he won that Bubble-Gum blowing contest, leading to one of the quirkier cards in the Topps stable in the 1970’s...

WHEN EXPANSION CAUSES HEADACHES FOR TOPPS: 1977 KURT BEVACQUA

I always get a kick out of the obvious headache the 1977 expansion caused for Topps when they were scrambling to get a full Blue Jays and Mariners "team" represented in their set.

Today's card: Kurt Bevacqua, was a prime example of what could go wrong, and the curious choices Topps made to select the players airbrushed into baseball card history.

Great job on the cap huh? Ha! Love it…

First off Bevacqua played in only 12 games in 1976, good for seven at-bats for the Milwaukee Brewers.

He was then purchased by the new Seattle team, so Topps went ahead and used Bevacqua as one of the Mariner infielders for their card set.

Problem was, Bevaqcua was released by Seattle before the '77 season even started, and found himself as a member of the Texas Rangers when the season broke.

So here we have a card for a guy who barely played the year before, and then never actually suited up for the team he was shown as a member of.

You have to feel for Topps when it comes to those cards. Must have been chaos trying to figure out who to have as members of the new squads.

Bevacqua joins other classics as Dave Roberts, Dave Hilton and Pete Broberg as guys that never suited up for the new expansion clubs they were supposedly part of.

"BEVACQUA AND THE BUBBLE"- CARD #564 IN THE 1976 SET

Now I'll be honest.

I never really knew where I stood with the Kurt Bevacqua "Bubble Gum Blowing Contest" card in the 1976 set (#564).

 

Wouldn't those points at the end of that instrument "pop" the bubble?

 

When I was a kid and pulled this card from a pack in 1976, sure I thought it was "nifty".

But as the years passed, and for NO reason whatsoever, any time I came across the card I'd get this annoyed feeling as I quickly moved along to other cards.

I guess I got too "serious" with my card collecting and thought of this card as a waste of space.

Now, as I'm an "old man" of 44, I can't help but love the card for the playfulness and great example of that time and place that was the 1970's.

Not that bubblegum blowing was a sign of the free-wheelin' '70's, but it WAS just "kooky" enough to be part of that awesomely wild span of ten years!

I have to say my favorite part of the card is the bracket posting on the back, showing the "March Madness" style progression of which players advanced to the next round of the competition.

Take a look:

 

Now why didn't the Tigers or Pirates compete?!

 

You have to love looking at all the players involved in the "tournament". Awesome!

Seems the winner got $1000 for himself as well as $1000 for his favorite charity.

Jeez, how times have changed huh?

The contest culminated during the pre-game show "The Baseball World of Joe Garagiola" before game 3 of the 1975 World Series.

Kurt Bevacqua was the American League champ and he went up against National League champ Johnny Oates.

I wonder if Oates realizes how he missed baseball card immortality when he lost that contest?

You think?