Adiós El Tiante (part 1)

Just a day after I posted about my favorite football PC player's birthday, my favorite baseball PC player passed away.  Luis Tiant was 83.

This 6" x 9" MLB photo decorates the cover of the first of nine binders that house all my baseball player collections.  Luis' cards are right up front.  There are 13 pages from the binder and several other things, so I'll split this into two posts since there are 27 images.  

Here is everything I have of his so far....

It all starts with the personalized IP autographed 1965 Topps rookie card.  Somewhere I had a picture of he and I when I got that signed, but I can't find it.  Not a great shot anyway and he seemed like he wasn't enjoying himself that day.  I just started the '65 set, so I'll need another one at some point for that.  

Found one of the '69 Topps highlights with his signature on it too.  Don't think it was very expensive.  Going through my collection to make these scans, I realize how bad some of these vintage cards are as far as centering.  That '66 is terrible.

The second page is a 9-pocket mini sheet with several inserts and oddballs.  (The bottom slots are empty so I cropped them out.)  A '69 Topps transfer, the regular and OPC deckle edges, a Dell photostamp, a Milton Bradley, and the '70 Kellogg's.  

The O-Pee-Chee versions of the '69 League Leaders cards begin page 3.  As a rule, I put Topps first, then Hostess and Kellogg's, then any others after that.  That changes in 1980 when Topps is no longer the dominant company.  The middle card is a Kahn's.  It might be '70, but only fits in the middle page slot sideways.  There will be a bunch of odd-sized items later that live in the odd-size binder, but that Kahn's just didn't have a good spot in that one, so it stays here.  And those '70 "Supers" aren't really super-sized.

The next page has holes - mostly for OPC versions.  Tiant has no '72 cards.  He was injured and spent significant time in the minors in '71 according to the back of the '73 cards.  I left a slot open for the OPC ERA Leaders below the base card, and for the '74 OPC below the base Topps too.  It works out better to show the pairs this way with an odd number of pockets. 

More from the '75 design later.  That SSPC is such a funny shot.  It looks like he's thinking "If this fool doesn't take the picture and get out of my way, I'm gonna sock him in the mouth!"

More OPC's, a cloth sticker, and a '79 Burger King that is like a Traded card.  Ya gotta love the pairings of the late '70's Topps & OPC's when a player changes teams.

Here's where the order switches.  All companies are in alphabetical order now.  I stuck that little stamp from '83 with the Donruss.  It's actually in a folded penny sleeve draped over the card.

Now it gets really diverse.  Senior Leagues, Swell, Line Drive, Minor Leagues, and Action Packed.

Moving on to post-career issues.  Ted Williams, Upper Deck, Fleer, etc.

Lots of reprinted images in this section.  Archives, Fan Favorites, Retired Signature, and the more uncommon Shoebox Topps issues, among others.

Now the finishes get more fancy then the photo selections.  I'm sure there are a lot more out there that would expand this part of the PC.

More retired player sets, more repeated pictures.  I think there are even more parallels of those Absolute Heroes.  I'm sure I'm still looking for the pewter '06 Greats.

And finally, you have the Topps Chrome Anniversary premiere edition and all the parallels, along with a few of the other issues from around the same year.  The base and Mustaches card are online exclusives.  The Archives '75 isn't what I was talking about before.  This year's Heritage box toppers are even nicer.

Had one straggler stuck on the back of the last page.  Didn't want to start another sheet just for one card.

Stay tuned for part two - all shapes and sizes - plus the mojo hits and a non-card item or two.