After the last post about the Replacement Player Project, I got a good amount of response, and I think I will try to do a number of posts, and try to do some bio about some of the cards/players that I make customs of. There are a number of cool stories I have come across while looking for photos and names of players. I think I will try to summarize some of the articles I have found and also provide links to where I found them. Among some of the interesting stories I have found are the following:
Chris Walpole of the Mets who told them that he was a former Independent League player. The problem was, he never was. By the time the Mets found out, he had played in a number of games. Not sure if I will be able to track down a photo of him, but we’ll see.
Douglas Duke of the Pirates went on to become a successful doctor after his baseball career.
Finally, John Fishel of the Angels owed back child support, and was tracked down in the spring, and actually arrested in the dugout. I’m sure I will come across more stories along the way.
One interesting thing I learned about yesterday had to do with the period right after the strike was resolved. There were a number of free agents who were older and towards the end of their career who still weren’t signed with teams when the 2nd Spring Training started. The players association decided to run a camp in Homestead, Florida for all of the unsigned players. It was run by former Major Leaguers, and scouts showed up and signed players right out of the camp. 90% of the players signed with teams, and one or two, like Jay Howell and Goose Gossage didn’t get signed and retired. The article said that with all of the free agents that were unsigned shortly before the spring this season that talks of another camp like this were in the works. Seems like MLB just wants anything to do with the strike just swept under the rug, and it makes me wonder if it just looks that way because the Internet was just getting on its feet in 1995, or if MLB paid the media to not cover anything and hide any archives of articles having to do with the strike. I will do my best to post as much as I can about the strike and what I find out, unless a player asks me not to.
With all that being said, here is a story about the most recent card I did for Cardinals replacement pitcher Larry Shikles. Larry played minor league baseball for the Boston Red Sox organization from 1986-1992, and for the Oakland Athletics organization in 1993. He got as far as AAA before retiring after the 1993 season. In 1990, he actually made it on a Topps baseball card, as part of the Topps TV set. Here is his card.
In the spring of 1995, Larry signed with the Cardinals to be a replacement player. He got talking with another Cardinal replacement, Mike Hinkle, who was in the 1990 Topps TV Cardinals set. Hinkle had been contacted by Topps because of a lawsuit stemming from the compensation players received for being in the Topps TV sets. Aparently, Major League players were getting around $15,000 dollars for being in the set, while the minor league guys only got 750 bucks. Some minor league guys sued Topps, and ended up getting $7,500 dollars in compensation. A Topps representative found Hinkle and gave him a check, and missed out on finding Larry, but Larry contacted him and he recieved a check later in the mail. There is a link to a 2018 article about Cardinals replacement players where I found the story, as well as one from Baseball Cards Come To Life blog with a shorter version. Lastly, here is the 1995 Topps Larry Shikles custom I made.
There are all kinds of interesting things I think I'll find in this project. I think I will mainly post a few group posts for each team, and aside from that, highlight the interesting players and cards. I will tag them as 'Replacement Player' so they can be easily found.
Thanks for checking out my latest post.
-Jeremy
Chris Walpole of the Mets who told them that he was a former Independent League player. The problem was, he never was. By the time the Mets found out, he had played in a number of games. Not sure if I will be able to track down a photo of him, but we’ll see.
Douglas Duke of the Pirates went on to become a successful doctor after his baseball career.
Finally, John Fishel of the Angels owed back child support, and was tracked down in the spring, and actually arrested in the dugout. I’m sure I will come across more stories along the way.
One interesting thing I learned about yesterday had to do with the period right after the strike was resolved. There were a number of free agents who were older and towards the end of their career who still weren’t signed with teams when the 2nd Spring Training started. The players association decided to run a camp in Homestead, Florida for all of the unsigned players. It was run by former Major Leaguers, and scouts showed up and signed players right out of the camp. 90% of the players signed with teams, and one or two, like Jay Howell and Goose Gossage didn’t get signed and retired. The article said that with all of the free agents that were unsigned shortly before the spring this season that talks of another camp like this were in the works. Seems like MLB just wants anything to do with the strike just swept under the rug, and it makes me wonder if it just looks that way because the Internet was just getting on its feet in 1995, or if MLB paid the media to not cover anything and hide any archives of articles having to do with the strike. I will do my best to post as much as I can about the strike and what I find out, unless a player asks me not to.
With all that being said, here is a story about the most recent card I did for Cardinals replacement pitcher Larry Shikles. Larry played minor league baseball for the Boston Red Sox organization from 1986-1992, and for the Oakland Athletics organization in 1993. He got as far as AAA before retiring after the 1993 season. In 1990, he actually made it on a Topps baseball card, as part of the Topps TV set. Here is his card.
In the spring of 1995, Larry signed with the Cardinals to be a replacement player. He got talking with another Cardinal replacement, Mike Hinkle, who was in the 1990 Topps TV Cardinals set. Hinkle had been contacted by Topps because of a lawsuit stemming from the compensation players received for being in the Topps TV sets. Aparently, Major League players were getting around $15,000 dollars for being in the set, while the minor league guys only got 750 bucks. Some minor league guys sued Topps, and ended up getting $7,500 dollars in compensation. A Topps representative found Hinkle and gave him a check, and missed out on finding Larry, but Larry contacted him and he recieved a check later in the mail. There is a link to a 2018 article about Cardinals replacement players where I found the story, as well as one from Baseball Cards Come To Life blog with a shorter version. Lastly, here is the 1995 Topps Larry Shikles custom I made.
There are all kinds of interesting things I think I'll find in this project. I think I will mainly post a few group posts for each team, and aside from that, highlight the interesting players and cards. I will tag them as 'Replacement Player' so they can be easily found.
Thanks for checking out my latest post.
-Jeremy
