1990 Pacific Baseball Legends

Greetings and welcome to another exciting pack rip on A Pack to be Named Later. Since there are now over 50 different writers for this awesome blog along with 1000s of readers I want to take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Marck, but most folks call me Side of Bacon or just Bacon. Some people call me Troll. I author a blog called the Collective Troll. I used to post daily, but life has got in the way of my collecting journals and now I am lucky to post weekly. I organized a group break on my blog late last year. I filled slots for every team and bought a lot of junk wax. Around the time it was supposed to start I began a new job with demanding hours and the group break got pushed to the back burner. Due to a lack of time and a vote by the participants I decided to just rip and ship the cards. You would be surprised how long it has taken me to rip and sort 200 packs of cards. I can open a box in about 5 minutes if it’s for me, but ripping wax that I don’t get to keep and sorting it into team piles has become something like work. Anyway, the rip is nearly done and I plan to ship everyone’s stuff out early this coming week, but as I have a little free time this weekend I am going to try and sneak in a few packs on this awesome blog. With the introduction out of the way let’s get down to business. The business today is a pack of 1990 Pacific Baseball Legends. I bought this pack while on a roller derby road trip. The guy had half a box of this, but I thought that 2 bucks a pack for junk wax era stuff was too much so I just got this one pack. I also got mixed up and I thought these were going to Senior League cards for some reason. When I got home and realized what I was ripping I really wish I had a deal with the dude to get everything he had. This was probably the most fun rip of the entire break. The 1990 Pacific Legends is a 110-card set that includes Hall of Fame players like Hank Aaron, Bob Gibson, Yogi Berra, Don Drysdale, Harmon Killebrew, Steve Carlton, Brooks Robinson, Rod Carew, Gaylord Perry, Monte Irvin, Lou Brock and Larry Doby. It also includes All Time Greats like Don Newcombe, George Foster, Ron Santo, Bobby Grich, Herb Score and Vida Blue. It ALSO includes current players (near the end of their careers) like Willie Wilson and Jesse Barfield. You can view the complete checklist here. They really throw a lot of variety, interesting players and seldom used images in this set. I think that Pacific made similar sets to this one year before and years after. I know I have seen cards with this design dated 1988 and 1989. It is a cool way to add to a player collection without spending a bunch and some of the pics they use are really cool. Check ‘em out, this is what we got: First out of the pack is the last card in the set. Card #110 of Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Jesse Barfield, one of the few active players to be deemed a Baseball Legend by Pacific Trading Cards. This card is great because in 1990 Barfield was still active and playing for the Yankees. I much prefer seeing him in Blue Jays gear. Next is card #47 of Phillies pitcher Robin Roberts, HOF Class of 1976. #95 of the Sphinx, Don Mossi, shown pitching for the Cleveland Indians. The back of the card has a bio, career stats and a stat line from what Pacific chose as the players best season. For Mossi they highlight 1961 when Mossi was 15-7 for the Indians. #71 of Dusty Baker, shown as an Atlanta Brave where he spent the first 8 years of his career. Next is card #41 of Manny Mota. This pack seems to be filled with famous Dodgers pinch hitters who aren’t in Dodger Blue. Mota is shown as a Pirate-he spent 6 seasons in the Burgh. Card #2 shows Tommie Agee as a New York Met. Agee won a Gold Glove and a World Series in New York. Speaking of World Series’… Card #4 shows Sal Bando of the Oakland A’s. Bando won 3 rings with the A’s in the early 70’s. Card #67 shows Yankees shortstop Joe Sewell, Hall of Fame Class of 1977. Sewell never actually played shortstop for the Yankees. He did play in 1216 games at the position for the Cleveland Indians before they released the future HOFer just before the 1931 season. Sewell signed with the Yankees and spent 3 years as their third baseman and won the Series with them in 1932. The way they colorized his eyes on this card is pretty creepy to me, but his stats are amazing. He had a career batting average of .313 and only struck out once every 62.6 times to the plate. He had 2226 hits and only 114 strikeouts in his career. In 1923 he batted .353, drove in 109 runs and only struck out 12 times. In 1925 he batted .336 and struck out 4 times. FOUR TIMES in a season. That is pretty mind blowing. That was his season, that’s an afternoon for Mark Reynolds or Pat Burrell… Card #57 of reliever Hoyt Wilhelm, HOF Class of 1985 is next. Wilhelm is shown on the White Sox where he pitched from age 40 till age 45. In 361 games for the Sox he had a 1.96 ERA. WOW! The final card is my favorite of this pack; it is card #12 of Cardinals left fielder Lou Brock. Brock was a 5-time All Star and stole 938 bases over his Hall of Fame career. He also had 3023 hits and 1610 runs scored and 2 World Series rings. Now that is a pack of cards! Thanks for reading. Thanks to all involved in this group break. You will get these cards everything else I tore up next week. Go Rays! Troll out.