Cameo blogger

A little diversion today, to redirect readers to a guest post I wrote for Baseball Fans Only. Dave from the UK Collectors Group on Facebook runs the blog and asked me to write something about collecting Tony Gwynn cards. You can read the post here (and see a picture of me looking a bit tired in the Hall of Fame!)

A couple of weeks back Fuji described a card I showed as a "cameo card" - that's when a player appears on another card that isn't really "theirs". The card in question was this card from the Topps 1989 set which features Tony sliding in to second base on the 'Pirates Leaders' card.

The year prior to this, Tony featured on the Padres Leaders card, alongside Benny Santiago. I'm not sure whether this is really a 'cameo', but it was listed on the checklist just as Padres Leaders and it doesn't have Tony or Benny named on the front.

This is another card that I have already blogged about, which arrived in a joblot of Tony Gwynn cards, but wasn't a Tony Gwynn card. He is high-fiving, and partially obscuring, his team-mate Greg Vaughn.

And here's another card that arrived in a similar lot of Tony Gwynn cards. Like on the first card in this post, he is sliding in to second base. This time it's Astros second baseman Bill Doran trying to avoid a Tony Gwynn slide. 

I admit I'm inconsistent with these cameo cards. The first two I count in the collection, the latter two I don't. I think if it has another player's name on the front then it can't really count as a Tony Gwynn card. 

I hope you enjoyed the cameos - sorry, no new cards today. If you want to see my cameo on Dave's blog, then here's the link again!

Dancing with Bill Doran

Back in May I did a run down of Tony's Upper Deck cards, including this one from 1990.

Back then, I wrote this: "Tony is trying to avoid getting tagged out at a base there. I think he looks like he is dancing. I'd love to be able to identify the baseman. I think that orange stripe on his arm is an Astros uniform, and his name seems to end RAN. The Astros second baseman in 1989 (when this photo was most likely taken) was Bill Doran, so maybe he is Tony's dance partner here."

Well, I think I've answered this question, based on this other card from the 1990 Upper Deck set that has recently come into my possession.

Yep, that's Tony sliding into second base ...and almost taking Bill out at the knees!

Bill's card was #198 in the set. 

I'm not counting this as a Tony Gwynn card, in the same way I didn't count the Greg Vaughn card where he is obscured by Tony, when I blogged about it.

I'm fairly sure both these photos are from the same game, given the uniforms. Which would be cool if true. They certainly seemed to be competing!

It is fun to have Tony appear on other player's cards and for that appearance to be reciprocated. 

Total: 530 cards (same total as yesterday)