eBay Item Of The Day

In 1967, Topps did a number of these teammate cards with, where possible, alliterative names such as the ones seen here: Bengal Belters, Pitt Power and Mets Maulers. I had always assumed every team had one, but no! After the jump, there’s a list of these cards that Topps made along with a list of the ones they should have made.

In hindsight, some of the choices seem strange. The Mets had a card, but the Yankees didn’t? The National League champion Dodgers didn’t, either, but the Indians, coming off an 81-81 campaign had two, including the only all-pitcher card. The Braves had a host of likely candidates that weren’t used; most obviously Hank Aaron, but Joe Torre, Rico Carty and Felipe Alou as well. Instead, they went with Denis Menke and Tony Cloninger, a pitcher (who did just hit two grand slams in one game the year before, but still...) The Orioles card might seem like an odd choice, but the #1 card of the Topps set in 1967 featured Hank Bauer, Frank Robinson and Brooks Robinson and was titled “The Champs,“ so not naming the two Robbies the Bird Bombers makes some sense.

The 1967 Topps Teammate cards:

Cards that should have been created, but weren’t: