Why this card is awesome: Because this card is a great shot of how Gwynn used to hold the bat. He did the opposite of choke up, rather puttign his hands as far down the end of the bat as possible. I believe he even wrapped his bottom pinky around the edge of the knob. Oh, and I love the italics on the back of the card.
Cool stat: Gwynn was simply an awesome player. You can read all kinds of things about his great career in other places. But here's a nice one for you: over the course of his career from 1982 to 2001, Gwynn had 7 seasons in which he had enough PA to qualify for the batting title (502) but struck out 23 or fewer times. Over that same period, everybody else in baseball did it only 6 times.
Gwynn is in my top 5 of all-time favorite players.
Hall of Fame count: 24
4 comments:
And look how thin Tony was then.
Can you list your top 5? I know that Mattingly is #1, and I think that you wrote that Baines was #2, but who fills the three other slots with Tony Gwynn?
Tony was pretty established by 1988 #360 is a bad number for him
True, Gwynn was thin back then, but the weight gain between 1988 and the end of his career doesn't compare to the amount of weight he's gained since then. Geez. Puckett was similar.
Also true that #360 is a bad number for Gwynn. He was underrated, thanks in part to the fact that the Padres weren't much of a contender for most of his years. Boggs was a slightly superior player overall, but the two of them were way out ahead of everyone else and Gwynn deserved better.
As for my top 5, I'm not really sure. Mattingly, Baines, and Gwynn are all there but nobody else comes to mind at the moment. For current players, I really like Pujols because he's so consistent, and many of the Japanese players (particularly Ichiro and H Matsui) due to their extremely good work ethics and hard play.)
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