Today is going to be the meat of the recap. I'll be sharing some facts, figures, and opinions and hopefully you will be informed and entertained. Now here is some trivia on the entire set from David Aardsma to Ben Zobrist and all points in between.
I'll be back on Sunday to wrap up this set along with showing off the top ten cards of the set as voted on by you. If you haven't voted for your ten yet, please do so on the right sidebar.
Team with the most cards
Boston Red Sox (57)
Team with the fewest cards
(tie) Seattle Mariners & Cincinnati Reds (39)
Total # of cards in this set
1494
Total # of unique players appearing in the set
1284 (1316 including managers)
Total # of players appearing with multiple teams
117
Total # of players appearing on 3 or more teams
6 (all with 3 teams)
Here are all six with teams shown in order of appearance.
The 6th is a bit tricky.
This is the order in which Pearce appeared in games, but not the order in which he was on the teams. Pearce started the year with the Yankees after being released by the Twins in Spring Training, but never got out of the minors. Then, he was purchased by the Orioles and played in 28 games and was then waived. Houston claimed him on waivers and he played in 21 games for the Astros. Then, the Yankees purchased him from Houston (I wonder if his value dropped by half once Baltimore drove him off the lot). He played in 12 games for New York at the end of the year before being waived near the end of the season. Finally, he was picked up by Baltimore once again, but didn't play in any more games for them. All told in 2012, Pearce had 6 different stops with 4 different franchises, but only played games in 3 of those stops. Whew!
Total # of players sharing the same name
12
Here are the 6 sets of players that share the same name
There were also two sets of players with the same name that included one traded player. The first two cards in each threesome are one player and third is a different player with the same name.
The final set of same name players only included one player along with one manager (or former manager)
Total # of players that I was forced to use mug-shot pictures
4
I tried to get updated on-field or in-dugout pics for everyone, but I missed these four guys. Aardsma pitched in 1 inning of 1 game. Taylor pitched in 3 games for a total of 2.1 innings. Solis and Quiroz were both the emergency catchers on their team during the September call ups. Solis played in 5 games and went 0-4, while Quiroz played in 2 games and went hitless in 2 at bats. Needless to say, there weren't a lot of opportunities to catch these guys on film.
Team write ups with the most pageviews
1. Miami Marlins Part 2
2. San Diego Padres Part 2
3. Cincinnati Reds Part 2
It is sort of odd that three small market teams, including two without a big blog presence, would get the most pageviews. I was pleasantly surprised by the turnout.
Team write ups with the fewest pageviews
1. Cleveland Indians Part 2
2. Atlanta Braves Part 2
3. Houston Astros Part 1
I was equally surprised that these three teams made up the fewest # of pageviews. Both Cleveland and Houston have at least 3 bloggers each and, before the massive Dodger takeover, about half of all blogs were affiliated with the Braves. Oh well, they will be there from now on in case people ever want to see them in the future.
Total # of teams with color changes from 1986 Topps
7 (including Nationals/Expos)
Total # of people that appeared in this set and 1986 Topps
15 (16 including Jim Leyland who was in 1986 Topps Traded)
Total # of those people I forgot to show in side-by-sides
1
I just totally forgot about Dodgers manager Don Mattingly, which is strange since he was one of the most sought after 1986 Topps cards (after Dwight Gooden) back in the day. It did work out that one of least favorite players ever that is currently managing my second least favorite team was the one forgotten. but it was still accidental. I'll make up for it now with Don Mattingly's side-by-side.
As much as I dislike Mattingly, I must say he has aged very well, probably the best of any of the 16 guys.
Don't forget to vote for your top ten, because the voting ends tomorrow.
Thanx for reading.
