30 Day Baseball Card Challenge

Tuesday, July 21, 2020

Solid First Impressions

Last month, I read something really interesting about Willie McCovey over on ARPSmith's Sportscard Obsession.  He was showing off a very cool scoresheet that he added to his collection.  On the back cover was the box score from McCovey's MLB debut on July 30th, 1959.

1998 UD Retro Sign of the Times #WM

Did you know that McCovey went 4 for 4 at the plate in his debut and two of those hits were triples?  How cool is that?

Fun Fact:  McCovey only hit 46 triples during his entire twenty-two season career.  

Like many of your blog posts, Adam inspired me to research other great MLB debuts.  That's where I found this article on MLB.com.  Feel free to click on the link, just make sure you promise to come back and finish reading this post.

I decided to focus on a few of my favorites and combine them with some cards from my collection.

2014 HA Originals Historic Autograph

Let's start off with Juan Marichal who happened to be celebrate the 60th anniversary of his MLB debut this past Sunday.  Back on July 19th, 1960, he kicked off his hall of fame career with one hit shutout over the Philadelphia Phillies at Candlestick Park.

Clay Dalrymple pinch hit for Cal Neeman in the top of the 8th inning with two outs and hit a single to centerfield to end the no-hitterMarichal ended up striking out twelve batters, while walking only onePretty impressive, right?

Fun Fact:  Bumpus Jones is the only pitcher to throw a no-hitter in his MLB debut.

Not So Fun FactMarichal hit John Roseboro with a bat.  He thought Roseboro was throwing the ball back to the pitcher and coming too close to his headThank you Elliptical Man and Mike Matson for clearing things up for me.

1965 Topps #266

Moving along... I thought I'd share the debut of Bert Campaneris since he was the focus of attention on a pair of blogs back in May.  Here are the links:  Night Owl Cards and Shoebox Legends.  Just remember to come back and finish reading this post.

Campy made his MLB debut on July 23rd, 1964 against the Minnesota Twins at the Met.  In his first at bat and on the first pitch he saw, he hit a home run off of Jim Kaat in the top of the first inning.  He hit another home run off of him in the seventh inning and ended up going 3 for 4 with three RBI's, a walk, and a stolen base that day.

Fun FactCampaneris was the first of five guys to play every position in a single MLB game.

Not So Fun Fact:  I was hoping to look up Campy's career numbers versus Kaat, but you now have to pay $8 for that information on Baseball Reference.  The free ride was fun while it lasted.

The last MLB debut I'll talk about is one of those guys who came over from Japan in the early 2000's and I'm not talking about Ichiro or Hideki.

2004 Topps Traded and Rookies Future Phenoms Relics #FP-KM


It's Kaz Matsui.  Back on April 6th, 2004 (Opening Day at Turner Field), Matsui was the leadoff hitter against the Russ Ortiz and the Atlanta Braves.


Like Campy, he hit a home run in his first Major League at-bat.  Unlike Campy, it was the very first pitch of the game and the season.  By the end of the day, he was 3 for 3 with two doubles, two walks, and three runs batted in.

Fun Fact:  According to Beckett, Kaz only has one certified, pack inserted autograph (2002 BBM Japan All-Star Game) and there are only 40 copies out there.

Not So Fun Fact (if you're a Padres fan):  In his first at bat of the 2006 season, he hit an inside-the-park home run off of Jake Peavy.

What about you?

Are there any MLB debuts that stand out to you?  Any fun (or not so fun) facts about that player?

If so, please share them down below for others to see.  Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

19 comments:

Elliptical Man said...

Roseboro was a catcher.

Mike said...

Kazuo Matsui also homered in his first AB on opening day in 2005 and hit an inside-the-park homerun in his first AB in 2006, although the 2006 shot came in the Mets' 15th game of the season due to Matsui opening the year on the DL. Outside of those three longballs in his initial AB of the season, Matsui only hit eight more homers during his 2.5-year stint with the Mets.

In terms of debuts, Orlando Hernandez's has always stood out for me both for his excellent performance (7 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 7 K, 2 BB, Win vs. TB on 6/3/98) as well as the major journey that he had to take just to ever have a chance to pitch in the U.S.

sg488 said...

John Montefusco,in his MLB debut not only did he get the win in relief he also hit a home run in his first MLB at bat.

Mike Matson said...

Indeed he was. Marichal was batting and felt Roseboro was throwing the ball back to the pitcher too close to Marichal's head. So I believe after a couple times it happening, Marichal snapped and started beating Roseboro with the bat

John Bateman said...

Starlin Castro I think got 6 RBIs in his first game and the great young David Clyde who was pitching at 18? for the Texas Rangers in 1973.

Brett Alan said...

Steven Matz in 2015. He did allow 2 runs in 7 2/3 innings...but he also drove in 4! He was the first Met and the 11th player in history to have 3 hits and 4 RBIs, and the only pitcher. The sight of his grandfather celebrating the third hit is etched in Mets fans minds. https://www.amazinavenue.com/2015/6/28/8859869/steven-matz-grandfather-mets-fan-gif-woooooo

gcrl said...

A couple of twins come to mind for me - Eddie Rosario homered on the first big league pitch he saw, and Joe Mauer reached base four times in his debut (a game I attended)

Johnnys Trading Spot said...

I'm not much of stat man. Albeit the HR, RBI, BA, Wins, K's, SB's the yearly/career totals are more my thing. Well, to my liking anyways. As far as standout debuts....a couple pop in memory (both Braves of course). Gattis hit a dinger in his debut , what stands out is that his dad was being interviewed when he hit the HR. Heyward banged a dinger on Opening Day in his debut. Pretty sure Horner slammed one in his debut too.

Nick said...

Kosuke Fukudome's debut (or at least his US debut) stands out for me. Fun part: he hit a game-tying thee-run HR in the 9th against the Brewers on Opening Day in 2008.

Not so fun part: the Cubs still wound up losing that game, and that was probably the best game Fukudome had as a Cub.

The Lost Collector said...

Cool post. My favorite debuts were when Tyler Austin and Aaron Judge debuted, and both hit homers in their first plate appearances. Back to back homers, in fact!

GTT said...

Last year I got to see the Yankees play the Rangers, and the Yanks pitcher Mike King made his debut. He looks like he could be a very good pitcher.

The Austin-Judge game was another great one.

Bo said...

Judge hit another home the next day. I was at Yankee Stadium for the third game and he drove in the winning run. That was late August, and he slumped majorly after that, but bounced back to have a pretty good first full season.

Peter K Steinberg said...

Very fun post here with great facts. I remember Stephen Strasburg's first start. 8 June 2010. 14 strikeouts. Wow.

NPB Card Guy said...

>Fun Fact: According to Beckett, Kaz only has one certified, pack inserted autograph (2002 BBM Japan All-Star Game) and there are only 40 copies out there.

Beckett is very wrong. In fairness to them, that might have been the only one issued in Japan before he left for MLB in 2004 but he had many certified, pack inserted autographs available in Japan after he returned to NPB in 2011.

RunForeKelloggs said...

sad to hear that about baseball-reference.

Matt said...

UD retro was such a great product. Nice on card autos and great design. UD has some great lines

Fuji said...

elliptical man & mike matson - thanks for pointing that out. i'll update the post as soon as i'm finished commenting

mike - i remember the hype over orlando hernandez bowman card back in the late 90's. i'll have to look him up on wiki to read about this journey

sg488 - very cool. didn't know that about montefusco

john bateman - wrote about clyde a few years ago. i remember he pitched his first mlb game less than a month after pitching his last high school game

brett alan - wow. that was a very cool debut. and the reaction by his grandfather was awesome. thanks for sharing. i either didn't hear about it or completely forgot about that

gcrl - that's pretty cool that you attended mauer's first game. still have that ticket?

johnnys trading spot - i'll have to see if they have a clip of the gattis homer on youtube. just watched it. very cool

nick - when i returned to collecting, i remember fukudome's cards being pretty popular. just watched the video of his 9th inning home run. the announcer mentioned that he was 3 for 3 with a walk before that home run. that's a great opening day performance

the lost collector & bo - didn't realize judge is a member of that club... but it doesn't surprise me. he's a beast.

gtt - gotta say... if he's a yankee, i won't be rooting for him ;D

peter k steinberg - now that's a debut i remember. very impressive

npb card guy - guess i'll have to check ebay to see if anyone has one for sale. thanks for the heads up

runforekelloggs - yeah, i was pretty bummed.

sport card collectors - yeah, that's a pretty underrated autograph set. i'll grab singles every now and then when they're cheap

The Snorting Bull said...

I feel like I have not seen any really great MLB ones. I saw the first game Pujols played in Busch Stadium, but the Cardinals started the 2001 season on a long road trip. Now, if we can throw some Minor Leagues in there, I have seen some good ones. Just in games in Durham, limiting to my top three, I have seen David Price, Longoria, and Blake Snell.

shoeboxlegends said...

Thanks for the link! That signed Campaneris is just plain beautiful, what a great card.