The Swingin' A's

Last Friday marked the 40th anniversary of the Oakland Athletics celebration over the Los Angeles Dodgers for their third consecutive World Series title.  At the time, I was just graduating from diapers and probably wasn't a fan of them for at least another year or so.

But that's not going to stop me from celebrating their history.  The A's have been my favorite team longer than any other franchise in any other sport.  And since I grew up in the 70's, one of my favorite things to collect is cardboard of The Swingin' A's.

Luckily for me, card companies have been very helpful in producing cards of most of the key players from those World Series teams.

Let's start with their starting rotation, which had three 17-game winners:

And if the big three weren't enough... the A's also had one of the best closers in the game and World Series MVP:

In terms of run support, they had the American League stolen base leader running around the bases:

But North wasn't alone... he had some historical company:

Mr. Washington is the first and last player to ever have "pinch runner" listed as their official position. 

They also had four guys who hit twenty-two or more home runs:

Rounding out my collection of old school Athletics is the lesser known "Campy":

Bert Campaneris is the franchise's all-time leader in hits and games played.  He also has the second most stolen bases in franchise history.  I'm sure you can figure out who's first.

Well that's it for today.  I can't believe it's already the start of the work week.  Ugh.  At least the World Series starts tomorrow.  Congratulations Kansas City Royals and San Francisco Giants fans!

Happy Monday and sayonara!