Carlos Perez.

A post by The Night Owl (LINK) inspired me to look at Carlos's career.

Carlos had a decent rookie season in 1995, then missed all of 1996. He came back in 1997, and the Expos allowed him to pitch 8 complete games out of 32 starts! He also had 5 shutouts, but only went 12-13 with a 108 ERA+. He pitched 206 innings in 1997, 241 in 1998, and after that he was essentially pitching batting practice.

I'm working on a theory that hard luck pitchers are often hurt by their team's defense and not just by the lack of runs scored in support. In 1997, in his 13 losses, Carlos gave up 17 unearned runs. In his 12 wins, he gave up 3 unearned runs. However, 12 of the unearned runs came in only 2 of the losses, so the theory will need more research.

Carlos was entertaining, and when he was on his game a good pitcher. Unfortunately there was a lot of ugliness in his non baseball life.

I wonder if there was something wacky in his tobaccey?

Random cards. Mike Scioscia.

Come on Mike, didn't anyone teach you not to point?

Signers. Fernando Valenzuela. Card back.

I like that he's signing a Sports Illustrated with himself on the cover, instead of the standard old card or ball shot. Shame he's signing it with a ballpoint.

Recycled photos. Mike Piazza.

Another new category. Those times when the same or very similar picture ends up on two different cards.

Don Barbara, Roberto Petagine, a bat and a glove.

Don Barbara had played in the PCL in 1992, and in 1994 was back in the league with Albuquerque. One of the other autograph hunters told me that Barbara would give him a bat if he introduced him to a girl, so naturally I asked him if he'd do the same for me. He said yes, so I convinced my then wife to bring a friend of hers along for what was the last game of the season. Yup, I pimped her out for a bat. Classy huh?

Yeah well, it's a nice bat. The signature isn't the best, but it's a nice LA Dodgers Louisville Slugger.

Barbara signed on with the Red Sox in the off-season as a replacement player, which is probably one of the main reasons his career ended after 1996. The guy could hit, he had some kind of a bat on him. He's now an assistant coach for the Pacific Tigers, under head coach Ed Sprague.

Roberto Petagine was another guy who could hit well in the minors, unfortunately it never worked out for him in the bigs. He shoulda been a star.

I've always been a wannabe first baseman, so I had both of them sign my glove at different times in 1994.

A little bat work.

I like cards that do a little more than show the standard action shots. These three show players hard at work making sure their weapons are ready for action.

 Ellis Burks give his bat 100% attention.

 Jeff Conine appears to be stroking the bone here.

Whatever Todd Zeile is doing, I'm sure he's doing in a mediocre and workmanlike way, very much like his career.

Random card. Antonio Osuna.

Antonio had some stuff. He had some decent major league numbers in his career.

He briefly pitched for Albuquerque in 1994, and I got this signed when they were in Vancouver. A guy I knew had asked him to sign the same card the day before, and Antonio flipped out because he'd never seen a card of himself before! He gave the card to Antonio, and more packs were bought and opened to find a couple more of the card to get signed. Kind of a cool story, as I'm sure most of us fans would love to see our first official baseball card. Antonio didn't speak much English at the time, but he was super happy to have a card to sign.

In a funny side note, the lefty Al Osuna was on the same team.