George Crowe
Boston Braves
1st base
- Played 9 seasons in the majors - 3 years each with the Braves, Reds and Cardinals.
- Played in the Negro Leagues - New York Black Yankees.
- Was the very first Indiana Mr. Basketball.
- Was the only Reds starter not elected to the 1957 All Star game when Cincinnati fans stuffed the ballot.
First Brave in the '53 Topps set. One of the reasons why '53 Topps is so awesome is that it marks the move of the Braves from Boston to Milwaukee. I don't think I've ever seen another set have cards with both the old and new city of the franchise on cards in the set. George is from the 1st series, so he gets Boston on his card.
Three things that make this card quite exceptional: The light standard peeping into the picture, the Yankee Stadium facade in the background of a National leaguer and those wonderful glasses. You can't find glasses like that nowadays. George was a two-sport star as he also played in the league that was the precursor to the NBA. Troll has an excellent post on George if you're interested.
If you hadn't figured it our yet, I will be posting each of the 1953 Topps cards in my set over the 240 days or so. I had originally thought about creating another '53-only blog to focus on this, then decided that was too much effort for too little reward. Besides, I've been slacking on posts on this blog lately, no need to divide my efforts.
1 comment:
Great post!!! I am a HUGE fan of Mr. George Crowe, what an amazing player he was! Imagine what he could have done at the plate in modern baseball with contact lens! The guy was practically blind and still blasted homeruns like no other. I like your point about different cities of the same franchise in the same set... In 1965 Topps they included players from both the Houston Colt 45s and the Houston Astros. Same city, different team name. Great post and I love the new header!
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