1952 Trades

I've been sorting through some vintage cards I bought a few years back. Of course by sort, I mean get distracted and start looking names up on baseball reference and SABR.

 1952 Bowman George Strickland

1952 Topps Ted Wilks

When I was sorting the cards my initial thought was "hey that Strickland card is cool"  so I pulled it aside to showcase on the blog. As usual I started reading about George Strikland and found out that both he and Ted Wilks were traded to the Indians and 1952. 

When I saw the name Wilks I immediately knew I had shown a card of him before.. I featured him in a post about some vintage Bowman.  As I got a little further in my vintage stack I noticed I had a nice 52 Topps Wilks.  It was destiny that these two cards be put in the same post.  

Both guys are not well known, but each had about 10 year careers.  The Pirates were short tenures for each with Strickland staying around 3 years and Wilks part of 2 seasons.  

I love the vibrant colors of each card and both are in really nice condition. Gotta love vintage cards. They tell so many stories...

Thanks for reading. 

Old Perfection

When it comes to buying vintage I do more window shopping than anything. I'll put a bunch of stuff on my watch list, but when the time comes to act my trigger finger gets a little shy. I think a lot of this stems from me being able to add a lot of old Pirates through trades. Mark Hoyle has pretty much filled up a binder and Zippy just sent me a T206. It's good to have helpful blogging friends!

With that being said I can be convinced to pull the trigger when the opportunity presents itself. Last month I was watching some auctions from a seller I follow and he posted a ton of 1952 Bowman cards. He probably had 25 or so, and all were in immaculate shape. I made up my mind that I wanted a few for my collection and went for it.  After it was all said in done I won 5. I was kind of kicking myself a little as I should have been more aggressive. The cards were beautiful.

Take a look.

 Bill Howerton

 Murray Dickson

 George Mitkovich

Ted Wilks

Billy Meyer

In terms of significance Murray Dickson and Billy Meyer (manager) had long tenures with the Bucs. Meyer actually had his number retired by the Pirates more for being a respected baseball guy than the results on the field. Some of the local Pittsburgh media have written about Meyer on occasion saying that he didn't deserve the honor. 

Price wise the cards cost anywhere from $6 to $13 a piece. I though a reasonable price as all 5 have outstanding fronts. The most notable wear is found on two of the backs. 

Hopefully the seller finds a few more 52 Pirates so I can keep adding to the collection. 

Thanks for reading.