OT -- why does Spahn get no love?

[Peter_Spaeth]

363 wins even though he only started at age 25 because of WW II. 13 20 win seasons. His baseball-reference statistics are:

Black Ink Pitching - 101 (4), Average HOFer ≈ 40

Gray Ink Pitching - 374 (3), Average HOFer ≈ 185

Hall of Fame Monitor Pitching - 260 (9), Likely HOFer ≈ 100

Hall of Fame Standards Pitching - 66 (10), Average HOFer ≈ 50

One could make the argument that he's among the 5 best pitchers of all time, and I don't think anyone would seriously dispute top 10. But his cards -- nobody really cares, do they?

Small market? Limited post-season? Something else?

[icollectDCsports]

I've often wondered about this, too. Figure it's related to the small market and a team that relocated.

[Jobu]

As a Milwaukee native I say it is due to the small market. While not a top 5 player at his position, the same thing applies to Eddie Matthews. I have often wondered how people would view Aaron had the team not moved to Atlanta.

Another example of Milwaukee getting no love is Paul Molitor. Even though he is also from a small market, George Brett, who played at the same time and has a nearly identical career line, gets a lot more love than Molitor.

[frankbmd]

I love Warren.

[Paul S]

I love Warren too

Better watch out and better not cry lest I start flashing postwar cards on this neck of the forum

It's common knowledge that the Malwalkee Braves moved to Atlanta because no one could spell Matthews with a single T.

[Jobu]

Ahhhh, Paul! You busted me man! So much for quick late night posts - I hope I don't get run out of the city. As punishment I will resist the temptation to edit and take my lumps.

[Paul S]

Originally Posted by Jobu

Ahhhh, Paul! You busted me man! So much for quick late night posts - I hope I don't get run out of the city. As punishment I will resist the temptation to edit and take my lumps.

Don't worry, Man. I do that all the time with Mat(t)hewson.

[Fred]

I'm a Spahn fan.

[deadballfreaK]

Good question! Not only did he put up amazing pitching numbers, but he also was a .234 lifetime hitter with 35 homers. His WAR as a hitter is plus 7.8. Also a decorated war hero. Wounded three times including a bullet that grazed his head.

The small market was a big part. Plus he was never a flashy or spectacular player. Didn't have any 25-5 seasons or 300 Ks. Just went out every year and pitched 290 innings, won 21, and had an ERA of 2.90. Just imagine how much money he would make toda!

[Exhibitman]

Shh! You're letting out a secret. Spahn is one of those hidden collecting gems.

[cardsfan73]

Huge Warren Spahn fan here! In my opinion one of the top 3 lefthanders of all time and I wouldn't argue if you wanted to throw him in the top 10 pitchers of all time. That's not to shabby company in my opinion.


"First we’ll use Spahn, then we’ll use Sain,
Then an off day, followed by rain.
Back will come Spahn, followed by Sain,
And followed, we hope, by two days of rain."

[deadballfreaK]

Spahn quotes from a SABR article by Jim Kaplan:

“After what I went through overseas, I never thought of anything I was told to do in baseball as hard work,” he insisted. “You get over feeling like that when you spend days on end sleeping in frozen tank tracks in enemy-threatened territory. The Army taught me what’s important and what isn’t.”

“I matured a lot in those [war] years,” he said. “If I had not had that maturity, I wouldn’t have pitched until I was 45.”

[itjclarke]

I'm a huge Spahn fan as well... as a young left handed pitching kid, hearing stories about his 15 or 16 inning 1-0 duel with Juan Marichal, looking at his ridiculous stats (I think 13 20 win seasons), or hearing about his WWII service in the Battle of the Bulge, has made him someone I've always held in high esteem.

Can't speak fully for lack of interest/demand in Spahn items, but as noted in many of the "Mays vs Mantle" type threads- it seems clear that on field performance is often only a part, even a smallish part in dictating demand. The Joe Ds, Mantles, Joe Namath and Jeter had "the look", max exposure, and an off field panache to go along with great play. Not sure if Spahn had any of those off field collecting intagibles.

That said, he's the man! Feel very lucky to have snagged this gem off BST last week.. mine is on the left

[I Only Smoke 4 the Cards]

Exposure seems to be the answer. The guy was amazing.

[the 'stache]

I'm a huge fan of Spahnie, too. And I don't get it. I only hope his cards continue to be undervalued long enough for me to buy them all.

Spahn is an enigma within the hobby. I mean, Clemente and Aaron played their careers for small market teams, Roberto spending all 17 seasons in Pittsburgh, and Hank with the Braves, first in Milwaukee (the team had, of course, moved to Milwaukee before his rookie season of 1954), then in Atlanta. And Aaron returned to Milwaukee to close out his career with the Brewers. Both Clemente and Aaron's rookie cards, and subsequent cards command high prices. You could argue that Clemente was the first Latin American superstar, and he's absolutely idolized to this day. And Aaron, being the all-time home run leader for quite a while after passing the Babe, is always going to be highly collectible.

No, I put Spahn in the same category I put Mathews in. They're both real head scratchers. Eddie Mathews was the only player to wear a Braves uniform in Boston, Milwaukee and Atlanta, if my memory serves me correctly. And he may not be a top 5 all-time third baseman, but I do think he's in the top 10 at the position. When Eddie Mathews hit the ball, it stayed hit. He and Aaron are the all-time leaders for home runs by a duo, knocking the ball out of the park 863 times while teammates.

But Spahn? I don't get it. I mean, he's one of the greatest left handed pitchers to ever play the game. Only Cy Young (15) had more 20 win seasons than Spahn's 13, tying Christy Mathewson, and beating Walter Johnson by one. And as mentioned, Spahn hit 35 home runs in his career, too. He could really hit the ball. In one season, 1958, Spahn had 122 plate appearances, and get this, he had a .333 average, a .463 SLG, and an .844 OPS...at age 37. His OPS + was 131. Andrew McCutchen of the Pirates, the NL MVP winner last year, had a 157 OPS +. That puts Spahnie's season into perspective.

[Econteachert205]

Good discussion. When I think of Spahn I also think of Steve Carlton, another excellent lefty who has undervalued (in my view) cards. But of course Carlton was sometimes known for a difficult personality, which is totally not true with Spahn, so that is out. I do think the market does play a role, but I also think that Spahn played in an era where the true superstars were all offensive players (Mantle, Mays, Williams, AAron, Clemente etc.) Besides Spahn, the best pitchers were guys like Robin Roberts, Billy Pierce and other really great though not superstar personality pitchers.

[jason.1969]

I will posit another couple reasons for Spahn's second tier status among collectors.

1. People seem to get caught up in the young phenom who enters the league and sets it on fire before he can barely drink. Mantle, Williams, DiMaggio, Feller...more recently Gooden, Griffey 2, Harper, Trout. But here is Warren Spahn with 277 wins after turning 30. Here is an article that puts the total in perspective. http://www.3-dbaseball.net/2009/06/a...faxes.html?m=1

2. Collectors and fans seem to favor strikeout pitchers with blazing fastballs...Feller again, Koufax, Ryan. Despite leading the NL in Ks four times, Spahn's high was 191 and avg was 124.

[clydepepper]

I've always been a Spahn fan- I think not being in New York when that was the center of the Baseball world has a lot to do with it.

Pitchers in general did not get enough love between Dizzy Dean and Sandy Koufax...even Whitey could have gotten more.

I'll repeat my favorite Spahn numbers: He wore #21; was born in 1921; won exactly 21 games an amazing eight different seasons...and yet, Jack McDowell got the nickname, though it was 'Black Jack' and not 'blackjack'.

Ken- that's a great 1964 'art card' work. I have the Sports Illustrated with that cover...wonderful shot.

I enjoyed seeing Paul Byrd use the 'old-fashioned' pump windup while he was with the Braves. That's how I started, but wound up with the abbreviated version that everyone seems to use now.

[Peter_Spaeth]

According to baseball-reference's JAWS rating, and also Bill James I believe although he may have him 3rd, Mathews rates 2nd among all time third basemen.

[clydepepper]

It also doesn't help that his Rookie Card is a Mug Shot.

[hoot-owl]

We all know Buffalo gets no love, and Warren Spahn was born there.......

All kidding aside--belongs in the top ten all time. Even his tough regional cards (55 Johnston cookies, 50 Drakes) can be had for reasonable money.

Why was he left out of the 62 Post Cereal set?

[Ladder7]

Modern crap 😏

[ALR-bishop]

As a set collector it was a challenge to get all 3 of his 1959 card variations. Initially Topps printed the card with his DOB on the back as 1931. Apparently after detecting that error they smudged the 3 for some number of runs, before then issuing a corrected 1921 card. The latter was the harest for me to find, and seems to command the highest premium



In my experience, this in one of his toughest Topps "cards", second only to the 55 version

[deadballfreaK]

I heard Mike Shannon tell a story about Mathews not long ago. Apparently Mathews was the toughest guy ever. Bar fighter. Liked to drink and kick ass. Supposedly other tough guys came to his home bar to challenge him. He'd whip most of them and then they would come back in and tip a few more together. Anyway the Braves were on a losing streak and after a particularly galling loss the manager (Bragan?) went ballistic. He went the length of the clubhouse and confronted each player with comments like "You stink!" and worse. He came to Mathews locker and stuttered, "Well you're OK." On to the next guy. "You suck!!"

[Peter_Spaeth]

As a barometer of his card values, his last card (65 Topps) sells for maybe 25 percent of Mays, Aaron, Clemente and Koufax.

[Leon]

Some of his cards aren't so handsome, maybe that is one reason...

[Beatles Guy]

I've always thought of Spahn and Frank Robinson as two of the most underrated players as far as cards go. Leon is right, Spahn had some really ugly cards. His 1950 Bowman is probably my favorite.

[abothebear]

He is goofy looking, and not in a good way. I think that is a big factor. That, coupled with a large number of his cards, as mentioned by others, not doing him any favors to hide or transform that look.

[ethicsprof]

when I was a kid in the 60s, I couldn't trade him for anything that I wanted.
He often ended up in the bicycle spokes. I think he had a bit of the Don Mossi problem.
all the best,
barry

[drcy]

Spahn is regularly mentioned as an underrated pitcher, so maybe he isn't so underrated.

[earlywynnfan]

Originally Posted by Jobu

As a Milwaukee native I say it is due to the small market. While not a top 5 player at his position, the same thing applies to Eddie Matthews. I have often wondered how people would view Aaron had the team not moved to Atlanta.

Another example of Milwaukee getting no love is Paul Molitor. Even though he is also from a small market, George Brett, who played at the same time and has a nearly identical career line, gets a lot more love than Molitor.

Well, Brett is probably the 2nd-best 3B of all time, while Molitor was one of many players who were excellent at putting the ball in play. No knock on Molitor, but for professional value, he can't be compared to Brett.

[ls7plus]

Originally Posted by deadballfreaK

Good question! Not only did he put up amazing pitching numbers, but he also was a .234 lifetime hitter with 35 homers. His WAR as a hitter is plus 7.8. Also a decorated war hero. Wounded three times including a bullet that grazed his head.

The small market was a big part. Plus he was never a flashy or spectacular player. Didn't have any 25-5 seasons or 300 Ks. Just went out every year and pitched 290 innings, won 21, and had an ERA of 2.90. Just imagine how much money he would make today!

+1--this pretty much says it all. The ace of his team's staff for an incredible 17 years!

Good post,

Larry

[ls7plus]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Shh! You're letting out a secret. Spahn is one of those hidden collecting gems.

And a very tough rookie find in the '47 Tip Top Bread set, in any condition!

Highest regards,

Larry

[ls7plus]

Originally Posted by deadballfreaK

I heard Mike Shannon tell a story about Mathews not long ago. Apparently Mathews was the toughest guy ever. Bar fighter. Liked to drink and kick ass. Supposedly other tough guys came to his home bar to challenge him. He'd whip most of them and then they would come back in and tip a few more together. Anyway the Braves were on a losing streak and after a particularly galling loss the manager (Bragan?) went ballistic. He went the length of the clubhouse and confronted each player with comments like "You stink!" and worse. He came to Mathews locker and stuttered, "Well you're OK." On to the next guy. "You suck!!"

Mathews was well known to have beaten the living daylights out of both Frank Robinson and Don Drysdale on the field!

Larry

[Scocs]

It's the hair. What other bald baseball player was worshipped prior to the late twentieth century or even into the twenty first?

And Joe Gariagiola doesn't count!

[jason.1969]

Would go with Michael Jordan, remembering his brief stint in the Chisox system.

[Peter_Spaeth]

He was funny too. After Willie Mays hit a 500 foot home run off him, the press asked him what had happened. He said, for the first 60 feet it was a hell of a pitch.

[Touch'EmAll]

Recently picked this one up. I have always really liked this card, the action shot is classic.

[Jobu]

That is a cool pose, though the landscape behind him looks like a scene from The Road.

-----------

Driving by Miller park today I noticed something that I had to add to this thread. It appears that the Brewers don't even give Spahn his props - the parking lot they named after him is all by itself and you have to cross under 2 freeways to get to the park! (red arrows) Mathews also ended up with a tiny lot named after him. While the argument can be made that they were not Brewers, there are bigger/closer lots named the following: Brewers 1, Brewers 2, Braves 1, Braves 2.

(http://milwaukee.brewers.mlb.com/mil...ent=automobile)