Any player cards you dont collect because of morals
 

I know I will never collect OJ Simpson

i note there are a bunch of guys in the the 50s sets that did not have nice things to say about jackie robinson and willie mays as well..

The only player I will not collect is Tony Gwynn and I will admit my reason is beyond silly.

I am so anti Tony Gwynn that when a great hobby friend was excited and sent me a picture of his new game used Tony Gwynn bat. My return email only said "if you ever bring him up again we can't be friends". He has never sent me a email about getting another Tony Gwynn item.

Cap Anson. And it's a bummer, because his Goodwin Champions is one of the most beautiful cards ever produced.

Interesting topic...

My family does not love the fact that I have an N28 Cap Anson - not a good dude as it relates to integrating the game.

Here's a tangent issue - anyone ever have an issue selling to or buying from another collector or dealer with very different political slants than your own?

(I admit... I have)

I've owned Pete Rose cards, but have never looked to acquire them. I usually sell them off as soon as possible.

I don't have a character screen.

None. Vintage is history, and history is not the study of things I like or people who share my life philosophy and values. My non-sports sets include mass murders like Alexander, Caesar, and the more modern ones that offend. OJ Simpson is in my 70’s football sets. Charlie Haeger is in my 2006 Bowman box. My boxing sets include Kid McCoy who murdered his girlfriend and Billy Papke who murdered his wife. If I had the wallet to chase Old Judge’s, I would have Anson in my set. He sits in many of my modern sets. I’m sure one can find dozens of players to object too in any set.

I cannot imagine living in a world where I refuse to deal with someone because they disagree with me. I don’t care if a person I am dealing with is a hardline conservative or a communist. I know good men and bad of every political stripe.

I don't collect Bonds, I do collect Cobb.

I would never refuse to deal with someone based on their views alone.

Ha! Classic.

Love it lol

i collect historical figures but there I draw some lines -- no Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Castro, or Trump.:eek:

This is where the drama begins.

Same. And I bought the 1956 Topps Adventure set WITHOUT the Max Schmeling card because I like the other boxing cards but have no interest in having a swastika in my collection.

I collect players and cards I like. I research the players and enjoy the history and the stories behind the game.
I do not truly not buy/or not buy a player based on their politics, behavior, character, etc.
If We did there are many, many players we would not collect. Each does as they do.

I also avoid Anson, but that's about it.

I love the Giants but don't collect Lawrence Taylor.

It's always bugged me to hear that John McGraw was said to have carried a small piece of rope from a lynching "for luck"

I first heard this during the Ken Burns baseball series many years ago and I think of it often when looking at his cards (i'm a HOP "as a player" collector so it's not an issue with McGraw)

But still...

Not a set collector, so I just buy cards I want and like. I guess by definition that makes it easy to pass by players I simply don't like.

I don't really often get concerned about the history or character of the player if I like the card.

I can remember circle-filing a few Denny McLain's simply for being a complete excuse filled d**k as I knew people in the town he helped destroy with his embezzlement scheme. So I guess that's one, as it personally touched me. I never bought one, but if it comes in a lot...it's gone.

McGraw was a weird intense character that tended to rub people the wrong way at times, as well as doing conflicting things. It is horribly odd that this was a perverse tradition at the time and not uncommon. What is weirder is that in a true example of conflicting actions, McGraw did actually try to break the color barrier in 1901 by attempting to sneak in Charles Grant Jr as an American Indian named Chief Tokohama. If it wasn’t for Charles Comiskey putting a stop to it by recognizing Grant, McGraw would have been successful.

As an example that few may know of this sick tradition, feel free to read about Nap Lajoie -

Not really. Although there were card sets I just couldn't get interested in. Like one that was all serial killers. Got the promo pack in a lot and probably still have it somewhere. I can't recall ever seeing the cards offered, so it's possible they didn't end up being issued.

AH the early 90s when there were boatloads of cards about everything.

Wow, horrible… almost wish I didn’t know about this. (But thx for sharing - just wish his history wasn’t so tarnished by something like this)

I just think it's too hard to judge the past by current standards. What is positive is that those past standards are gone.

The real issue for me is when people do not learn from the mistakes or misguided mores of the past and continue to live by them. When we hide these things or erase them, they are only bound to repeat. We learn, we move forward.

I hear you and can see and agree with you to a point... but for me, a lucky lynching rope?? That's as clear as can be, even applying some latitude for a different time. This blows waaay past my own limit.

It's just a bummer to learn these things

Feel free to send me your Anson’s, Lajoie’s, McGraw’s and anyone else who does not meet todays standards of acceptable thought. Free your collection of its burden, and get some cash (note: cash may picture individuals who do not fit your worldview) in exchange!

P.S. Good luck finding 2022 right think in 1910.

What's truly astonishing is how matter of factly the newspaper reports the murder.

Yeah that was an intense read.

There is something to be said about those who reform later in life such as Speaker and Cobb. I have a lot of respect for those who can see the err in their ways and ideals, especially at an older age.

I went diving into the story here of this sad incident.

Robertson murdered a policeman on the street on a "forenoon", Deputy Sherriff Phillip Fatch. NY Times Article is here, though I can only read the abstract (https://www.nytimesn7cgmftshazwhfgzm...l-richard.html).

It appears that he was accused of assault, and two policemen came to arrest him. This unsourced marker, clearly and heavily biased to the most charitable view of Robertson possible, (https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=202593) claims "When two white deputies arrived to arrest Mr. Robertson, he objected and ultimately fled after an exchange of gunfire left all three wounded." It seems that there is little doubt he murdered a cop and shot another, who appears to have been making a lawful arrest. I can find nothing on if Robertson was guilty or not of the original assault, which is probably lost to time and only the claimed victims really knew, possibly the police if they had provided evidence. Robertson was shot by his victims three times as well. After Fatch succumbed to his wounds, a mob removed him from his cell and "fired several shots" and hung him. I interpret this to mean the poor man was given a coup de grace before being strung up, that's usually what this kind of phrasing meant at that time.

There are efforts for this memorial to Robertson and its final placement, which is apparently a hot topic in Mobile (https://www.al.com/news/2022/07/cont...-happened.html). Advocates of the memorial, which they wanted to place where a statue of the cancelled Raphael Semmes used to stand, claimed they were unaware of the allegation Robertson committed murder, which seems absolutely impossible to credibly believe as the memorial does include that fact, though phrased in the most charitable way.

What a sad and thoroughly unnecessary human tragedy all around, with 2 deaths and another probably seriously wounded person. A lynching is, should be needless too say, a horrible thing, as is the denial of due process rights, especially when the guilty party is already in custody and no longer a meaningful threat to the public. So is committing murder in the first place, Fatch seems to have done nothing wrong here as far as I have read, he served a legitimate warrant for arrest on assault charges, for those charges to be heard in court. As to the modern controversy, I do not think at this point I will ever understand the cancellation of historical figures to be replaced with similar statues, memorials and commemorations of people who are not historical figures and evidently committed objectively horrible crimes, but are more amenable to the narratives of those doing said cancelling. There seem to be many victims in this saga, and no heroes.

Incredibly sad story and thanks for doing the footwork. Regardless of the crimes involved, carrying a piece of lynching rope would only bring bad mojo in my book. I don't really care for Anson and his racist past so I don't collect his cards, but I also collect cards I like that are morally bankrupt in other ways, so I don't really have a leg to stand on.

Carrying a piece of lynch rope for luck is, of course, not as bad as actually doing said lynching, but it is such an odd thing to encounter. Rough street justice or perceived justice, racial and not racial, has been a norm for the vast majority of human history, but this little anecdote surprises. An all-around tragedy, the mechanism of it's sad and bloody conclusion turned into a good luck charm. History is often more strange than any fiction.

I do not mean this in a personal or negative way to anyone, but I find it endlessly interesting that today we see and treat racism (Anson's crime of thought, after the fact) as in many ways worse than even murder itself, that most absolute and final of all things (Simpson's crime of action, and a crime when committed). Anson is more objected to than Simpson, a statue of Semmes is pulled down for a memorial to a fellow who apparently committed a homicide without any dispute that he did. It dots our culture in many ways and places, and it surely says something about who we are as a people today, but I am not quite smart enough to put my finger on exactly what that is.

The information included in that Lajoie announcement made sure everyone knew who was hung. It went out of its way to tell you who was on the rope. The anecdote could have been about lynching anyone, and this good luck superstition, but it was about lynching a specific type of person.

I don't know that anything can be gleaned about Lajoie from the story though. He might have had this thing thrust on him and been polite about it but personally disturbed. I'm not sure from what's there.

Anson's crimes were not of thought only, but of action. It's referenced at length in regards to Moses Fleetwood Walker and the Chicago Mascot Clarence Duvall in the book "The Summer of Beer and Whiskey" by Edward Achorn.

Can't imagine collecting Aaron Hernendez cards

I don't have a copy of this book, though it's on my long "get it and read it" list. What crime did Anson commit? I am only familiar with his organizing professional white baseball to exclude black players, but I am no expert on Anson.

I was just referencing your "crimes of thought" comment and just said they were crimes of action, not an actual crime, just him being a horrible racist.

The book elaborates on his hatred of minorities and what led him to that ideology and the situation with Walker and how that shaped baseball.

That book is also an audiobook with a great narrator, I highly recommend it. Also 59 in 84 by same author and narrator about Old Hoss Radbourn is also excellent.

Ah. I mean that Anson's 'crime' is one of the intellect. He never lynched anybody, enslaved a person, or assaulted someone for the color of their skin as far as I am aware. What he did was not a crime at all, was accepted by his society at that time (Anson was not a commissioner or somebody who could simply dictate to a reluctant following), and was Anson refusing to do a thing himself.

59 in 84, I loved, fascinating look at one of the most interesting single player seasons of baseball history.

You'll love The Summer of Beer and Whiskey then. Chris Von Der Ahe was quite a character.

Thank you! Found a like new hardcover online for $5 and just ordered it.

I don’t collect too much post 1980 but if I saw a neat Mel Hall Cubs pinback or team issued photo I wouldn’t have any trepidations about buying it.

This idea has never actually crossed my mind before. For me personally, it wouldn't really matter what their morals were/are as they are not benefiting from me picking up the card.

In regards to the lynching rope, that is truly a bizarre concept and now after I submit this post, will likely go down a long rabbit hole trying to research it. It would be interesting to find out the chain of custody of a rope taken from around a murdered person's neck to being cut up and pieces given to a baseball player.

Fully agree with this. At the National the first booth I went to had a table full of nazi cards. Really off putting, especially since I went with a friend who is Jewish. There are some lines to draw and that’s certainly one for me.

Great original post and thought provoking for sure!

Some really sad things on this thread. Certainly a "lucky lynching rope" is putrid. Also foreign to me is the concept of not dealing with a dealer who has different political views from my own. I also find it beyond the pale that Trump was compared with Hitler and Stalin (the later 2 killed millions upon millions of people). Ignorant and unwise hyperbole. An interesting topic gone off the rails with some extremist comments.

To answer OP: I selectively collect players I like but am fine with ones I don't being in sets. For me the other side of that coin is more apparent in my collection: My favorite player is Campanella in part because of his character: overcoming discrimination and staying positive after the accident. Yet I am also aware that he wasn't the best husband to at least one of his wives.

Every human has strong faults and flaws. I try not to cast too many stones because i know my own heart is not always where it should be.

As a set collector I collect all cards in any set I collect...the good, the bad and the ugly. I guess I could feel a little guitly about buying a fantasy 1959 Ed Bouchee card :)

I forgot him being an immoral Cub too! It took me forever to get a decent 1962 Canadian Post of his.

Yup, and that's another reason why I won't collect some old non-sports issues. On a related note, I'll sometimes attend in-person auctions in Indiana and also bid in some auctions from smaller companies online, and it bothers me that many of these auction houses sell Nazi paraphernalia. They sell this crap because obviously some people buy it, but I have considered contacting the owners of these auction houses and asking them why they wish to perpetuate interest in objects associated with nothing buy hate. I've held off from doing so....people have a right to sell what they want as long as it's not illegal. But I may well start personally avoiding the places that include such items in their auctions. I'm sure my business wouldn't be missed in most cases.

I couldn’t possibly agree more…. Cheers to you for taking a personal stand.

And related, I occasionally see posts of late 1800’s card sets which include incredibly racist caricature images of African American baseball players, etc. I just can’t imagine how there is joy in collecting cards that perpetuate inages like this. Clearly some do, and to each his own, I guess. I just don’t get it

Well said

I wanted to buy some Nazi coinage once, and my mother heard about it and gave me a rebuke. I'm a historian, and to me I see a historical artifact. But I passed them up and haven't ever bought any.

I think a similar question to sale of Nazi items is: why are serial killer books and shows so popular? I imagine collecting items of evil and watching items of evil have many similar characteristics.

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First, I only collect Baseball, so, many of those mentioned previously, aren't in my 'arena'.

I do discriminate against PED users - the sole exception being journeyman catcher Geff Zaun, who actually did 'call his shot' in the 1999 Hall-of-Fame game I attended in Cooperstown.

I also will never collect Rose or any other cheaters...as, in doing so, IMO, dishonors the legacy of those who did not cheat.

Besides, I'd go broke trying to collect EVERYBODY.


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Please share your reasoning...I have always thought Gwynn was a good guy.



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this whole thread makes me think of this quote: "The world is full of bastards, the number increasing rapidly the further one gets from Missoula, Montana."

Personally, I cannot live in a B&W white world, and believe most of us live in gray. Perhaps it's because I'm a teacher, I have to walk into class every day forgetting and forgiving the stupid idiotic things my students (mostly male) do every day. Teenage boys must only have 100 working brain cells, and middle school boys only half that amount.

So, when it comes to cards, I don't usually think of a players value to society. I also came to maturity during the steroid era, so that probably taints my opinion as well.

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I would think they are probably popular because they are exciting, the opposite of the banality of evil if we may keep the comparison; evil at it's most visceral. Many are the most extreme type of mystery, that with the highest stakes and consequences. The element of the unknown, oftentimes in the identity of the killer and in the bizarre compulsions driving the tragic act, certainly seems to appeal to many. I think history shows us that every people in every time and of every faith and of no faith have been fascinated with death, the cost we all eventually must pay to enjoy life. People are interested when they hear something shocking. The vast, vast majority see the villain of the piece as the villain of the piece, and while interested there is no element of support for the actions of that evil. If watching horror movies made one a monster, nobody could still be alive.

I have read true crime books. I see nothing immoral in having done so. I have a large library of history books, almost all of which contain material greatly objectionable to current orthodoxy. Some of them contain Nazi's and their symbols. One of them is about a serial killer in Berlin under the Nazi regime, even. I once had a friend of a friend at a gathering at my place get upset and storm out because of the "Nazi flag" on my living room table, which after investigating what they were on about, turned out to be the book jacket to William Shirer's book I was reading that week (and is very anti-Nazi). I have read Mein Kampf in its entirety. History, genuine inquiry into it, is not the study of things one likes or their party finds amenable to their narrative, as nobody states but most seem to clearly desire. My collection of history cards contains some good and some bad and mostly grey. I will never understand the increasingly popular view that that which is bad or negative in the narrative is offensive, and that that which is offensive needs to be censored, whether formally or informally, kept from public view, or curated out of collections, and only a very ill-defined and constantly shifting world view ever be permissible to seriously engage with, which often includes individuals who did great evil as well but are amenable to the narrative.

its probably about timing..give it 200 years..and there will be more nazi buyers etc

Gregg Zaun, you conflated him with Geoff Zahn, who laid an egg for the Cubs when they traded a disgruntled Burt Hooton for him.

You are correct...oops! I remember the event more than the name.


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Thanks Jeff. For me, the issue hits too close to home.
BTW, I agree with your related comment about early cards with racist caricatures of ball players. I dare say that most would not see any joy in collecting those particular cards. I do understand though, that there may be some historians or completists that would purchase these items (I can appreciate a financial motivation to sell a complete set if it brings more $$, so maybe there is the feeling of a need to add a card that might be offensive to some, in order to get that additional financial gain).

This has been an interesting thread. I've learned some things I never knew before. I hazard to guess that another interesting thread might be this: Would you draft or do you currently carry any unethical or immoral players on your fantasy teams!! Now I'm sure that would open a can of worms!

Al, don't shame the centerpiece of my pervert autograph collection.:D

https://www.collectorfocus.com/image...604/bouchee-ed

Maybe for his batting battles with Boggs?

LOL, that and his beyond amazing late in life insanely huge increase in batting average from age 33-37. His huge production increase made Barry Bonds increase look like Barry had never even heard of PEDs.

Weirdly couldn't care less about anyone else's huge increase in production late in their careers.

I said it didn't make sense.:eek::D

I feel like Tony probably got better because pitching got worse as his career went on.

That is beyond laughable to me. The 5 years he was age 28-32 his batting average averaged .318 in what is the prime years of most athletes. Then the 5 years from age 33-37 he averaged .369 over the years most are seriously declining.

If this wasn't good guy Tony Gwynn would adding 51 points to their batting average in their later years be totally ignored? If it was bad pitching the entire league average should have went through the roof.

and that is all I have to say on the subject.:)

I have no interest in Gwynn being clean or dirty, but for the record, the league did go through the roof in 1993, Gwynn’s age 33 season. We went from 3.88 runs per game to 4.49, batting averages jumped 12 points, OPS jumped 42. They stayed high for a number of years after, 1993 marks a significant leaping point in NL offense.

Why is it laughable? One of those 28 to 32 seasons he hit 313 but also led the league in hitting and led the league in hitting the next season too.

National League average ERA from 1988 to 1992:

3.45
3.49
3.79
3.68
3.50

National League average ERA from 1993 to 1997:

4.04
4.21
4.18
4.21
4.20

Tony Gwynn was not everyone. He was one of the most talented hitters of all time. Pitching did get worse so why wouldn't an already elite hitter not get better?

Obviously your insinuation is he was taking PEDs or doing something else along the lines of cheating. If PEDs, I've seriously asked this question before. Knowing how PEDs apparently effect muscles and strength, please explain then how taking them can have such a dramatic effect on someone's batting average, but as is the case with Gwynn, seemingly no such dramatic effect on his hitting home runs, which seems to be the one constant similar factor among all PED using players other than pitchers. I've never come across anyone yet that can provide a reasonable or logical explanation as to how increased strength alone can also so dramatically increase one's eyesight, hand-eye coordination, and the like, that are tremendous factors in helping with a player's batting average.

Wouldn't posting the actual batting average during that time be WAY more relevant since that is what is being discussed. ERA is for pitchers.:D

Are you suggesting there's no link between worse pitching and an elite hitter's rising batting average? Does rising league average ERA not indicate pitching declined as his career went on?

There is a link but if we are just using things with links why not total bases?

I feel like you think I'm being arbitrary but there was a statistical decline in pitching because pitching got worse. It makes sense that an elite hitter would get better if the average pitcher is worse. I don't see why that's laughable. That's what I would expect to happen.

I never collected his cards anyway, but I'm guessing there aren't too many Felipe Vazquez collectors on here. He's one guy I'm not interested in collecting....

If the claim is that “pitching got worse”, then using ERA makes sense. It’s the standard criteria of effectiveness for pitchers, and the core claim made was about pitchers.

I don’t think pitching just gets worse one year, I think we’re seeing the growing effect of steroid proliferation and expansion.

I don't think you're being arbitrary, but did you ever realize and consider that the NL expansion and addition ot two more teams, the Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins, just happened to also occur in 1993, the exact same year you noted the NL change in average ERA? Pitching may not have necessarily gotten worse, but obviously became more diluted due to the expansion. Also, the continuing and possibly expanding use of PEDs, and maybe a particular new PED coming out around that same time, could also be a contributing factor to the increasing ERAs. Hey, if nothing else, simply adding the Colorado Rockies with their mile high altitude and thin air into the NL is going to have at least a small impact on the overall NL average ERA, don't you think?

So I did some research on the lynching of Richard Robertson (above article).

Robertson was arrested and jailed in January 1909, for allegedly shooting and killing Deputy Philip Fatch.

The altercation occurred after two deputies, including Fatch, arrived at Robertson’s home to arrest him on a warrant for assault. Robertson, a carpenter working on a home in downtown Mobile, had been accused by two white plumbers – also working on the same home – of assault.

Robertson fled the deputies, and all three exchanged gunfire. Robertson was shot and transported to jail.

I am in no way justifying a barbaric lynching (or the accepting of hanging ropes as gifts). I'm only pointing out that this was not an "innocent" man that hung that day.

Did you consider I might have thought of all those things and that's why I said pitching got worse as Gwynn's career went on? From 1992 to 1997 the NL average ERA went from 3.50 to 4.20, that is a significant rise and I'm not sure how you can say it doesn't indicate a decline in pitching. You said pitching was diluted, same thing. If the average pitcher is worse and there are more bad pitchers than good pitchers, why wouldn't it stand to reason that an elite hitter would have a higher batting average against weaker competition?

I don't see where the controversy lies with Gwynn.

In 107 AB’s against Greg Maddux, Gwynn hit .415 against him. I don’t think Gwynn cared who was pitching.

Seriously still on ERA.:confused:
Here you go.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/NL/bat.shtml

I don’t see how this helps your cause either. Average batting average went from 252 in 1992 to 264 in 1993. Very clearly demonstrating a decline in the quality of pitching and average players hitting for a higher batting average.

Respectfully, I'm sure the folks who did the lynching probably felt the same way that day... for me, it's irrelevant.

I'd also like to add that the topic on this thread has been so thought provoking for me as a collector. As someone earlier joked, they'd be happy to take cards off my hands of some of the sketchier HOF members, it's honestly something that has crossed my mind over the last day or two.

And thanks to all who have kept the conversation civil - lots of adults here, which is nice (and sadly rare these days)

If we can debate using the same statistics over the same periods it would be way easier. I see no reason for me to debate something I never brought up like ERA.

Another HUGE thing you and others seem to overlook. In my very first post I clearly stated my reason was "beyond silly". How do you argue against that?:confused: