1991 Donruss French Back Proof
 

Good morning,

I recently picked up this blank-front proof of Tim Burke. The back looks like a regular 1991 Donruss card except it is in French. This would be similar to the Leaf products Donruss issued through 1988. However the actual 1991 Leaf set is its own design.

I'm assuming this was part of an unissued test set that was back-doored from Donruss but was just wondering if anyone had any more information or has any other cards? I've included an image of the regular 1991 Donruss Tim Burke back for reference.

Thanks for your help.

Attachment 513987

Attachment 513988

Attachment 513989

Interesting that his home city is changed.

Sorry, don't have anything to add regarding that interesting card, but man, the rabbit holes you go down. I barely remember Tim Burke, but he had a sneaky good few years as a reliever.

Shows how differently we look at relievers and pitchers in general nowadays.

1985, his Rookie year. He had an arguably great season as a Rookie. Led the league in games pitched (78), pitched 120 relief innings with a 2.39 ERA and a 1.08 WHIP.

Not a stopper though, so he didn't even show up in the ROY voting. Weird, right?

2 years later in 1987 he pitched 91 innings in relief. Was 7-0, 18 Saves on a save by committee staff, Posted a 1.19 ERA and 0.89 Whip and an absolutely filthy ERA+ of 356 (Mariano's best season was 316 in only 70 innings) and posted a 4.3 WAR (out of this world for a reliever and equivalent to Mariano's best year as a stopper).

Easily the most dominant reliever in the league that year.

You know who won the Fireman Award AND Cy Young that Year? Steve Bedrosian! Same amount of innings and inferior in all other analytical categories...but with a boatload of saves.

Did Burke garner a single point on the Cy Young ballot? No!

Did Burke even make the All-Star team? No!

Did Burke win his Arbitration case the next year, to bump his salary from $625,000 a year to $850,000 a year? He must have...right? HELL NO!



Anyways...cool card. :cool:

His other claim to fame was giving up a 3 run HR in the MABL Fall Classic in Dunedin in 1993.

Guess who the batter was? :D:D:D

I wonder if it was a net54 member? Hopefully he didn’t Cadillac it. [emoji41][emoji869]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Burke did pitch in the 1989 ASG

2 years later.

Rhymes with.........Tim?

:D

That's a story worth hearing.

It's not like there's going to be another Tim Burke thread started anytime in the near future. :)

Lol.
I don't think any of our MABL/MSBL teams were entering, so we were free agent fill-ins because a lot of teams from around the country had incomplete rosters due to the time/cost involved. I think I was picked up by Cobb County Georgia as a P/OF.

I say 1993, but it may have been later, because of the by-laws that said a player had to be out of professional ball for a certain amount of time and he hadn't technically met that. But they made an exception, which wasn't unusual.

Walk, two outs, and then an error by the shortstop on an attempted FC, got me to the plate. 1st pitch on the fists, then 2 sinkers away for balls. Not sure if I hit a high sinker or a fastball that didn't get in enough. Left centerfield no-doubter.

Hit another one later in the game off of some guy. :D

So Andrew Miller without the star run?

I guess I never realized Burke was actually pretty good. Had a nice little trip down Baseball Reference here.

It's odd this card is only in French, the Leaf parallel sets for Canada were in both languages, not just French. I have no idea what this is beyond the obvious 'some sort of test', but it's really cool.

I would assume as this is a Montreal card that it was created for a stadium giveaway.

Haha, this^^^

I have no idea who Tim Burke even is and I was shocked about that when I look at his stats... I was born in 85 so a little before my time but still!

Seems like Montreal's version of Dave Stieb... the Canadians get no love sadly :(

This was around the era when Topps was doing UK releases, maybe Donruss was considering doing a set release in France? That would explain why the card is in French only (anything Canadian should be in English and French). And it may explain why they tested it on an Expos player, the obvious first choice for a team of interest in France.

Just pure speculation on my part.