T213 Joe Kelley who?

[martyogelvie]

pardon my ignorance if this is common knowledge but i was doing some Coupon searches today and found a Joe Kelley from 1914 Coupon listed with the team (N.Y. American). is this the Yankees because Joe Kelley didn't play for the Yankees, or anyone else during this time frame..

what gives.. also, is this the same Joe Kelley in the 1919 Coupon cards?

[barrysloate]

Kelley was a scout for the Yankees in 1915 and 16.

[Kawika]

Originally Posted by barrysloate

Kelley was a scout for the Yankees in 1915 and 16.

Every time I see a Joe Kelley card I think it's Bill Murray in a previous life. Whilst perusing the New York Times archives I saw mention that Kelley represented Toronto in some type of executive capacity in discussions with MLB in forming an association of teams to counter the upstart Federal league in 1914. That was the only reference I could find. Kelley finished his playing career with Toronto in 1910 and it's a long stretch as to why he would be on a 1914 Coupon in his T206 Toronto duds. Another Joe Kelley played for Pittsburgh in the latter part of the 1910's and may be the guy on the 1919 card although I haven't seen the card and don't know what it looks like.

[FrankWakefield]

Lots of the T213s have images depicting teams inconsistent with the caption. The captions were updated a bit, not so much so for the images. That's why Kelley's in Toronto garb.

This may well be the first card issued for a scout. Anyone aware of a prior card that would have been issued when the person depicted was only a scout?

[martyogelvie]

So this is THE Joe Kelley... and his association with the Yankees as a SCOUT got him on a card...

[FrankWakefield]

Yes, Kelley; scout no.

I think the card exists because 'they' were trying to issue cards with Coupon backs. 'They' had the old fronts from the white border cards (T206), so from those images they picked out those for whom they could issue cards. Kelley was a well liked, capable player in his day. So putting out a card of him was an easy choice, even if he was only a scout at the time. After all, he makes it into T206 not because of what he was doing in Toronto, but for what he'd done years before. If you study the type 3 Coupon cards, I don't think you'll see many cards for the new stars of the day. It was the availability of the 'Kelley' front that got him into Coupons.

[FrankWakefield]

He was a scout for them in 1915 and 1916. I think that's the connection. Barry, you're a quicker typer... I took a quick look at Mr. Lipset's Encyclopedia. I knew that the Federal League appears in the set, didn't know if the cards were as recent as 1915. But it seems that type 2 and type 3 get out to 1915 and 1916.