1978 Topps Image Inventory

[deweyinthehall]

1978 Topps Detroit Tigers

There are 30 Tiger images in the set, including Dave Roberts, painted to appear a Cub, minus Roric Harrison.

The team photo was taken in Tiger Stadium sometime between April 27 and June 22, owing to the presence of Luis Alvarado (3rd row, 3rd from left). The other players are too indistinct and I could find no key to accompany the image to permit a more precise dating.

The black and white image of Houk was taken at some point during his playing career with the Yankees, which spanned 1947-1954.

A good number of the images were taken at Joker Marchant Stadium in Lakeland, FL during the spring of '77, including: Arroyo, Ruhle, Wockenfuss, Fuentes, Mankowski, Rodriguez, Oglivie, Scrivener, Taylor, Morris, Parrish and Whitaker.

The Tigers had two series in Oakland, 6/10-6/12 and 8/24, during which time these images were taken: Houk, Foucault, Rozema, Hiller, Staub, May, Kemp and Corcoran.

Dave Roberts, painted to look like a Cub, was snapped in Oakland during the June series, as he had departed the club before their stop there in August.

Mark Fidrych was also taken in Oakland, but here we have a game action shot (as opposed to Rozema, which appears to have been taken as he warmed up in the pen). The only game Fidrych appeared in in Oakland that season was 6/11, which positively dates this image. He started, and threw a CG win.

LeFlore, Veryzer and Thompson all appear to have been captured during one of the club's visits to Yankee Stadium, 7/1-7/3 or 9/30-10/2.

This leaves us with Milt Wilcox, Mickey Stanley and Alan Trammell. All are wearing home uniforms, meaning they were either photographed in Lakeland or at Tiger Stadium. I think both the Wilcox and the Trammell photo clearly have the cavernous stadium in the background, so they were both shot there (Trammell was called up in September, so his would have been either 9/2-9/8 or 9/16-9/25).

Mickey Stanley is harder, but the image isn't a posed shot - it's what could be called a candid which is an action shot but without action, if that makes any sense. These sorts of images are scarce if not non-existent in the spring sites, so my conclusion is that this is Tiger Stadium as well.