1975 Topps #104 Bill Madlock

Bill Madlock was intimately involved with the departure of two Cubs greats. Madlock came to the Cubs in a trade with the Rangers. Madlock and Vic Harris came to the Cubs for Fergie Jenkins. The arrival of Madlock allowed the Cubs to trade Ron Santo to the White Sox.

While Madlock only played for the Cubs from 1974 through 1976, he complied outstanding numbers. In 400 games as a Cubs, Madlock batted .336 with 31 home runs and 202 RBI's. He was the National League Batting Leader in both 1975 and 1976. He finsihed third in the 1974 Rookie of the Year balloting and was an All Star in 1975. After the 1976 season, Madlock was traded to the Giants for Bobby Murcer.

Madlock who had the nickname "Mad Dog" for his fiery temper, completed a 15 season career with six different teams. His overall statistics showed a .305 batting average with 2008 hits, 163 home runs and 860 RBI's.

1975 Topps #63 Steve Swisher

Steve Swisher came to the Cubs in the December 1973 trade that sent Ron Santo to the White Sox for Swisher, Ken Frailing and Steve Stone. Swisher started 362 games for the Cubs at catcher during a four year period (1974-1977). Swisher was not a strong offensive factor as he batted .217 with 16 home runs and 106 RBI’s as a Cub.

In 1977, Swisher was traded to the Cardinals along with Jerry Morales for Hector Cruz and Dave Rader. It was the Cub’s intent to strengthen the catcher position with this trade. Rader played only 116 games as a Cubs and exhibited less fire power than Swisher.

Swisher is the father of current Yankee, Nick Swisher.

Dave Kingman Autograph And Graded Cubs Cards

I have added a new item to my collection of Cubs autograph and game-used cards. This card is from the 2005 Upper Deck Origins set and features a Dave Kingman autograph.

When the Cubs signed Dave Kingman as a Free Agent in November 1977, fans were excited by the possibility of the 6’6” Kingman taking aim at the ivy covered walls with the wind blowing out. I remember thinking that he could hit 75 HRs if the wind could just blow out every day. Kingman did not disappoint as he averaged 31 HRs and 84 RBIs during his three year stay in Chicago. Kingman had the best year of his 16 year career in 1979.

During the 1979 season, Kingman hit 48 HRs and 115 RBIs. His 48 home runs were good enough to lead the major leagues. After three years with the Cubs, Kingman was traded to the Mets for Steve Henderson and cash.

Although Kingman only played for the Cubs during three seasons, he has four different Topps cards in a Cubs uniform (1978 to 1981). I currently have two of these cards in my graded Cubs collection. Both cards are graded PSA 9 – Mint.

One of Kingman's career days at the plate occurred in Los Angeles on May 14, 1978. He hit three home runs against the Dodgers, including a three run shot in the top of the 15th inning that gave the Cubs a 10-7 victory. Eight of the Cubs' ten runs were driven in by Kingman.


Although Kingman hit over 400 home runs during his career, he was never a seriously considered candidate for the Hall of Fame. He became the first MLB player to hit over 400 home runs and NOT be voted into the HOF.

More Sosa HR Parade Cards

After my last post about the 1999 Topps Sosa Home Run Parade set, I went to Beckett and found a number of reasonably priced cards that I needed to complete my Sosa set. I am not completely done but I have made a big dent in this 66 card set. In the last 2 days I have recieved cards #9, #14, #22, #23, #37, #38 and #55. In addition, I should recieve #18, #29 and #52 shortly.

When every thing has been recieved, I will need only 5 more cards to finish this set. The ones that I still need to find are #16, #19, #26, #42 and #61. I believe that #61 will be both the most difficult and most expense to finish my set.

1975 Topps #658 - Vic Harris

The last card that I currently have in my 1975 Topps graded Cubs collection is #658 featuring Vic Harris. Harris played for the Cubs in 1974 and 1975 during an 8 years career with five different teams.

He came to the Cubs after the 1973 season. Harris along with Bill Madlock were traded to the Cubs from the Rangers for Fergie Jenkins. Harris started the 1974 season as the Cubs 2nd baseman but was sent to the minors after hitting .195 in 62 games. In 1975, Harris was on the Cubs bench as a pinch hitter and utility player. During his Cubs career, Harris batted .191 in 113 games with no home runs and only 16 RBIs. After the 1975 season, he was traded to the Cardinals for Mick Kelleher.

1975 Topps #604 - Oscar Zamora

Oscar Zamora is featured on card # 604 of the 1975 Topps set. Zamora played 15 seasons in professional baseball. However, parts of 14 seasons were spent in the minors. Zamora played parts of three seasons in the majors. Only one season was spent entirely in the majors (1975). As a Cub, Zamora was a reliever. He pitched in 148 games for the Cubs winning 13 and losing 14. His ERA as a Cub was 4.34 with 23 saves. Zamora became expendable in 1976, when Bruce Sutter arrived on the scene. He was granted Free Agency in November 1977 and signed with Houston. He played in 10 games for Houston before his MLB career ended.

During his years with the Cubs, Zamora gave up an average of more than one hit per inning (236 hits in 209 2/3 innings). Cubs fans made up a song to the tune of “That’s Amore”.

“When the pitch is so fat,”
“That the ball meets the bat,”
“That’s Zamora.”

Two More 1999 Topps - Sosa Home Runs Added

Although I took some time off during the holiday week, I was able to add two more home runs from the 1999 Topps subset. There are 66 variations of card number 461 in the 1999 Topps set. Each variation commemorates one of Sosa's 66 Home Runs during the 1998 season. I now have 51 of the variations, leaving only 15 more to complete the subset.

The challenge to this subset is not finding the variations because they are reasonably easy to locate on EBay, Sportslot or Beckett. The challenge is finding the home runs that one needs for a reasonable price. It would seem that most of the numbers can be purchased for $3.00 or $5.00 including shipping. At this price it would cost about $300 to $350 to complete a set. But I have seen these cards listed for $6.00 to $10.00 (and higher).

The cards that I have just added are home runs #4 and #53. Sosa hit home run #4 on April 23, 1998 off of Dan Miceli of the Padres. This was before Sosa's big June home run explosion. After this home run, he was on track to hit a season total of 37 HRs.

Home run number 53 came on August 28, 1998 against the Rockies. The pitcher was John Thomson. This home run tightened the race between McGwire and Sosa to just a single HR.

The 15 cards that I still need to complete this HR Parade sub-set are; 9, 14, 16, 18, 19, 22, 23, 26, 29, 37, 38, 42, 52, 55 and 61.