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William Ronald Bryan
Kansas City Athletics
Catcher
Born: December 4, 1938, Morgan, GA
Signed: Signed by the Kansas City Athletics as an amateur free agent before 1960 season
Major League Teams: Kansas City Athletics 1961-1966; New York Yankees 1966-1967; Washington Senators 1968
Billy Bryan spent the bulk of his eight seasons in the majors as a back-up catcher for the A's between 1961 and 1966. Given the chance to start on a regular basis in 1965, Bryan posted career high numbers in just about every offensive category, including average (.252), home runs (14) and RBIs (51). He had his best professional seasons in the minors, hitting an even 100 home runs over eight minor league seasons. In 1962 with the Albuquerque Dukes, Bryan led the team in home runs (25) and RBIs (85) while hitting .293.
Bryan wrapped up his big league career as a back-up for the Yankees and Senators, and after a few seasons in the minors with the Senators and Phillies organizations, he retired in 1970. Bryan was a career .216 hitter with 41 home runs and 125 RBIs over 374 games.Building the Set
August 21, 2020 from Charleston, SC - Card #144
In my largest (by volume) purchase to date, I spent an enjoyable hour or so in mid-August browsing the eBay store of seller mantlerulz and clicking Add to Cart on 30 different cards. We had previously added 29 cards to our set back in February from the Philly Show. The 30 cards, all commons, cost me $52 total (before shipping and taxes) with the cards ranging in prices from $1 to $6. I love this haul and I found the seller's store by accident when I was browsing eBay in an attempt to add a few more cheap cards from the set's first series. With the exception of the cards for Dick Howser (#92) and manager Birdie Tebbets (#301), along with the few former Phillies in the lot, most of the players featured on these cards are unknown to me. In the coming weeks, I'll go through each of these new cards for our set in detail, and we've now passed the quarter mark for completion of the complete set. We still have a long way to go, and quite a few pricey cards to add but any day I can add 30 commons in excellent shape and at a low prices is a great day. This Bryan card was $1.
The Card / Athletics Team Set
The photo here was taken during the 1963 season on the road as Bryan switched to #9 for the 1964 season. Also, and as demonstrated by Bryan's history of Topps cards below, Topps dubbed him Billy whenever he was pictured wearing a green hat, but the more business-like Bill all other times.
I felt the need to look up why Bryan would be intentionally walked three times in a game, as indicated by the write-up on the back. This happened on April 27, 1963 against the Senators in a game the A's would win, 7-3. Each time Bryan was intentionally walked in that game, the Senators retired the next batter to end an inning - so it worked. The two times he wasn't intentionally walked he flew out to center and then hit a two-run home run off Jim Duckworth. Barry Bonds holds the record now with four intentional walks in a game.
1965 Season
As mentioned above, this was Bryan's best season in the majors. He appeared in 108 games, starting 89 games behind the plate. Rene Lachemann (#526) was Bryan's back-up, starting 54 games. The A's, managed by Mel McGaha (#391), finished in the basement of the American League, losing 103 games.
Phillies Connection
In 1970, his final season playing professional baseball, Bryan appeared in 18 games for the Class-A Spartanburg Phillies. The 31-year-old catcher was by far the oldest player on that team as most players were in their teens or early 20s. Bryan briefly served as the back-up catcher to Dan Benoit and future big leaguer Jim Essian.
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First Mainstream Card: 1963 Topps #236
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (5): 1963, 1965-1968
Most Recent Mainstream Card: 2017 Topps Heritage Real One Autographs #ROA-BB
16 - Bryan non-parallel baseball cards in the Beckett online database as of 8/25/20.
Sources:
Baseball Reference
Beckett Database
The Trading Card Database
Previous Card: #50 Juan Marichal - San Francisco Giants
Next Card: #52 Ed Roebuck - Philadelphia Phillies
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