 |
 |
Tony Pedro Oliva
Minnesota Twins
Outfield
Born: July 20, 1938, Pinar del Rio, Cuba
Signed: Signed by the Minnesota Twins as an amateur free agent before 1961 season
Major League Teams: Minnesota Twins 1962-1976
Hall of Fame Induction: 2022
A lifetime Twin and a professional hitter, Tony Oliva played in parts of 15 seasons, leading the league in hits five times in the span of seven years between 1964 and 1970. Oliva was the nearly unanimous choice for the American League Rookie of the Year in 1964, the year he collected career highs in runs scored (109), hits (217) and doubles (43). That was also the first of his eight consecutive trips to the All-Star Game. The Twins made it to the World Series in 1965 thanks in part to the strong offense provided by Oliva, ZoiloVersalles (#157) and Harmon Killebrew (#400). Oliva was the American League MVP runner-up that season to Versalles. A solid fielder, Oliva won a Gold Glove in 1966 and led all right fielders in putouts in six different seasons and in assists twice. He was runner up again in 1970 for the league's MVP honors, and he followed that up by hitting a career high .337 in 1971 to win his third batting title, while also leading the league with a .546 slugging percentage.
Building the Set
December 4, 2021 from The Philly Show (Huggins & Scott Auctions, Silver Spring, MD) - Card #387
You'll be seeing this particular passage on my 1965 Topps blog for quite some time as we added a whopping 97 cards to our set during the December Philadelphia Sports Collectors Show. If I'm ambitious and compose posts on five cards a week, I should be completely caught up by the end of May. If I'm not as ambitious, I might still be going through this stack by the time we hit July. Either way, I'll enjoy the process and I'm looking forward to taking my time. I've posted a complete summary of this fantastic show over at The Phillies Room.
The Card / Twins Team Set
Oliva was an easy pick for the Topps All-Star Rookie Team, and there's an uncorrected error here as the trophy indicates 1963 as the year and not the correct 1964. This is his first solo card, having appeared on multi-player Rookie Stars cards in both the 1963 and 1964 Topps sets. It's his second card in the set, as he appeared atop the Batting Leaders card way back with card #1. The back of the card mentions how Oliva was virtually unknown until exploding onto the baseball scene in 1964.
1965 Season
Oliva's sophomore season was another stellar effort, as he again won the league's batting title by hitting .321. As mentioned above, he helped power the Twins to the World Series. In 149 games, making 140 starts in right field, Oliva had 16 home runs, 98 RBIs and led the league with 185 hits. The Dodgers were able to control him during the World Series, as he batted just .192 (5 for 26) although he did hit a home run off Don Drysdale (#260) in Game 4.
Other Notable Baseball Cards
First Mainstream Card: 1963 Topps #228
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (15): 1963-1976, 1989
Most Recent Mainstream Card: 2021 Topps Heritage Real One Autographs #ROA-TO
428 - Oliva non-parallel baseball cards in the Beckett online database as of 12/5/21.
Sources:
Baseball Reference
Beckett Database
SABR
The Trading Card Database
A lifetime Twin and a professional hitter, Tony Oliva played in parts of 15 seasons, leading the league in hits five times in the span of seven years between 1964 and 1970. Oliva was the nearly unanimous choice for the American League Rookie of the Year in 1964, the year he collected career highs in runs scored (109), hits (217) and doubles (43). That was also the first of his eight consecutive trips to the All-Star Game. The Twins made it to the World Series in 1965 thanks in part to the strong offense provided by Oliva, ZoiloVersalles (#157) and Harmon Killebrew (#400). Oliva was the American League MVP runner-up that season to Versalles. A solid fielder, Oliva won a Gold Glove in 1966 and led all right fielders in putouts in six different seasons and in assists twice. He was runner up again in 1970 for the league's MVP honors, and he followed that up by hitting a career high .337 in 1971 to win his third batting title, while also leading the league with a .546 slugging percentage.
Oliva prolonged his career as a designated hitter for the Twins and retired following the 1976 season. A player-coach during that final season, he shifted to full-time coach in 1977, spending two different stints with the Twins - 1976 to 1978, and 1985 to 1991. His #6 was retired by the Twins in 1991, and he joined the Minnesota Twins Hall of Fame in their inaugural class in 2000, along with Killebrew, Rod Carew, Kent Hrbek, Kirby Puckett and former owner Calvin Griffith. On the day I drafted this post, it was announced Oliva had been elected into the Hall of Fame by the Golden Days Era Committee, and he'll be inducted in July 2022.
December 4, 2021 from The Philly Show (Huggins & Scott Auctions, Silver Spring, MD) - Card #387
You'll be seeing this particular passage on my 1965 Topps blog for quite some time as we added a whopping 97 cards to our set during the December Philadelphia Sports Collectors Show. If I'm ambitious and compose posts on five cards a week, I should be completely caught up by the end of May. If I'm not as ambitious, I might still be going through this stack by the time we hit July. Either way, I'll enjoy the process and I'm looking forward to taking my time. I've posted a complete summary of this fantastic show over at The Phillies Room.
This Oliva card, as well as the Mets team card (#551) were my first two purchases of the show as we were still getting acclimated to the lay-out and the large crowd. Oliva was marked as $40, but the dealer, Huggins & Scott Auctions from Silver Spring, Maryland, had a sign over his display that everything was 50% off. For $20, I couldn't pass up this card.
The Card / Twins Team Set
Oliva was an easy pick for the Topps All-Star Rookie Team, and there's an uncorrected error here as the trophy indicates 1963 as the year and not the correct 1964. This is his first solo card, having appeared on multi-player Rookie Stars cards in both the 1963 and 1964 Topps sets. It's his second card in the set, as he appeared atop the Batting Leaders card way back with card #1. The back of the card mentions how Oliva was virtually unknown until exploding onto the baseball scene in 1964.
Topps reprinted the card in its 2005 Topps Rookie Cup Reprints insert set. Oliva is in the harder to find 1965 Topps Transfers insert set, but he's not in the 1965 Topps Embossed insert set.
1965 Season
Oliva's sophomore season was another stellar effort, as he again won the league's batting title by hitting .321. As mentioned above, he helped power the Twins to the World Series. In 149 games, making 140 starts in right field, Oliva had 16 home runs, 98 RBIs and led the league with 185 hits. The Dodgers were able to control him during the World Series, as he batted just .192 (5 for 26) although he did hit a home run off Don Drysdale (#260) in Game 4.
|
|
|
|
|
First Mainstream Card: 1963 Topps #228
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (15): 1963-1976, 1989
Most Recent Mainstream Card: 2021 Topps Heritage Real One Autographs #ROA-TO
428 - Oliva non-parallel baseball cards in the Beckett online database as of 12/5/21.
Sources:
Baseball Reference
Beckett Database
SABR
The Trading Card Database
Wikipedia
Previous Card: #339 Ryne Duren - Cincinnati Reds
Previous Card: #339 Ryne Duren - Cincinnati Reds
Next Card: #341 Bobby Bolin - San Francisco Giants
No comments:
Post a Comment