#105T Roberto Alomar

Here's the first rubber bat we've seen in a while. On the front, we can also see a guy in a muscle shirt as well as a photographer.

On the back of the card, I feel fairly certain that the hat is airbrushed onto Alomar. It just doesn't look right, especially at the edge where his hair is under the brim of the cap.

Best word on the back is "smashing," used as an adjective and not a present participle.

I also note mention in the space of a couple of sentences of Sandy Alomar Sr., Sandy Alomar Jr., Nolan Ryan, and Tony Gwynn.

#29T Dickie Thon

CARD

For the second card in a row, we see a player about to NOT get a base hit. Looks to me like that ball is going to be popped up and backwards. Pretty cool photo, though.

Weird thing about the card back is that it mentions what Thon did in 1988. I guess I don't totally understand why both this set and the 1988 Topps Traded don't have 1988 season statistics on them. I suppose the issue is that they came out sometime before the season was over, mainly to reflect off-season movement in 1987 or new rookies in 1988.

STAT

Tuna had 9 total bases 3 different times in his career, all team victories.

CAREER

Thon's career is pretty well-known, and if you don't know, just read the back of the card below. He had a very good year with the Phillies in 1989 and then petered out for good after that.

#9T Keith Moreland

CARD

Moreland's bat looks sort of rubbery in the photo.

This seems like a good time to point out how good the text on the back of these cards is. Take a read on the back of Moreland's card and you learn quite a lot about him. Compare this to the text on the back of his 88 Topps card, or his 88 Topps traded card (which are the same, incidentally.) At least those Topps cards feature complete sentences, a bit of a rarity for Topps from this era. The Score cards, by comparison, are always complete sentences and give a lot more info than the Topps cards.

Score did make some sacrifices in order to fit all that text on there. More to come on that later.

STAT

Moreland just crushed Kevin Gross and Bill Gullickson.

CAREER

I don't have too much to say about Moreland. He benefitted more than most from the homer-crazy year of 1987, taking the opportunity to post his only season with more than 16 homers. As a result, he's remembered in some circles as a home run hitter despite finishing with a career OPS+ of just 104. That's not a terrible number, just not what you'd expect from a true power hitter.

For me, the two other memorable things about Moreland's career are his performance in the 1981 NLDS for the Phillies and his having been traded for HOFer Goose Gossage.