1981 Fleer "Stretched" Expectations to Capture a Legend
Amid the muck of a botched debut, a glorious Hall of Fame card
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1981 Fleer Willie McCovey (#434) - Card of the Day
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The 1981 Fleer baseball card set was a hobby superstar that delivered exactly what collectors expected: an issue full of stars, commons, and special cards covering almost every aspect of the diamond.
Most importantly, Fleer delivered direct competition to Topps and a real hobby choice for the first time in a quarter century.
But 1981 Fleer also delivered goods no one could have expected.
For starters, Fleer’s successful antitrust lawsuit against Topps opened the door for other companies to make cards of current players, too. Donruss joined the fray right away, bringing even more choice to the hobby.
And then there was Error Card Mania, incited by the appearance of the infamous “C. Nettles” card in the early batches of 1981 Fleer. By the time Graig Nettles made his debut in the set later in the year, collectors were scrutinizing every 1981 card they pulled to find the next big error.
Between the Donruss and Fleer sets, there were plenty of goof-ups to find: John Littlefield a Hobby Legend">reverse negatives, misspellings, “little hand” cards, wrong-number cards, and on and on and on.
Finding error cards became a national obsession, and selling or trading them for big returns spurred the first widespread wave of speculators in the hobby. The added attention and money flowing in eventually helped fuel the cardboard boom of the 1980s.
It was just another unintended side effect of the new 1981 sets, though who knows? Maybe Fleer planned to use their inaugural issue as hobby kindling all along.
More subtle among the unexpected outcomes of the 1981 Fleer set, and one that continues to benefit the hobby today, was card #434.
Willie McCovey had come home to the Giants as a free agent before the 1977 season following a four-year run with the Padres and A’s. Stretch was 39 years old but turned in a star-level performance at the plate by batting .280 with 28 home runs and 86 RBI.
McCovey wasn’t quite as stout in 1978 (.228/12/64), but he was still San Francisco’s primary first baseman as they turned in a surprising 89-73 record. That left them in third place in the old National League West, but they competed for the crown most of the summer.
The next two seasons weren’t as kind to the Giants, though Big Mac rebounded a bit, to .249/15/57 in 1979. San Francisco, meanwhile, fired manager Joe Altobelli late in the season, replacing him with third base coach Dave Bristol.
Bristol and McCovey both returned to start the new season, but both Mike Ivie and rookie Rich Murray got long looks at first base in the early going, relegating Stretch to part-timer status.
After hitting just .204 with a single home run (to tie him with Ted Williams at 521 career dingers), McCovey retired at the All-Star break. That left card companies plenty of time to decide what to do with him for 1981, and Topps did what they always did for players who they knew wouldn’t be on a big league roster: they left him off their checklist.
Donruss followed the Topps model and also passed on McCovey when drawing up their 1981 plans.
Not Fleer, though.
Whether they knew what their competition had in mind or not, the new kid on the block took the opportunity to issue one last McCovey card, at #434 in their first-ever full-blown set.
The result was the posed Spring Training shot you see above, with McCovey still looking fairly youthful and like he could put the hurt on any baseball you wanted to toss his way.
And, of course, he was sporting those 1970s sideburns like the throwback he was.
The back of that McCovey card is a headache waiting to happen, an invitation to try out your new bifocals, and a work of statistical art that required no narrative explanation:
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And so it was that Fleer, in meeting so many hobby expectations, exceeding others, and creating new ways to fail on cardboard, also graced us with an unexpected Hall of Fame card, a career-capper that shouldn’t have existed, at least according to the set-construction standards of the day.
It was a pattern Fleer would repeat in 1984 with Johnny Bench, Carl Yastrzemski, Gaylord Perry, and Fergie Jenkins, and with Tom Seaver in 1987. They weren’t always the only company to issue a career-capper for a given player, but they sure set a high bar with their McCovey tribute.
And we can all be especially grateful for that final look at the Giants legend this week as we continue to revel in “surprise” Hall of Fame baseball cards, wherever and however we can find them.
As it turns out, this isn’t the first time I’ve rambled on about McCovey’s cardboard farewell. Several years back, I anointed the card with a special “award” as part of one my challenge series: How Big Mac Scored the Best Baseball Card of 1981.
The 1981 Fleer McCovey also loomed large in 5 Career-Cappers that Left Us Wanting More from Our Legends.
1960 Nu-Card Baseball Hi-Lites Willie McCovey Fed the (Deserved) Hype
Keeping with our McCovey theme but backing up the truck to the very beginning of his hobby run, did you know the Giants’ slugger had a “hidden” rookie card in 1960?
Well now you do! Read all about it right here.
McCovey Loomed Large Among Cardboard Heroes
No one had a better fan view of McCovey’s comings and goings than Rob Adams, author of Cardboard Heroes. Rob was there in San Francisco for McCovey’s prime and rejoiced when he returned.
Not surprisingly, McCovey appears more than once in Cardboard Heroes, which is an absolute nostalgia bomb (in the best way) for baseball fans and collectors who have loved the game and hobby longer than most of today’s major leaguers have been alive.
And if you’re a Giants fan? Well, then, Cardboard Heroes is a definite must-read — Rob sprinkles all sorts of Giants lore and facts throughout and ends the book with an 80-page appendix analyzing and rating every Giants trade from 1958 through 1985.
Wow!
Time to get your copy if you haven’t already!
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