Bill Lindsey Knows the Secret to Landing a 1988 Fleer Rookie Card
Even if he needed a little help from teammates along the way
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1988 Fleer Bill Lindsey (#403) - Card of the Day
What’s a catcher gotta do to get a taste of big league action?
Well, Bill Lindsey can tell you what’s not enough.
It’s not enough to be drafted twice in the same year by two different teams, but to not sign with either of them.
It’s not enough to then, two years later, sign as an amateur free agent with the most successful baseball franchise of all time.
It’s not enough to stick it out with that third franchise, through thick and thin and across thousands of miles of bumpy minor league bus-ride terrain, for six full seasons.
Heck, it’s not even enough to catch a full no-hitter from the left arm of Nashville Sounds batterymate Jim Deshaies on May 4, 1984.
None of that is enough.
But…
You might start to turn the corner if, somehow, you can become the player to be named later in a trade that originally sends Ron Hassey and Carlos Martínez to the White Sox in exchange for Ron Kittle, Joel Skinner, and Wayne Tolleson.
And then it also helps if your new team — the ChiSox — have a 39-year-old catcher, even if it is Carlton Fisk.
All those factors came together like a charm for Bill Lindsey — finally — in the summer of 1987. The Sox called him up after the All-Star break, and for exactly a month, from July 18 through August 18, Lindsey was on-call.
In those 32 calendar days (count ‘em!), manager Jim Fregosi found a spot in nine games for Lindsey, including five starts behind the plate. It was heady territory for the 27-year-old career minor leaguer and he responded by hitting .188 with three strikeouts and a single RBI in 19 plate appearances.
Lindsey would never make it to The Show again, but he did make the cut in the 1988 Fleer set, the one where every card looked like a birthday cake or a Little Debbie.
And while that rookie card was popping out of wax packs across the land, Lindsey himself was winding down his pro career with one last minor league run.
Just like he had every summer since 1981.
Today, this 1980s baseball man turns 64 years old.
Just Getting Warmed Up
One of the young Sox whe Lindsey passed on his way to and from Comiskey in 1987 was reliever Bobby Thigpen, still technically a rookie that summer even though he’d appeared in 20 games late in 1986.
Thigpen, of course, would soon assume Chicago’s closer role, saving a then-record 57 games in 1990 and 201 in his career.
In between his brush with Lindsey and his brush with history, Donruss anointed Thigpen as one of Baseball’s Best in 1988, all done up in luxurious tan borders.
You can read all about that monstrosity right here.
—
Hope your week wasn’t too monstrous, but even if it was, at least it’s over.
And if, by chance your week is not over, well…at least the eclipse is over.
Baseball made it through, the stadiums didn’t melt, the sun shines once again on our green cathedrals.
Sounds like a happy weekend brewing to me.
Thanks for reading.
—Adam