(Welcome to the fourth day of our All-Star week celebration. Check out yesterday’s post here.)
The All-Star break is over, which means today is the start of the second half (suspend your belief in mathematics for five minutes, would ya?).
And, while Turning-the-Corner Day may not be quite as magical as Opening Day, it does bring some hope, and some perspective.
Take 1981, for example.
After an ugly players’ strike right smack dab in the middle of the first half that wiped out about 50 games for each team, the two sides came to an agreement on July 31.
And that agreement got things rolling again, with the All-Star Game to be played on August 9 and the second half to begin the next day, on August 10.
Guess what else began that day (August 10, that is). Here, I’ll give you a hint …
Yes, young Cal Ripken, Jr., made his major league debut on August 10, 1981, the very start of the bogus Second Half (a proper noun in 1981 only) perpetrated that year by MLB.
That wasn’t the beginning of Iron Cal’s famous streak, though. He’d miss a few games between that 12th-inning pinch-running debut and May 20, 1982, when the streak began in earnest.
Cal did log enough play for the Orioles in 1981 for Topps to take notice, just in time to get him on a rookie card for his 1982 Rookie-of-the-Year campaign and a year ahead of his first All-Star selection.
Ripken made Topps look good for calling him out as a FUTURE STAR nearly right way, in other words.
‘Future Star’? Pfffft. Try All-Star.
Of course, not all “future stars” pan out. And, for some of them, the future is already gone by the time they get their cardboard.
Heck, even happened for one of Cal’s cardmates up there. And it happened for some others, too …
Yeah, that’s sort of a downer, but I’m a Reds fan heading into the second “half” of the 2022 season. What I wouldn’t give for a Dave Van Gorder sighting!
Anyway, the trade deadline is fast approaching, and this just might be the year I find a deal for my Kurt Stillwell cache.
Enjoy the sprint home!
—Adam