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1976 Topps Nyls Nyman (#258) - Card of the Day
Nyls Nyman set himself up just right to take a shot at making a mark with the 1975 Chicago White Sox.
Coming off an 80-80-3 third-place finish in 1974, the Sox were a young team with some holes to fill and a manager — Chuck Tanner — entering his fifth full year on the job.
For his part, Nyman had parlayed his status as a 16th-round pick into a quick climb up the ChiSox ladder, courtesy of a propensity for contact and a good eye for the strike zone.
Oh, and 20-steal speed.
So, after hitting .315 and .311 in 1973 and 1974 while touching Single-, Double-, and Triple-A pitching, Nyman was ready for more — which he got with a cup of coffee in September 1974.
A .643 batting average with Chicago did nothing to hurt his prospects, and Nyman broke Spring Training with the Sox in 1975.
Before that, though, the team sent Dick Allen packing (to the Braves) in the offseason, which opened first base for Carlos May…which opened left field for young Jerry Hairston.
But also for younger Nyls Nyman.
At 21, Nyman was still pretty fresh, even by prospect status. Unfortunately, he was also sort of overmatched in the majors, managing just a .226 batting average and .255 on-base percentage in 342 plate appearances.
While Nyman was trying to find his place in the majors, he was also working to find a place in collections. He shared a rookie card (#619) in the 1975 Topps set with Benny Ayala, Tommy Smith, and Jerry Turner, which made it easy to overlook any one of them.
But, though the long look at the south side didn’t do much for Nyman’s future big league prospects, it did earn him the nifty solo card in the 1976 Topps set that you see above.
Alas, he would spend that Bicentennial summer back at Triple-A Iowa, save for an eight-game run in the bigs in June.
It was more of the same in 1977 before the Sox made Nyman the dreaded Player to Be Named Later in a trade that brought Clay Carroll over from the Cardinals.
That change of scenery didn’t do much for Nyman’s performance, and he spent both 1978 (Cards) and 1979 (Reds) in the minors before hanging up his spikes.
Today, nearly 45 years later, Nyls Nyman turns 70 years old. So…happy birthday to a fella who trod a trail most of us can only dream about.
1975 TCMA 1919 White Sox
At the same time Nyland was making his case on the south side, TCMA decided it would be a good time to “celebrate” the 1919 White Sox.
Air quotes because, you know, those White Sox were also known as the Black Sox, as in the team that allegedly threw the World Series to the grandfathers of my Reds.
Anyhoo…
TCMA, probably most famous for their minor league issues, put together this 28-card set that features all the big names from the team, including Shoeless Joe Jackson, Ed Cicotte, Eddie Collins, Kid Gleason, Ray Schalk, and Buck Weaver.
I’m kinda partial to old Happy Felsch up there, because he really does look so gosh darn giddy.
Overall, these are no-frills black-and-white glimpses into a different era of baseball and America. Nothing special as cards, but pretty interesting as artifacts.
You can usually find a few of these running around on eBay, but they’re not super cheap at this point — $10 or more for singles, and $100 and up for a complete set when one shows up.
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That does it for this Thursday edition of What-up White Sox Cardboard Nonsense.
Maybe next time around, we can delve into The Mystery of the Lyttle Floating Nuclear Ballcap:
In the meantime, I’ll see if Frank and Joe and Chet and the rest of the chums are up for helping out.
Thanks for reading.
—Adam