Rich Gedman 1989 Topps, Lee Smith 1990 Topps and Jeff Gray 1991 Fleer

On September 5, 2017 I received these cards from the Baseball Card Bandit (BCB):

On Facebook, I wrote: I've been really lax in my BCB updates. I received three cards in the last few weeks -- all Red Sox. 

The interesting thing is that on the Rich Gedman envelope, the return address was "BCB My Hometown". Gedman is from Worcester, it seems the BCB dropped a hint and that eliminates my first suspect. 

Looks like I'll have to rethink who it is. 

Quick hits:

Gedman: famous for his helicopter swing, two-time All Star that was flummoxed by Charlie Hough's knuckleball, victim of ownership collusion who never got his career back on track. Played 150 games a year because his back up was Marc Sullivan. 

2019: Rich Gedman was the local boy made good. He grew up in Massachusetts and the next thing you know, he's the starting catcher for the local nine. As someone who probably idolized Carlton Fisk, this was a big deal. And he did really well too. For a time.

But for Gedman, his career highs where like Monkey Paw wishes. He played in the 1985 and 86 All-Star Game, but Charlie Hough's knuckleball made Gedman look like a Little Leaguer in 1986. He just couldn't catch the things and they rolled all over the place. He was a laughingstock. Then there was his first World Series where Stanley bounced the ball in front of him and it rolled to the backstop putting Ray Knight in scoring position. After the season ended he was poised to be a big time free agent, only with Collusion rearing its ugly head, he didn't get an offer and due to the weird free agent rules of the day, signed with the Sox but could not report until May 1. 

The same thing happened to Tim Raines but while Raines was still awesome that year, Gedman never got on track and had a horrible 1987. And that snowballed into horrible 1988 and 1989. Gedman was a Walt Hriniak disciple and needed precise timing for his helicopter swing to work. I've always thought that missing 1987 Spring Training screwed up his timing and his lost season turned into a lost career. It also meant that Boston fans had to suffer through a month of Marc Sullivan catching. 

Gedman has had a pretty good post career where he's managed his hometown Worcester Tornados for a bit and is working for the Red Sox now. Gedman wasn't a bad guy, I used to like him a lot, he was just really unlucky. 

Lee Smith: hulking borderline HoFer reliever who pitched well in Boston but GM Lou Gorman couldn't leave well enough alone so he signed Jeff Reardon. Was traded for quarters on the dollar for Tom Brunansky. Said he'd literally sleep through the first five innings of every game before waking up, stretching and getting to the bullpen. 

2019: Since 2017, Smith has turned from a borderline Hall of Famer, to a real Hall of Famer as he was inducted by the Veteran's Committee (or whatever they're calling that now) about two months ago. Gorman's trade to get Smith was brilliant: Calvin Schiraldi and Al Nipper to the Cubs. That was it. But like I said above, he couldn't just leave well enough alone. He had to tinker and futz. Next thing you know, Smith is on his way to St. Louis for Brunansky. 

Smith had some really great years after he left Boston while the Red Sox bullpen was always a question mark. Who knows what could have been?

Look at his card, dude looked hulking. How could you not want him as your closer?

I wrote a bit more about this trade twice, in the Reardon pieces here and here. 

Jeff Gray: decent middle reliever most "famous" for having a stroke in the before a 1991 game. He was actually having a terrific year for the Sox before this injury occurred. He tried to come back but never could do it. According to Wikipedia he and Jody Reed owned a restaurant in Sarasota, FL called Beef O'Gradys. I want to go there.

2019: I still want to go to Beef O'Grady's. It sounds like a magical place.