ONCE IN A MOONSHOT

               It was 55 years yesterday that man landed on the moon & Hall of Fame pitcher Gaylord Perry went deep for the first time in his career. The story goes that Perry's manager once was quoted ".....Man will land on the moon before Gaylord goes deep." Sure enough minutes after news was flashed across the scoreboard that Apollo 11 at Candlestick Park Gaylord launched a 1-0 count off Claude Osteen in the Bottom of the 3rd inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers making the score 3-2 (Final score with Perry being the winning pitcher 7-3) at the time. 

               Now the reason for me retelling this legend of baseball lore is simple not only to celebrate the anniversary of this feat but to also reveal the answer to the contest that I had offered on July 17th posting. The player in questioned was TY COBB so congrats to Angels Tom from the blog "The Angels In Order" as well Red Sox Nation own Matt from the blog "Diamond Jesters" to Tigers/Rays crazed fanatic Jeremy from the blog "Topps Cards Never Were" all 3 of you were correct in identifying the Georgia Peach in the Indians uniform. However reviewing all your answers no one came up with the correct reason why he wasn't in his familiar Tigers uniform. That being no one really knows why even Cobb himself has spun 3 answers to this question in 3 separate interviews. The first he said left in Detroit & forgot to pack it. The second Cobb said to Al Stump when during his cross country travel when Stump was assisting him write his Autobiography he wore the Indians in honor of the Addie Joss who the game was being played for but unfortunately that Stump didn't mentioned that until later in life about that mystery & didn't include it in his book at the time in when he was writing it. The 3rd interview was conducted by legendary baseball announcer Ernie Harwell when Ernie asked the great Cobb about it Cobb said he couldn't recall the whereabouts of the uniform. So with 3 possible winners I need to figure out who deserves the set so I will propose another trivia question the first of the 3 gentlemen to correctly get this question will win the prize.

                Remember gentlemen no assistance from Google to help you figure out this answer please & your all 3 trying to win the 1990 Topps Major League Debut 1989 set. So here's the question. What uniform # was never issued besides the following #'s 78,79,80,82,83,84,90,92,94,95,96,97,98 by the New York Metropolitians & who was it worn by stay tuned to a future blog post to see which of these 3 gentlemen will take home the prize until then remember Rogers Hornsby when asked about signing autographs. " Any ballplayer who doesn't sign an autograph for little kids ain't an American, he's a communist."