Topps stadium club offers top-level photography and even many of my friends, who are designers, are amazed by those photos. This year, I didn’t miss this product. It’s guaranteed two on-card autographs in each hobby box and there are also several inserts. However, there are only a few numbered cards. This time, I got a black and white card of Mike Yastrzemski. It’s my first time to find black and white card from the Topps stadium club.
Topps chose to use a photo of Mike Yastrzemski and his grandfather Carl Yastrzemski. Carl Yastrzemski is a big name in baseball. He played 23 seasons in the major league, all these 23 seasons were with the Boston Red Sox. In his career, he was batting .285/.379/.462. He had 3419 hits, 452 home runs and 1844 RBI. He is the Red Sox all-time leader in hits, RBI, games played and many other stats. In addition, he won the AL MVP in 1967, won the batting title three times and he’s an eighteen-time All-Star. We definitely don’t have enough room to show how great he was as a player.
However, Mike Yastrzemski’s road to the big league is quite different. He was actually selected by the Red Sox in the 2009 draft, but didn’t sign. Then, he was selected by the Mariners in 2012, but decided not to sign. The Orioles selected him in the 2013 draft. He was traded to the Giants in March 2019 and made his MLB debut on May 25, 2019 when he was 28. So far in his career, he’s hitting .281/.357/.535.
Carl Yastrzemski made his major league debut at 21 and won the MVP award at 27. It’s just impossible to compare his career to others. However, there is something interesting between grandfather and grandson. Carl Yastrzemski posted an OPS over .900 in a single season for 4 times in his career. Mike Yastrzemski just had a .968 OPS in 2020.
Carl Yastrzemski had 5 seasons with an at least .500 Slugging Percentage and Mike Yastrzemski’s SLG was above .510 in each of his first two seasons. It’s worth noting that Carl Yastrzemski had a SLG of .622, it was his highest SLG in a single season and that was in 1967, a year he won the MVP.
Meanwhile, they each received points in MVP voting in their second year. Carl Yastrzemski received 9 vote points in 1962 AL MVP voting and he slashed .296/.363/.469 that season. 2020 is a tough year for many people, but Mike Yastrzemski had a pretty good season in his second year with the Giants, he slashed .297/.400/.568 and finished 8th in the NL MVP voting, which he received 81 points.
It could be extremely hard to find words to describe Carl Yastrzemski’s career. He won many awards, he’s a Hall of Famer and he still leads several career records in the Red Sox. Mike Yastrzemski began his MLB career at 28 and he probably couldn’t set as many records as his grandfather did. However, he’s a good player with an OPS of .968 in the 2020 season, which ranked 12th in the majors. Meanwhile, Mike Yastrzemski was named to the ALL-MLB second team in 2020. Winning the World Series is the ultimate goal of baseball players. Unfortunately, Carl Yastrzemski and the Red Sox didn’t win the WS title in 1967 and 1975. Is it possible to see Mike Yastrzemski achieve this goal and add another chapter in the Yastrzemskis?
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