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Melvin Frederick Nelson
St. Louis Cardinals
Pitcher
Born: May 30, 1936, San Diego, CA
Signed: Signed by the St. Louis Cardinals as an amateur free agent before 1956 season
Major League Teams: St. Louis Cardinals 1960; Los Angeles Angels 1963; Minnesota Twins 1965, 1967; St. Louis Cardinals 1968-1969
World Series Appearances: St. Louis Cardinals 1968
Mel Nelson was a left-handed relief pitcher who appeared in parts of six seasons with the Cardinals, Angels and Twins. He set a career high in appearances with 36 for the 1963 Angels, and two years later contributed to the 1965 pennant-winning Twins. His best season however came with the eventual National League Champion Cardinals in 1968. In 18 games, including four starts, Nelson went 2-1 with a 2.91 ERA over 52 2/3 innings pitched. He pitched a scoreless inning in the 1968 World Series in a mop-up role in Game 6, won by the Tigers, 13-1. In 93 career games, Nelson was 4-10 with a 4.40 ERA and five saves.
Mel Nelson was a left-handed relief pitcher who appeared in parts of six seasons with the Cardinals, Angels and Twins. He set a career high in appearances with 36 for the 1963 Angels, and two years later contributed to the 1965 pennant-winning Twins. His best season however came with the eventual National League Champion Cardinals in 1968. In 18 games, including four starts, Nelson went 2-1 with a 2.91 ERA over 52 2/3 innings pitched. He pitched a scoreless inning in the 1968 World Series in a mop-up role in Game 6, won by the Tigers, 13-1. In 93 career games, Nelson was 4-10 with a 4.40 ERA and five saves.
After his playing days, Nelson was a long-time scout between 1973 and 2005 with the Indians, Dodgers, White Sox, Athletics, Cardinals, Rockies, Yankees and Astros.
Some text for this post originally appeared on my 1965 Topps blog.
Building the Set / Card #195
March 12, 2023 from The Philly Show (Uncle Dick's Cards)
The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Accuracy Index +5
1969 Season
Nelson started the season with the Cardinals, and never quite recovered from his opening day appearance in which he allowed four 14th inning runs in an eventual 6-2 with by the Pirates. Nelson settled down, not allowing any runs in his next five relief appearances, but then he gave up three runs against the Dodgers without retiring a batter on May 24th. A little over a week later, he was demoted to the minor leagues and he'd never return to the majors.
Other Notable Baseball Cards
First Mainstream Card: 1963 Topps #522
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (5): 1963-1966, 1969
Most Recent Mainstream Card: 1981 TCMA The 1960s II #346
Total Non-Parallel Baseball Cards: 17 in the Beckett online database as of 11/22/23.
Sources:
Baseball Reference / SABR / Wikipedia
March 12, 2023 from The Philly Show (Uncle Dick's Cards)
In mid-March, Doug and I attended the Philadelphia Sports Collectors Show, held within the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania. My main focus for this show was accumulating as many 1969 Topps commons as possible, which I did by adding a grand total of 193 cards to our set. That's almost 30% of the entire set added in one enjoyable afternoon. I wrote a full summary of the show in a post over at The Phillies Room, found here.
This is the 118th of the 193 commons and semi-stars purchased, pulled and stacked from the first two neon green binders housing 1969 Topps cards at the multi-table spread of Uncle Dick's Cards from Babylon, New York. My method was simple - I pulled up a chair, found a card I needed, picked the best of the group from the binder page and set it aside. After each 100 cards, I'd ask the dealer to tell me how much damage I had done so far. With a budget in mind, I kept going twice, continuing after card #100 and card #200, and stopping at card #298. The final amount due was 17% off the sticker price for the pile of 193 cards, with this card costing me less than a dollar.
The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Accuracy Index +5
This is great looking card, and one of the better posed and cropped photos in the entire 1969 Topps set. It's also Nelson's final appearance in a Topps set. Nelson's uniform #35 is partially visible on his back. Topps opted to omit his minor league statistics on the back of the card, meaning there's more room for a summary of Nelson's (mostly) minor league career to date.
Accuracy Index: Nelson's last card scores a +5.
1969 Season
Nelson started the season with the Cardinals, and never quite recovered from his opening day appearance in which he allowed four 14th inning runs in an eventual 6-2 with by the Pirates. Nelson settled down, not allowing any runs in his next five relief appearances, but then he gave up three runs against the Dodgers without retiring a batter on May 24th. A little over a week later, he was demoted to the minor leagues and he'd never return to the majors.
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First Mainstream Card: 1963 Topps #522
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (5): 1963-1966, 1969
Most Recent Mainstream Card: 1981 TCMA The 1960s II #346
Total Non-Parallel Baseball Cards: 17 in the Beckett online database as of 11/22/23.
Sources:
Baseball Reference / SABR / Wikipedia
Beckett Database / The Trading Card Database
1965 Topps Blog
1965 Topps Blog
#180 Willie Horton - Detroit Tigers / #182 Bill Rigney MG - California Angels
It would be interesting to see what exactly is the oldest picture used for the 69 set. According to Baseball Almanac, Nelson wore #35 for the Cardinals in 1960 and #47 for the 68-69 seasons. So this picture could be 8 or 9 years old!
ReplyDeleteGreat catch, and this has to be one of the oldest photos used . . . I would think?
ReplyDelete