#240 Ken Harrelson - Boston Red Sox

Kenneth Smith Harrelson
Boston Red Sox
First Base-Outfield

Bats:  Right  Throws:  Right  Height:  6'2"  Weight:  190
Born:  September 4, 1941, Woodruff, SC
Signed:  Signed by the Kansas City Athletics as an amateur free agent before 1959 season
Major League Teams:  Kansas City Athletics 1963-1966; Washington Senators 1966-1967; Kansas City Athletics 1967; Boston Red Sox 1967-1969; Cleveland Indians 1969-1971

World Series Appearances:  Boston Red Sox 1967

Before he was a long-time television broadcaster with the White Sox, and recipient of the 2020 Ford C. Frick Award for his contributions to baseball as a broadcaster, Ken "Hawk" Harrelson played nine seasons in the majors with the Athletics, Senators, Red Sox and Indians.  Never one to shy away from sharing his opinions, Harrelson's second stint with the Athletics came to an end in August 1967 when the team abruptly released him.  He had been quoted as calling Athletics' owner Charlie Finley "a menace to baseball" after the firing of popular manager Alvin Dark (#91).  Harrelson signed with the Red Sox where he'd see his only postseason play in the 1967 World Series.

His three seasons in Boston were the best of his career.  Harrelson was an All-Star in 1968, led the league in RBIs with 109 and finished third in MVP voting behind Denny McLain (#150) and Bill Freehan (#390).  He wrapped up his playing career with three seasons with the Indians and a broken leg suffered in the spring training 1970 cut down significantly on his playing time.  After retiring from baseball, Harrelson attempted a career as a professional golfer but he'd find his true calling as a broadcaster.  He was the play-by-play announcer for the Red Sox between 1975 and 1980, and joined the White Sox booth in 1981.  Following a brief stint in the White Sox front office, and working Yankees' broadcasts between 1987 and 1990, Harrelson returned to the White Sox broadcasting team where he announced games for 28 seasons between 1991 and 2018.

Some text for this post originally appeared on my 1965 Topps blog.

Building the Set / Card #235
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 158th 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 a little over $2.

The Card / Red Sox Team Set / Accuracy Index -8

Was Topps clever enough to purposely put Harrelson and Bob Taylor (#239), two players with the nickname "Hawk," back to back in the set?

Harrelson is clearly wearing an Athletics jersey here, a team he hadn't played for since the summer of 1967.  His insert in the Decals set at least tries to make it look as if he's wearing a Red Sox uniform.  this is also one of four appearances by Harrelson in the 1969 Topps set.  He's on two League Leaders cards (#3 and #5) and an American League All-Star card (#417).  Topps pays tribute to Harrelson's nickname with the swinging cartoon hawk on the back of the card.

Accuracy Index:  Harrelson drops to only a -8, but if I had set up my scoring system for a discretionary docking of points based on players obviously wearing the jerseys of their former teams, he would have definitely lost more points.

Inserts:  Harrelson is included in the 35 card Topps Deckle Edge insert set and is one of 48 decals in the Topps Decals insert set.  He's one of 27 players to appear in both insert sets.

1969 Season
The popular Harrelson was shockingly traded to the Cleveland Indians on April 19th, after having played in 10 games for the Red Sox over the first week-plus of the season.  Harrelson, Dick Ellsworth (#605) and Juan Pizarro (#498) were shipped to the Indians in exchange for Joe Azcue (#176), Vicente Romo (#267) and Sonny Siebert (#455).  Initially refusing to report to Cleveland, a meeting with then Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, among others, convinced Harrelson to accept the trade.  Harrelson settled in as the team's regular right fielder, batting .222 in 149 games, with 27 home runs and 84 RBIs.  He tied Tony Horton for the team lead in home runs, while Horton led the team with 93 RBIs.

1964 Topps #419

1966 Topps #55

1967 Topps #188

1968 Topps #566

1971 Topps #510

Other Notable Baseball Cards
First Mainstream Card:  1964 Topps #419
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (8):  1964-1971
Most Recent Mainstream Card:  2020 Topps Heritage Real One Autographs #ROA-KH
Total Non-Parallel Baseball Cards:  86 in the Beckett online database as of 2/11/24.

Sources:  
Baseball Reference / SABR / Wikipedia

Beckett Database / The Trading Card Database
1965 Topps Blog

#239 Bob Taylor - Kansas City Royals / #241 Jim Brewer - Los Angeles Dodgers