#653 - Bob Stinson

I’m certainly stretching things out here – work is still a monster and uses up all my computer time. For the for real last action card in the ’74 set we get Bob Stinson who appears to be jawing with either an umpire or a pitching coach at an away field that looks eerily empty. ’73 was more-or-less Bob’s rookie year though I believe he put enough bench time for either St. Louis or Houston to not be a true rookie. He stepped into the running menage of Expos catchers, most of whose surnames until then began with a B – Bateman, Boccabella, Brand – after being purchased by them late in spring training from the Astros. He pretty much split back-up time to Boccabella with Terry Humphrey, who was a bit of a better fielder but couldn’t touch Bob’s stick. Bob did a nice offensive job in limited work, adding a .374 OBA to his published stats. He had an interesting early Topps history with three rookie cards from ’70 to ’72, each with a different team (he’s up there with Lou Piniella). What’s going on here is hard to tell, but he sure does look concerned. He’d make up for that on his ’77 card when he seemed full of whimsy.

Bob Stinson was born in North Carolina and had relocated to Miami where in high school he was all-county as an outfielder his junior (.303) and senior (.402) years. Both Charlie Hough and Kurt Bevacqua were teammates on that county team. After graduating he was drafted by Kansas City but stayed local and switched to catcher for Miami-Dade for whom he played fall ball – and then was drafted in the first round by Washington but again passed – and then had a big season in spring ball. He was then taken by LA in the first round and this time he signed. He then spent most of that summer in Rookie ball as an outfielder hitting .282 with a little power. In ’67 he moved up to Double A where his average fell a bit to .243 and his strikeouts ratcheted up but he did a pretty good job in his first work behind the plate. Around his military time in ’68 he boosted his average at the same level to .285 and also upped his catching time considerably. He then moved up to Triple A in ’69 where he hit .281 with much better power, stole twelve bases, and for the first time put up more walks than strikeouts. He also made his debut in LA. After spending most of that season in the outfield he returned to Triple A and catching in ’70, putting up a .298/6/53 line in his 315 at bats but was now having to contend with fellow young guys Joe Ferguson and Steve Yeager. After the season he joined Ted Sizemore in going to St. Louis for Dick Allen.

For the Cardinals Stinson again spent most of the year in Triple A, where he had a nice line of .324/7/46 with a .438 OBA in 300 at bats. He did a little time up top but didn’t get into many games and after the season was on the road again, this time to Houston for infielder Marty Martinez. Bob then spent the whole season with the Astros but again got very little work, and then at the end of ’73 spring training was sold to the Expos. In ’74 John Boccabella went to San Francisco for his final season but new kid Barry Foote kept Bob back in the depth chart and he only got 87 at bats that year. In another spring training deal, Bob went to Kansas City for speedster Rodney Scott.

When Stinson got to KC the Royals had two incumbent catchers in Fran Healy and Buck Martinez so again Bob’s time was limited. But in ’75 he began a pretty consistent run of hitting in the .260’s with a pretty good OBA which was more offense than either of those guys would generally put up and after hitting .265 in 147 at bats that year he got 61 starts behind the plate in ’76 and upped his line to .263/2/25 in 209 at bats before seeing his only post-season action. That November he got nabbed by the new Mariners in the expansion draft and for the next three seasons Bob was the regular Seattle catcher, peaking in ’78 with a .258/11/55 line and a .346 OBA in 364 at bats. In ’79 he began losing starting time to Larry Cox, who was a better defender and a couple years younger. Then in ’80 new guy Jerry Narron showed up and Bob again became third in line in his final season. He finished with a .250 average with 33 homers, 120 RBI’s, and a .337 OBA. In the post-season he went hitless in his only at bat and in the minors he hit .279 with a .350 OBA.

After playing Stinson remained in the Northwest, working for Boeing a bunch of years as a mechanic and also playing in local leagues until the late Nineties when he was hurt at work and in a car accident. He remained with Boeing until his kids finished school and then relocated to Florida where he has been doing private instruction in hitting and golf ever since.

Bob got a lot of notoriety from that JUCO tournament and was a rarity: a catcher who switch-hit. On his cards in which he is in a hitting pose, the pose is always as a lefty. His card in ’80 looks like it was taken a couple seconds after this one. His given first name is pretty cool; this card was the last one on which he’d use it in his signature.

These guys missed being Royals together by just over a season:

1. Stinson and Amos Otis ’75 to ’76 Royals;

2. Otis and Gail Hopkins ’71 to ’73 Royals.

#603 - 1974 Rookie Catchers

At the other side of the battery we get four catchers, one of whom had a solid career, one of whom had a couple good seasons, and two who get represented just on rookie cards, and that right here.

Barry Foote played all over the infield and outfield in high school in Smithfield, NC. A first round pick by the Expos in the ’70 draft, the team immediately turned him into a catcher and in Rookie ball that summer he hit .266 with some power and a .379 OBA. While mastering his position he would put up some high error totals but he was very aggressive and normally led his league in assists and double plays. In A ball in ’71 his average fell to .230 as his strikeouts ratcheted up but he continued to impress behind the plate and in ’72 in Double A he turned on the power with a .253/16/75 line. ’73 was all Triple A where he put up a .262/19/65 season prior to his September debut during which he hit .667 in his few at bats. In ’74 he would take over as starting catcher and his .262/11/60 season would get him on the Topps Rookie team. Unfortunately it would also be his best year. While his freshman season was good enough to keep Gary Carter in the outfield most of the next couple seasons, Barry's sophomore jinx year was pretty terrible as his stat line fell to .194/7/30 on just a few less at bats. He rebounded a bit to hit .234 in ’76 but by the end of the year Carter had claimed the starting role and he would retain it to start the ’77 season. After getting only a few at bats, Barry would get traded to the Phillies at the '77 deadline with pitcher Dan Warthen for catcher Tim Blackwell and pitcher Wayne Twitchell. Through ’78 he would be the third-string guy behind Bob Boone and Tim McCarver and get very little plate time. Prior to the ’79 season he would join Ted Sizemore, Jerry Martin, and a couple minor leaguers in a trade to the Cubs for Greg Gross, Dave Rader, and Manny Trillo. That trade got him back into a starting role and he responded with his best numbers since his rookie year with a .254/16/56 season. But Barry then began experiencing some extreme lower back pain and the next year he lost his starting role, ironically to Blackwell, and hit .238 in just over 200 at bats. In ’81 young Jody Davis supplanted Blackwell, Barry slid to third on the depth chart, and another mid-season trade had him on the move, this time to the Yankees, where he had more activity the second half but hit only .208. In ’82 his injury and the depth chart kept his time minimal and he did a few games in Triple A in his final season. He hit .230 for his career, with 57 homers and 230 RBI’s. In the post-season he hit .333 in five games. Defensively he led the NL in assists once and double plays twice and picked off 38% of runners that ran on hm, a pretty good premium to the league average. He remained in the NY system as a coach in the minors before managing in the team’s chain from ’84 to ’86, winning his league championship one year. From ’87 to ’89 he managed in the Toronto chain, again winning a championship. He then coached up top for the White Sox (’90-’91) and the Mets (’92-’93). During that time he also started up Tri-State Homes, a construction company that built homes in North Carolina. He then stayed busy locally, helping to establish the Carolina Mudcats, build an oil and gas exploration company that was a player in Alaska, and do cell spectrum work for the National Wireless Network. Since the mid-2000’s he has been running his two companies: Streamer Video, which teaches lay people how to watch baseball games; and F2 Technologies, a wirelss communications company.

Tom Lundstedt played the big three sports in high school outside Chicago in Illinois. In all three sports one of his teammates was Dave Kingman. Tom was selected in a late round by the Dodgers in ’67 but instead went to the University of Michigan on a basketball scholarship. He averaged over 20 points a game for his freshman team and then played his sophomore year with Dan Fife and Rudy Tomjonavich. After that year he switched his scholarship to baseball which he’d also been playing all along. He was then taken by the Cubs in the first round of the ’70 draft and though he fielded well that summer in A and Double A, he hit terribly and spent the ’71 season in A ball where he hit considerably better, with a .266 average and a .410 OBA. In ’72 he returned to Double A where he hit .255 and the next year moved up to Triple A where he maxed out with a .295/11/57 stat line in 322 at bats with a .402 OBA. He made his MLB debut that September and then remained in Chicago in ’74 where he was behind George Mitterwald and Steve Swisher and only got into a few games before knee surgery ended his season in June. Prior to the ’75 season he was traded to the Twins for Mike Adams. That year he moved back and forth between Minnesota and Triple A where he hit .264 but considerably lower up top. It was his final season and he finished with a .092 average in 65 MLB at bats and .256 with 30 homers in the minors. After playing he finished his business degree at the University of Minnesota and then fell into commercial real estate in the Twin Cities area. He then started doing seminars on real estate investing which he continues to do from his own shop.

Charlie Moore was drafted by the Brewers upon graduating high school in Birmingham, Alabama in ’71. He hit .297 that summer in A ball and .259 the next at the same level. In ’73 he combined for a .269 season with 15 homers and 70 RBI’s between Double A and Triple A – he hit better at the higher level – before making his September debut. He then spent the next three seasons backing up Darrell Porter behind the plate and initially doing some DH work. In ’75 Charlie hit well to open the season – he would hit .290 on the year – so the team also had him play in the outfield to keep his bat in the line-up. But Charlie had a tough time out there and in ’76 his average fell 100 points, partly in response. In ’77 Porter was traded to Kansas City and Charlie got the starting catcher role, upped his average nearly 60 points, but had a bad defensive season – he led the AL in errors and passed balls – as his skills seemed to have left him while he was in the outfield. In ’78 Buck Rodgers began to work with Charlie on restoring his defense and while that year he would lose his starting status to Buck Martinez, his catching improved markedly as did his offense, as he hit .269, .300, and .291 the next three years. He also recaptured the starting role in ’79 and ’80. Prior to the ’81 season the Brewers picked up Ted Simmons in a huge trade and though Charlie hit .301 he played behind Simmons and also did some outfield work. He was far more successful in that role than earlier and for the next three seasons he would play primarily in right where he shone defensively, once leading the AL in double plays, and once in putouts. He hit .254 in ’82 and .284 the following year and in between had an excellent post-season in the Series run. He missed time in ’84 to a knee injury and in ’85 returned to the starting role behind the plate. He split time in that role in ’86 and then finished out his career with Toronto in ’87 doing his dual thing. Charlie hit .261 for his career with 43 triples, 36 homers, and 408 RBI’s. In the post-season he hit .354 in 16 games. Following his playing career he returned to the Birmingham area where he has since been a salesman in various industries.

This is technically not the rookie card of Sergio Robles as he had another one in the ’73 set. Sergio was a pretty little guy and a big deal catcher in his native Mexico. Signed by the Dodgers after being scouted playing for state teams below the border in ’68 he spent the next three seasons in A ball where he hit a combined .264 and was an excellent fielder. In ’71 he moved up to Triple A where he hit .265 before being traded to Baltimore as part of the package that moved Frank Robinson to LA. He hit .266 in ’72 before making his MLB debut that August but fell to .207 in ’73, the year he saw his most action in Baltimore. He then spent ’74 playing in Mexico City before being sold to St. Louis prior to the ’75 season. After hitting .217 in Triple A that year he spent ’76 in both the St. Louis and LA organization, and put in his final MLB time that year for the Dodgers. He then returned to Mexico where he would continue to play ball year-round for the next ten years. He finished in The States with a .095 MLB average and hit .251 in the minors. He has managed and coached in Mexico for much of the time since. He has s SABR bio.

We get 21 MLB seasons out of this group and that parenthetical name of Sergio’s looks familiar but I do not believe he and Fernando are related. Lundstedt was certainly tall for a catcher.

Let’s see how we do for the hook-up. From the last card we start with the ’74 Twins:

1. Rod Carew was on the ’74 Twins;

2. Carew and Jose Morales or Bombo Rivera ’78 Twins;

3. Rivera and Morales and Barry Foote ’74 to ’76 Expos.

Each of Lundstedt and Robles only got tiny MLB at bats but we make them count:

1. Barry Foote and Andre Thornton (coming up) ’76 Expos;

2. Thornton and Tom Lundstedt ’74 Cubs;

3. Lundstedt and Larry Hisle ’75 Twins;

4. Hisle and Charlie Moore ’78 to ’82 Brewers;

5. Moore and Bill Travers ’73 to ’80 Brewers;

6. Travers and Bobby Grich ’81 and ’83 Angels;

7. Grich and Sergio Robles ’72 to ’73 Orioles.