1971 O-Pee-Chee Frank Duffy Milt Wilcox #164 Rookie Stars Cincinnati Reds

Description

1971 O-Pee-Chee Frank Duffy Milt Wilcox #164 Rookie Stars Cincinnati Reds Two rookie cards for the price of one, and one of them came within a single out of perfection. Alex Collect presents this 1971 O-Pee-Chee Frank Duffy Milt Wilcox #164 Rookie Stars Cincinnati Reds card, the multi-player rookie issue from the Canadian bilingual set, pairing two careers that stretched across the most entertaining decade the sport has ever known. This is a Canadian O-Pee-Chee bilingual back, printed in Canada and far scarcer than its Topps counterpart, with the distinctive Rookie Stars layout carrying both players' biographies in English and French and miniature pitching and batting tables in the Canadian style. The front is the beloved 1971 Rookie Stars design, the black header and sunny yellow name panels framing Duffy atop and Wilcox below in their red Cincinnati caps. Milt Wilcox is the headline for most buyers, and deservedly so. A hard throwing right hander, he is best remembered in Detroit, where on April 15, 1983 he retired the first 26 Chicago White Sox he faced, one single out from a perfect game, before settling for a one-hit shutout that remains one of the most famous near misses in modern baseball. The very next year he helped deliver the ultimate consolation, going 17 and 8 for the 1984 Detroit Tigers club that stormed to the World Series championship, capping a 16 season career with 119 major league victories. Frank Duffy charts his own wonderfully 1970s path, a slick fielding shortstop named the National Baseball Congress Sandlotter of the Year for 1967, as proudly noted right on this card's back, who debuted with Cincinnati before the Big Red Machine fully assembled, then became the everyday shortstop for the mid decade Cleveland Indians, which famously means he was holding down the position at Municipal Stadium on the riotous Ten Cent Beer Night of June 4, 1974, one of the wildest evenings in sports history. The photographs show a well loved vintage copy, with noticeable softening and rounding at both bottom corners, moderate wear at the top tips, light chipping and fraying along the left edge of the black header, centering running slightly off at roughly 55 to 45, bright and unfaded yellow name panels, and surfaces that remain free of creases, wrinkles, stains or writing on either side, with the bilingual back showing honest corner touches only. The rounded lower corners keep our estimate at a conservative VG-EX 4, fully priced in. Rookie Stars cards of legitimate World Series contributors always outrun their modest price tags over time, and this scarce Canadian version checks every box for Tigers, Reds and rookie card collectors alike. Grade Estimate: VG-EX 4