Near the far end of Cleveland’s I-X Center, a 530,000-square-foot space filled with cards, photos, bobbleheads and helmets for the National Sports Collectors Convention stood a display case with a jersey faded to a grayish-blue hue. It traveled to Cleveland from Wrigley Field via an armored transport and it’s expected to be auctioned off for more than $30 million. Advertisement Babe Ruth wore the uniform top in 1932, as he called his shot during Game 3 of the World Series.
Some items at the overwhelmingly bustling convention, seem mythical, even when separated only by glass. There’s a signed Joe DiMaggio jersey from the 1947 World Series, game-worn jerseys of Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson, as well as Barry Bonds’ 755th home run ball. Or, for the movie buffs, there are a pair of ruby slippers Judy Garland wore 85 years ago while portraying Dorothy in the “Wizard of Oz.
” All I’m here for, though, is to find a David Justice card in an ever-so-slightly different price range. When I was a kid, Justice was my favorite player, the owner of the smoothest left-handed swing by anyone not named Ken Griffey Jr. I batted righty, but I’d venture to the other side of the box when playing in the neighborhood just so I could attempt to replicate that thing of beauty.
When Justice was traded to Cleveland in 1997, I imitated the swing daily and watched it nightly. My 2-year-old son has an Aaron Judge rookie card — a gift from a family friend — resting on a bookshelf in his room, beside a Charlie Brown book and a wooden Very Hungry Caterpillar. It’s only right I tell him about Justice one day.
It shouldn’t be difficult to find one. After all, there must be millions and millions of cards at the I-X Center for this event. It’ll be a fun assignment to see who I can find.
.. or who I cannot.
The worst-case scenario — an extensive “remember some dudes” session — isn’t so bad at all. The first display case I see contains nothing but excellence: Mickey Mantle, Orlando Cepeda, Roger Maris, Willie Mays, Harmon Killebrew, Hoyt Wilhelm, Herb Score, Pee Wee Reese, Ed Mathews (so formal), Curt Flood and Al Kaline. The next display is more of the same, with Ruth, Bonds Lou Brock, Chipper Jones, Rocky Colavito, Greg Maddux and a card highlighting that Lou Gehrig’s then-record streak of consecutive games came to an end at 2,130.
Advertisement Justice was good — 305 home runs, a couple of Silver Slugger awards, two top-five MVP finishes — but this is a different caliber. There are tables with rows of cards for $1 apiece or 60 for $50, but rifling through them all would take days, and my head is spinning. I peer down toward the ground and spot four portraits resting against a table: Greg Maddux.
Chipper Jones. Steve Avery. And the man of the hour.
The seller contends he’s peddling them only as a set, for $4,000. “I can break it up,” he relents, “but you’re not gonna like the price.” One stand has cards sorted by team.
The Cleveland collection has Satchel Paige, Jim Thome, CC Sabathia, Corey Kluber, Bob Feller and Eli Morgan. The Atlanta collection has Ozzie Albies, John Smoltz, Justin Upton, Rafael Furcal and Ronald Acuña Jr. All right, here’s how we end this: We’ll buy one box of 1991 Fleer Ultra cards and one box of 1998 Bowman cards .
In all, 60 packs and 744 cards. One has to be a Justice..
. right? There’s no way to know if this will take 30 seconds or three hours, but don’t worry, I won’t list the identity of every single card, especially since the first one I see is..
. wait, no, that’s Jeff Treadway in a Braves uniform, not Justice. A 1991 Justice card would have him in Atlanta gear, coming off a National League Rookie of the Year season.
A 1998 card would have him in Cleveland gear, on the heels of his best season. That first pack includes Bip Roberts, a Padres infielder who joined Justice in Cleveland in 1997 and played a consequential role in the postseason. Fellow infielder Tony Fernández lined a baseball off Roberts’ left thumb in batting practice ahead of Game 6 of the ALCS, so Fernández replaced him in the lineup and then launched the game-winning, series-clinching homer in extra innings.
Roberts was sick for Game 7 of the World Series, so Fernández manned second base and then committed a costly error in the 11th inning. There’s also a Griffey card , but we’re seeking the second-smoothest swing, not the smoothest. The card displays Griffey releasing the bat at the end of his swing, which is a tease, like seeing only the credits of an Oscar-winning film.
Three Hall of Famers highlight the next pack, with Maddux rocking a Cubs uniform and Eddie Murray representing the Dodgers. Rickey Henderson won the AL MVP the year before, with a 1.016 OPS, 28 homers and 65 stolen bases.
Next, we have Andres Galarraga in a powder blue Expos top, Don Mattingly, with a massive wad filling his cheek as he crouches to snag a pickoff attempt at first base, and Pat Borders, Justice’s teammate in Cleveland in 1997-98. Advertisement In the same pack, we find a Reggie Jefferson card, and then a guy Jefferson was traded for in December 1993, Omar Vizquel. Even better, there’s a Marquis Grissom, who was dealt to Cleveland with Justice at the end of spring training in 1997, a shocking trade that shipped Kenny Lofton to Atlanta ahead of a contract year.
Ah, Jeff Conine, another member of that hastily-assembled-and-even-more-hastily-deconstructed 1997 Marlins roster that beat Cleveland in the World Series. Doug Jones, briefly Justice’s teammate in Cleveland in 1998, probably had a mustache in the womb. Frank Thomas finished third in the AL MVP balloting in his first full season in 1991.
How about Rich Garces, the six-foot, 250-pound Twins (and, later, Red Sox) reliever nicknamed “El Guapo,” or “The Handsome One”? Gary Sheffield, another 1997 Florida man, looks strange in a Brewers uniform, especially as he pirouettes over a sliding Carney Lansford at second base. Ozzie Guillen lunges toward a pitch outside the zone on the front of his card. On Steve Avery’s card, the southpaw offers a piercing gaze that screams, “You should have paid the $4,000 for the Braves portrait set.
” Perhaps you’re familiar with Bobby Witt’s son, a current AL MVP contender for the Royals. Well, senior pitched for seven teams across 16 big-league seasons. This pack includes a ton of talent.
Cubs icon Ryne Sandberg. George Brett, who won his third batting crown in 1990. Jose Canseco.
Nolan Ryan. John Kruk. Julio Franco, the ageless wonder.
Plus, a couple more Braves teases in Glavine and infielder Jeff Blauser. A sobering find: Steve Olin, the Cleveland closer who tragically died in a spring training boating accident in 1993. His son, Garrett, lives in the Pacific Northwest and wears his dad’s old No.
31 jersey to minor-league or independent league games. He stuffs his pockets with his dad’s cards and hands them out to anyone who recognizes the name on the jersey. A baseball family, a haunting tragedy, and a son keeping his father’s story alive Some more Cleveland flair surfaces.
Sandy Alomar Jr., the 1990 AL Rookie of the Year. Casey Candaele, another former Cleveland hitter, but the only one known to take batting practice in the nude.
Shawon Dunston. Travis Fryman. Kevin Mitchell.
Ellis Burks. Eric Plunk, a longtime Cleveland reliever who was reliable except for a nightmarish outing against the Yankees in the 1997 playoffs that prompted a newspaper headline the next day of “KER-PLUNK.” Dennis Martinez, Cleveland’s quadragenarian ace in the mid-’90s.
Matt Williams, Cleveland’s other new slugger tasked to replace Albert Belle’s muscle in 1997. Advertisement No Justice, though. There’s a Fred McGriff card, before he joined the Braves and formed an imposing middle of the order with Justice and Jones.
Ozzie Smith, appropriately making a leaping catch for the Cardinals. Cory Snyder, rocking a fabulous mullet/mustache combination in his White Sox top. Dave Winfield, who was reportedly traded to Cleveland in 1994 for a dinner between general managers , since the players strike wiped out his chance to suit up for his new team that season.
Another Griffey, this time completing his majestic swing, with the tip of his bat buried in the dirt, his right arm extended and his left hand raised in the air. There’s a Barry Bonds card. You remember him, the skinny Pirates outfielder.
An Andy Benes, an unassuming righty who bounced from the Padres to the Mariners, Cardinals and Diamondbacks. Justice tagged him for five home runs, his most against any pitcher. A couple more ’97 Marlins: Jim Eisenreich, an inspiring figure in the Tourettes community , and Bobby Bonilla, who’s still cashing checks from the Mets.
We’re down to the last 1991 pack. Paul O’Neill, my least favorite player as a kid, my anti-Justice. Another.
Damn. Griffey. I must be the first person in the universe to ever gripe about too many Griffey cards.
On to 1998. We begin with Justice’s former teammate, Jones, and a chrome (read: shiny) Lance Berkman card that includes this note from an unidentified scout: “As good a hitter as I have ever seen.” Berkman was a top prospect with the Astros at the time.
There’s a Bernie Williams, whom I always thought had one of the sweeter right-handed swings, and Roberto Alomar, Justice’s teammate for a year and a half in Cleveland. There’s a Barry Larkin, who over the previous decade had notched nine All-Star nods, seven Silver Slugger Awards and three Gold Glove Awards. There’s a Richie Sexson, who has to lean forward to fit on the card with his 6-foot-7 frame.
He debuted in 1997 for Cleveland and became a regular contributor in ’98. On the back of his card, under skills, Sexson is described as a “worker bee.” Advertisement There’s an Edgar Renteria, who in ’97 crushed the hopes of Justice and every Cleveland fan convinced the Indians were about to win the World Series.
There’s a Larry Walker, who was amid a stretch of three seasons in which he hit .366, .363 and .
379. That’s an impressive feat at Coors Field, on the moon, anywhere. There’s a Sammy Sosa, who would embark on an innocent little home run record chase with Mark McGwire that summer.
This card displays his signature, which reads “Samuel Sosa.” I figured only his mom called him that when yelling at him about corking his bat. There’s a chrome Marcus McCain, who I had never heard of.
He was in A-ball with the Devil Rays in 1997, and that was his only professional experience. He was listed at 5-foot-7, 150 pounds, which might explain why his card reads “would-be star of Smurf track team.” Harsh.
Here it is! An Indians uniform! An outfielder! It’s...
Jason Fitzgerald. Who? He was the 41st overall pick in 1997 out of Tulane, spent six years in Cleveland’s organization and one with the Braves, then two in independent ball, but he never reached the majors. Mike Mussina had some wars with Cleveland in the 1997 ALCS.
Jeff Kent, traded out of Cleveland the year before Justice arrived, ultimately blossomed into an MVP-winning second baseman in San Francisco. We now have two cards of Atlanta reliever Kevin McGlinchy, but none of his former teammate. Iván Rodriguez is a nice pull; in 1998, he was amid a string of 10 consecutive All-Star seasons.
A couple of Astros teammates and future Hall of Famers: Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell, who is emerging from his crouched stance to launch what appears to be an extra-base hit. Ricky Ledee! I’ll never forget watching Baseball Tonight in 2000 when the news crawled across the ticker at the bottom of the screen that the Indians had traded Justice to the Yankees for Ledee (whom they flipped for David Segui 29 days later). Cleveland did also receive Jake Westbrook, whom they eventually dealt for Corey Kluber, whom they eventually dealt for Emmanuel Clase in the most prolific trade tree in franchise history.
(It dates back nearly a half-century.) Anyway, Ledee hit .222 in 17 games for Cleveland.
And we still don’t have a Justice card. Advertisement Hey look, another Marcus McCain. I wonder if he would want these.
So many ‘90s stars: Edgar Martinez, Curt Schilling, Juan Gonzalez, Miguel Tejada, Roger Clemens, Scott Rolen, Rafael Palmeiro, a teenage prospect for the Dodgers named Adrián Beltré, whose list of skills on the back of his card reads, “All of them!” That sounds about right for an eventual first-ballot Hall of Famer. More Cleveland cards, but still no Justice. Danny Peoples, a first-rounder in 1996 who spent six years in the farm system but never reached the majors.
Jim Thome, the franchise’s all-time home run king, a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Another Sandy Alomar Jr., on the heels of his career year, in which he blasted a game-winning home run in front of his home crowd in the All-Star Game.
Sean Casey, one of baseball’s best storytellers, who shadowed Thome before being traded to the Reds for burly pitcher Dave Burba. A Mike Piazza card from the year he was traded twice, eight days apart, from the Dodgers to the Marlins to the Mets. An Orlando Hernández, the Yankees hurler dubbed “El Duque,” from before he ever stepped foot on a major-league mound.
Ryan Minor, who replaced Ripken at the end of his Iron Man streak. A David Ortiz card, in which he’s wearing Minnesota Twins pinstripes. A Cubs prospect named Kerry Wood, just before he burst onto the big-league scene with a 20-strikeout outing.
There’s a Belle card from his days with the White Sox, which means we have the guy Justice replaced. We also have the guys who replaced Justice in 2001, Gonzalez and Marty Cordova. A couple of Mo Vaughn cards.
He didn’t deserve the 1995 AL MVP, by the way. Belle did. We’re down to four packs.
Forty cards remain. A fourth Griffey card, this time just after contact, with his bat leaving the zone. Another Glavine.
A chrome Casey. A Todd Helton rookie card. Another Maddux.
Maybe I should’ve just coughed up the $4,000 for the Braves set. Advertisement And there he is, mid-swing, eyes staring down the baseball as it spins toward him, his bat roaring through the zone, his back knee bent, his hips twisted, looking cool and confident. His 1997 stats sparkle on the back of the card, a .
329/.418/.596 slash line, 33 homers, more walks than strikeouts.
It includes an opponent breakdown; he tortured the A’s that year. The White Sox were the only team to keep him from homering. He’s card No.
698, but it was worth the wait. Now, I wonder if I can trade this for that Ruth jersey. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence in all our coverage.
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