SoI posted
this entry about Juan Bell on Tuesday. A few nights later, I was looking through some cards that I still have to enter into my computer inventory and I found the card above. I'll repost the 1992 Donruss Juan Bell below, so you can look at them one on top of the other:
So the plot thickens. Was there a rogue photographer with Score who was secretly working for Donruss? Or vice versa? I never imagined that there could be double agents amidst the growing number of card companies that were vying for an ever-larger piece of the pie in the early 1990s. This makes me wish that I still had my cards organized alphabetically, rather than by year and brand, so that I'd be more readily able to spot cool trends like this. As always, if you have any more examples of things like this, let me know...
SoI posted this entry about Juan Bell on Tuesday. A few nights later, I was looking through some cards that I still have to enter into my computer inventory and I found the card above. I'll repost the 1992 Donruss Juan Bell below, so you can look at them one on top of the other:
So the plot thickens. Was there a rogue photographer with Score who was secretly working for Donruss? Or vice versa? I never imagined that there could be double agents amidst the growing number of card companies that were vying for an ever-larger piece of the pie in the early 1990s. This makes me wish that I still had my cards organized alphabetically, rather than by year and brand, so that I'd be more readily able to spot cool trends like this. As always, if you have any more examples of things like this, let me know...
Kevin,
ReplyDeleteThis is really uncanny. The Score photo is fractions of a second later than the Donruss photo (look at Juan's right leg and his head in comparison to the background).
The angle of Quintana's head might indicate that the Score photographer was a few feet to the left of the Donruss photographer - but I could be wrong!?!
Also, Juan's face is much more clear and defined in the Donruss photo - but that could just be the printing process and not the photo.
Great job on pulling (and pointing) this out!!!
Card o the Day: CSI edition.
ReplyDeleteMy guess would be the same photographer took the two shots in rapid succession. Maybe there are "free agent" baseball card photographers, that sell their photos to various companies. Gotta admit, 35 years collecting cards and I know very little about the photographers.
ReplyDeleteESPN ran an interesting article on baseball card photographer Gregg Forwerck, who's done photos for Topps for 19 years. Unbelievably, Barry Bonds is one of Gregg's heroes; Nolan Ryan is not. Check out the article at http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&id=3285908&sportCat=mlb.
Larry,
ReplyDeleteAwesome article - thanx for referring us to that!
Further CSI Update - I believe this photo must have come from the top of the second inning of this game - http://tiny.cc/1RcsC
ReplyDeleteIf that is correct, then Juan successfully turned the DP, Ripken-Bell-Milligan.
You guys did some great legwork on this. Larry, I'd read that article before, but it was great to give it another look!
ReplyDeleteTim, I believe you're right. The only other games featuring both Bell and Quintana in Memorial Stadium in 1991 were a double-header in late September, and Carlos was 0-5 that day. The wonders of technology, that we can pinpoint a moment in baseball card legend.