Vintage Fridays: Steve Barber, 1965 Topps #113

Although Steve Barber was traded from the Angels to the Brewers in October of 1973, he was released the following March before ever appearing in a regular season game with the Brew Crew. Tonight the Orioles venture into Miller Park to fight for Steve's honor...or something. I suppose the current team has their own set of motivations, chief among them the continuation of a great stretch in which they've won five of their last six games and eleven of sixteen. But I've got something personal riding on this game.

Today I made a friendly wager with fellow card blogger, Milwaukee resident, and avid Brewers fan Bill (aka Thorzul). If the Orioles win at least two of the three games in the weekend series, Bill will make a guest appearance on this blog to talk about his five favorite O's cards. However, if Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun and pals somehow manage to take the series, I will be reduced to talking up my choicest Brewer cards on his blog. I already have a few cards in mind, but I'm not too worried about having to type them up.

The tale of the tape shows the Orioles as clearly superior, with three World Series titles to Milwaukee's zero. Sure, they bested us in that thrilling down-to-the-wire pennant race in 1982, but I hear that Paul Molitor was on cocaine. So he probably had an unfair edge, with his drug of choice giving him a jolt of energy and plenty of extra awake time. I'm sure he used that time to study game tapes. Cheater.

Most importantly of all, the Orioles were the Brewers before the Brewers were the Brewers...do you follow? When the American League debuted in 1901, there was a Milwaukee franchise named the Brewers. They soon moved to St. Louis and became the Browns. Five decades later, the franchise located once more to Baltimore. Take that, you cheese-eating Favre-lovers!