Gregg Olson, 1993 Donruss #117

I hope you don't mind if I mention my 1993 Topps set blog here once in a while. After all, this blog still gets more eyeballs than that one, and a guy's got to sell himself, even when he's writing for free. I'm about 30 percent of the way through the base set, and I'm continually surprised and amused by the things that I'm learning about the players of my adolescence. Today's subject is Gregg Olson, somebody with whom I'd expect to have more familiarity than most other players from that time. But in a few minutes spent on Baseball Reference and a bit of Googling, I discovered the following things that I'd either forgotten or never knew in the first place:

-In his Rookie of the Year campaign in 1989, the Otter allowed one home run in 85 innings. One. Uno. That's nuts.

-After he tore elbow ligaments in August 1993 and the Orioles chose not to re-sign him, Olson pitched for eight other MLB teams through the 2001 season. He went from the Braves to the Indians to the Royals to the Tigers to the Astros to the Twins to the Royals again to the Diamondbacks to the Dodgers. I remember him with Atlanta, Arizona...maybe Detroit and/or Kansas City if I dig deep enough. There's so much baseball that has happened without my noticing.

-While playing for Buck Showalter's D-backs, Gregg notched his only hit in five career plate appearances...and it was a two-run homer, with Florida's Oscar Henriquez serving as the victim.

-In his post-pitching life, Olson has worked as a scout for the Padres.

See, you learn something (or things) new every day. If you're not already reading my 1993 Topps blog, you're cheating yourself. Or you've got better things to do with your time, and I can't begrudge you that.