Special Post...Justice for Ralph Lumenti

Late Update re: Baseball Reference, see the bottom.

Early last year I posted the '59 Topps card #316 which is supposed to show Ralph Lumenti. As noted in that post the picture is not Lumenti but rather it's a shot of Senators teammate Camilo Pascual.

A few days ago reader Sheriff Tom pointed out that not only is Lumenti not shown on his Topps card but his Baseball Reference page features the same incorrect picture. Some guys just can't catch a break.

As I noted in my reply to Tom my copy of the Lumenti/Pascual card is is terrible shape. It's probably the worst conditioned card in my set binder (outside of the Gibson rookie).

So I figured the least I could do was upgrade the card. If Lumenti was going to have an error card at least it would be a nice error card.

I found this one on eBay just a couple of bucks shipped and it arrived in a day or so. It was listed as vg/ex and it's easily at least that good. I am also going to send BR a note about the incorrect picture. Hopefully they will fix it. We'll see. Below is a screenshot of the 'before' page. I hope to be able to come back and add the 'after'.

August 20 Update: I received an email from RB Feedback stating that they were going to notify their picture provider of the error.

#56 Carl Sawatski

From his signing with the Phillies in 1945 at the age of 18 until his death in 1991 Carl Sawatski spent nearly his entire adult life in the game of baseball. Born in Pennsylvania but raised in Little Rock Sawatski spent four seasons in the minors as the property of three different franchises before he debuted with a handful of at bats in 1948 with the Cubs. Prodigious power numbers in Nashville in '49/'50 earned him another look at big league pitching before Uncle Sam called and Sawatski gave two years to the military service. His minor league exploits are chronicled here on the Nashville Sounds website.

Returning to baseball he played another season for the Cubs before being traded to the cross town White Sox. He didn't hit much for either club and found himself back in the minors in 1956 and then returned to the bigs with the World Series champion Braves in 1957 as a back-up catcher. He got a couple of Series at bats and a ring for his efforts.

The Braves traded him to the Phils in 1958 and they in turn passed him along to the Cards in 1960. For  six seasons, from 1958 until he retired after the '63 season, Sawatski averaged around 80 games and 210 at bats each year. He twice hit nearly .300 and had a career high 13 homers in 1962.

After retiring he became the GM of the Arkansas Travelers in the Cards chain and then served as the president of the Southern League until his passing.

Looks like a Connie Mack stadium shot here. Topps' East Coast photographers sometimes traveled out of New York, kicking and screaming I'm sure.

And note that the Phils cap on the logo is missing the red ink. From a quick googling it appears all the '59 Sawatski cards suffered from this. It is not listed as a variation or error on this usually reliable list. Perhaps printing anomolies are not considered errors/variations.