1977 john montefusco

it's an extreme closeup thanks to the way o-pee-chee cropped the photo on john 'the count' montefusco's card in 1977.  they also fiddled with his facsimile autograph while they were at it.  here is his 1977 o-pee-chee card:

here's the topps front:

good lord, that's a huge glove.

now the o-pee-chee back:

it's fairly appropriate that the cartoon on this card features freddie patek, since montefusco kind of looks like andre the giant.  right?

and the topps back:

i will say up front that i was not a fan of the count's simply because he pitched for the giants.  well, it turns out that the giants lost all 4 of his starts agains the dodgers in 1977, so perhaps i shouldn't have been so hard on him.  his record that year was a disappointing (for him, not me) 7-12 despite a reasonable 3.49 era.  over the course of his career, montefusco was 10-10 against the dodgers, one of three teams against whom he earned that many victories.

it makes sense if you think about it - montefusco spent much of his career in the nl west, first with the giants and later with the braves - that the batter he faced most often over the course of his career was none other than steve garvey.  the garv was a .287 hitter against him, with a homer, 11 rbi and 16 k's.  second on the list is ron cey, followed by davey lopes.  the other infielder, bill russell, is sixth on the list of batters montefusco faced most often, behind a couple of cincinnati reds.

voici à vous, 1977 john montefusco!