1979 derrel thomas

derrel thomas signed as a free agent with the dodgers after the 1978 season ended. here is his 1979 o-pee-chee card:

here's the topps front:

now the o-pee-chee back:

and the topps back:

during his 5 years in la, thomas played everywhere but pitcher. in 1979, however, he was the dodgers' primary centerfielder while still making appearances at every infield position. he wasn't known for his power (he hit only 5 home runs all year), but he did connect for a roundtripper against jr richard, had a grand slam against bob knepper and the giants, and hit two home runs in a game off of bill caudill and the cubs.

thomas has proven to be the penultimate dodger player to wear the numbers 1 (he wore it when he first joined the dodgers in 1979, and it was retired in 1984 for pee wee reese after gary weiss wore it in 1980) and 34 (he wore it in 1979 after ken brett left). in 1980, thomas became the first dodger to wear number 30 after maury wills retired as he wanted to honor his long-time hero. that meant that number 34 was available for fernando valenzuela when he was called up late in the season, and no one else has worn it since.

thomas is still involved with the dodgers today, even though he played for the expos, angels and phillies after his days in dodger blue came to an end. speaking of ends, this is the last of the 1979 variations!

voici à vous, 1979 derrel thomas!

1985 derrel thomas

here is derrel thomas' 1985 o-pee-chee card:

here's the topps front:

now the o-pee-chee back:

and the topps back:

much like ralph garr's 1980 o-pee-chee card, this one is a head scratcher.  the back of the cards clearly show that thomas finished the 1984 season with the california angels, yet topps portrayed him as an expo in their 1985 set.  the difference here is that there is no mention of the transaction on the back of the topps card.  we are left to wonder if maybe topps reversed the stats on the back and he began the year as an angel and finished with the expos.  o-pee-chee, however, clarifies the point by telling us that the transaction took place in september of 1984. which brings up another point:  baseball reference tells us that in that transaction, thomas was purchased by the angels from the expos, yet o-pee-chee indicates that he was traded.  here's a case where 'now with' would have made sense.  still, i don't think i'll categorize this as an error, since i don't definitively know whether there was some deal struck between montreal and california.

even stranger is that on davey lopes' 1985 card, topps added the text to the front to alert us that he was being shown in a former team's uniform.  why they didn't do that for another card in the same set with the same situation is beyond me.  to make matters worse, the angels released thomas in november of 1984 and he signed with the phillies as a free agent in may of 1985, so everybody's wrong on this card. 

at any rate, thomas spent the bulk of the 1984 season in montreal before joining the angels.  and, for the second time in his career, he played 7 of 9 positions in the field, failing only to pitch and catch.  in 1980, the other season in which he was so widely used, he caught but didn't pitch or play first since popeye wouldn't take a day off.  in 1985, his final big league season, he hit .207 for the phils in a super-utility role.  his last major league at bat came against the pirates in october of '85 when he grounded out against bob kipper to end game 161.

voici à vous, 1985 derrel thomas!