1956 Dodgers Lineup card with an interesting story
 

Just picked this up from eBay. Signed by HOF Manager Walt Alston on the back, and the lineup features legends including Jackie Robinson, Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snider, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges.

This particular lineup card has an interesting story. Back in 2014 it was sold by the auction house Mears, as a "1955 circa Brooklyn Dodgers Original Lineup Card." It looked similar to how it looks now except the lineup card did not have a date written on the card.

(http://sports.mearsonlineauctions.co...-lot78373.aspx)

2 years later the lineup card was sold by Mears again, this time in a lot. The strange thing was that now the lineup card was dated: "5/12/1956". The listing made the reason for the addition of the date obvious. On 5/12/1956 Carl Erskine pitched a no-hitter. Looking at 5/12/1956 the lineup that is on the card is a perfect match. The problem is that this exact lineup was used 4 times in 1956, and Erskine only pitched a no-hitter on one of them.

(http://sports.mearsonlineauctions.co...lot101973.aspx)


A little while later the item was listed at Lelands. This was the first time I came across the item, and I learned the rest of this story doing some research. I sent the info to Lelands and they pulled the listing. I was disappointed since I was still interested in the lineup card.

A while later the lineup card ended up on eBay looking as it does now (with the date blacked out). The account is from the sister of the owner of Lelands. The items sold then for $400+ and while disappointed, the price was pretty steep.

This past week the lineup card was once again listed from the same account. I think there is a chance there was some shill bidding now as well (the second highest bidder has 100% bidding with this seller over the last 30 days) but I bid an amount I was ok with, and won it.

On Jackie Robinson Day, I thought it is a pretty cool pickup.

Super item. A piece of history.

Congrats Jeff. Such is a great item. I was one of the underbidders.

Nice pickup! Glad you finally added the card to your collection!

Thanks! With the fact that there were lineup cards for every game, there aren't too many vintage ones out there.


Sorry about that. (Not very sorry though :) Do you collect lineup cards, or just something about this one?


Thanks! Still haven't found a Durocher one yet, but happy to have picked this one up.

Great pick-up. Sounds like it is going to the perfect home :-)

Would changes have been written in? Maybe the date can be narrowed down by checking if any changes were made in the other games?
I'm thinking that would have to be extended to other years too.

Thanks!


I had not thought of that. I checked the 4 games with this exact lineup in 1956, and the others all had a ton of changes, but the no-hit game (not surprisingly) kept the same 9 players the whole game.

I think it definitely makes it a little more likely that the card is from the no-hit game (along with the fact that it's the closest date to the date printed on the back of the card), though REA has a 1955 Dodger's lineup card up now with no markings and in that game there was a couple of pitching changes (although no substitutions in the lineup)

Regarding other years, I don't think it is likely. The card has a 1956 date printed on the back. I can't imagine it would have been printed before 1956, (although I've seen a number that were not used on the date printed) and 1956 was Robinson's last season, so it could not have been later. (This exact lineup never played in 1955 either.)

Something obvious just occurred to me. The card is from Ebbet's Field:

The 4 dates that had this exact lineup were:

5/12/1956 - Erskine no-hitter
5/18/1956 - Koufax 15th career appearance
5/22/1956 - Koufax 17th career appearance
5/28/1956 - Road game

Looks like it has to be 5/12, 5/18 or 5/22 which were played at Ebbet's Field. I feel like the lack of any lineup changes makes it more likely that it is from the 5/12 game which did not have any changes, but nothing conclusive so far.

I believe you mean to say Ebbets Field and not Dodger Stadium. Anyways, if the exact same line-up with no changes played on those 3 dates, I can't see any other factor that would point to one of those dates over the others.

OK, sorry. I thought those 3 dates all had no line-up changes, but indeed only one (the Erskine no-hitter) did. That's the game I would be thinking it was.

Yup my bad, I edited that. I meant Dodger's home games.

On the other 2 dates there were player substitutions during the game, (only the no-hit game was the same throughout the game) but I've seen enough times where the changes were not written in to say definitively that it was from the game that didn't have the changes.

Definitely would love to think it was from the no-hit game, but can't say for sure.