Up For Grabs: Donnie Baseball

Cardinals fans, please watch this space! In the coming weeks, I will be listing a bunch of my extra Cardinals cards here, most likely in the same format as these Up For Grabs posts. I'm getting to the point where something like 20% of the unwanted cards in my collection are Cardinals cards, and that's just not right. Before we get to those, however, I have a few more non-Cardinals players to finally clear out of the binders. As always, look for the list at the end of the post.

Don Mattingly is probably not the most popular ex-ballplayer around right now. Reports seem to float by every day discussing his imminent termination as manager of the Dodgers. As much as I liked Mattingly as a player, it wouldn't really bother me to see his days as a Dodger come to an end because I grew up in the '80s believing that the Yankees were great and the Dodgers were the enemy.

Of course, these days I have a hard time finding much affection for the Yankees. This year's team is some sort of weird hybrid of superstar (Cano, Sabathia) and free agent scrapheap fantasy draft fodder (Travis Hafner? Lyle Overbay? Brennan Boesch?)

Mattingly was a terrific player for awhile, but he remains outside of the Hall of Fame inner circle. His highs were probably not quite high enough for books to be written about him and his career wasn't quite as long as many 1B sluggers that we're used to. In fact, Mattingly wasn't really a slugger at all, but he did a very good impression of one for a few years in the '80s.

Still, he's a curious case. Is it possible for someone to be so overrated that he's actually maybe a little bit overlooked. His career was pretty much bookended by Yankee World Series appearances, but he debuted a year too late and retired a year too soon to participate. He was one of the few talented, marketable players that stuck with the Yankees all the way through their lean years, and he never suited up for any other big league team.

The list:

1991 Post #29 [4 available]
1987 Fleer #104
1985 Fleer Limited Edition #20
1989 Cereal Superstars #11
1996 Topps Stadium Club #73
1991 Fleer Provisions #11 [2 available]
1991 Score (The Franchise) #856 [3 available]
1988 Topps Sticker Backs (w/ John Kruk sticker) #35
1988 O-Pee-Chee Sticker Backs (w/ Scott Bailes / Casey Candaele stickers) #35
1989 Topps UK Minis #49
1993 Triple Play #120
1993 Topps #32
1989 Classic Orange #106
1992 Topps #300
2010 Topps The Cards Your Mom Threw Out #CMT157
1991 Upper Deck #354
1992 Upper Deck #356
1992 Score #23
2008 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes (w/ Dave Winfield and Reggie Jackson) #190
2008 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes (w/ Wade Boggs) #176 [2 available]
1990 Topps Mini League Leaders #24
1989 Fleer #258
1990 Fleer #447
1990 Fleer (SuperStarSpecials w/ Mark McGwire) #638 [2 available]
1991 Score #23
1988 Fleer Sluggers vs. Pitchers #26
1991 Donruss #107
1990 Post #1
1992 Topps Stadium Club #420
1990 Topps #200 [7 available]
1990 Bowman Art Inserts [4 available]
1991 Fleer #673
1988 Donruss MVP #BC-21
1987 Topps (Yankees Leaders w/ Rickey Henderson) #406 [2 available]
1987 Topps (All-Stars ERR no trademark) #606
1987 Topps (All-Stars COR) #606
1987 Topps Mini League Leaders #65
1988 Topps UK Minis #45 [2 available]
1988 Topps Glossy All-Stars #2
1988 Topps (Record Breakers) #2
1992 Fleer #237 [2 available]
1989 Topps #700
1989 Topps (All-Stars) #397
1991 Topps (ERR 10 hits in 1990) #100 [2 available]
1991 Leaf #425
1989 Donruss #74
1989 Donruss (Diamond Kings) #26
1990 Bowman #443
1990 Topps Kay-Bee Kings #18
1990 Leaf #69
1987 Sportflics (Tri-Stars w/ Wally Joyner and Eddie Murray) #75
1988 Fleer Sluggers vs. Pitchers #25
1987 Fleer (SuperStarSpecials w/ Darryl Strawberry) #638
1996 Bazooka #23

[updated 7/7/13]