Unpossible Autograph Friday- Dave Boswell, Oriole #272

The Orioles family lost another member this past week when former Orioles pitcher Dave Boswell passed away on Monday from a heart attack. He was 67 years old.

Dave pitched in the Majors from 1964-71, mostly for the Twins, but also appeared briefly with the Tigers and O's at the end of his playing career. An arm injury knocked him out of baseball when he was just 27 years old.

He led the American League with a .706 win percentage in 1966 when he went 12-5 with the Twins and was generally known to give up a lot of hits but also struck out a large number of hitters. His time with the Orioles was at the tail-end of his career and didn't last very long. He made his Baltimore debut on May 29, 1971 and finished out the season with the Orioles; he went 1-2 with a 4.38 ERA over 15 appearances.

Unfortunately, his career was marred by a few off the field incidents, including a 1969 fight with his manager Billy Martin that left them both needing stitches. I know that Martin had a reputation as a fiery guy, so it's hard to assign blame to either party but it sounds as though Dave might have had a bit of a temper himself.

Since his time with the Orioles was so short, this Crown card is his only Orioles card. He had signed a copy of it in person for me at an Alumni Signing at Camden Yards a few years back but I am trying to upgrade to personalized autographs whenever possible. Interestingly, Dave had just returned this TTM request to me a mere nine days before his passing. I would have to guess that it was among the last autographs he signed in his life, so it makes it even more special to me.

RIP Dave

Still Partying...Cartoon Bird Style

So the Orioles wrapped up their ten game, three city road trip yesterday with a win against the Angels of Anaheim in Southern California and a 6-4 record on the trip. That might not seem too amazing to many of you that root for, how do I say this...somewhat more successful teams. But it was the Orioles first winning record on such a long road trip since 2004. Even though the team lost the series to the Angels, since they had won two of three in Toronto and then three of four against the White Sox, they were guaranteed at least a .500 record on the trip when they arrived in Anaheim.

I'm probably getting ahead of myself, but this year's team seems to be different from the Orioles teams of recent seasons. Now, I'm quite a realistic fan who would be happy if the team could get to 81-81 (or even 82-80!) and break the consecutive losing seasons streak for the time being. Then they can continue to build towards being a playoff caliber team.

Yesterday, I cited the official return of the orange uniforms as my unfounded reason for the team's improved play. Russell, a fellow Orioles autograph collector, commented on the post, and mentioned that he believes the return of the cartoon bird caps could be responsible for the turnaround. Hey, why not? I'll go with that, so here are some of the cartoon bird hats from over the years.

Here's Dave Boswell showing off the cartoon bird cap worn from 1966-74.

Mark Brown is kindly displaying the 1975-88 version of the bird. 

And here's new Oriole Endy Chavez wearing the 2012-hopefully forever cartoon bird cap.

You might notice that this card isn't signed yet, but I'm working on it! Endy is one of the few new players who already have an Orioles card that I need to get signed to have my collection up-to-date.

An attempt to catch up...Orioles Alumni Autographs

I am so far behind on things I want to post that if I can share half of what I have I will still be a few weeks behind. If that even makes sense.

The two main things I will try to get to this week are my pictures and autographs from the Nats Picnic in the Park two Saturday's ago and my pictures from Harold Baines' Orioles Hall of Fame induction this past Saturday. I know Steve at White Sox Cards will be especially interested in those.

But today's post will showcase the autographs I've got at the past four or five Orioles Alumni Autograph series. Most of these are available in a trade if you are interested.

And here we go...


This was the first time I ever got Dave's autograph. Nice addition to my collection!



If you are an O's fan and don't have "the B's" autograph, you are doing something wrong.



My Devo autograph collection is much larger now than it was before. My favorite is the upside down one.


Ken Gerhart, yep.



This was the first time I got Ross's autograph in person. Check out his cards from back in the day. He had some wacky hair styles. This one wasn't too bad, in comparison at least.



John Habyan, another first time in person auto.



Billy Hunter was nice as always.



Dave Johnson is always around the Yard. Another guy that any O's collector should have.



McGregor is a local guy; which equals me having 50 autographs of his. Give or take 20.



Gary is not around nearly as much so I don't have very many of his signatures. And couldn't Donruss and Fleer changed the border colors up just a little bit? Ah, the 80s.



Dave made an appearance, taking a break from his Minor League duties.



My Larry Sheets autograph collection rivals my McGregor & Bumbry collections.


Bill Swaggerty doesn't look like this at all. At least, not anymore.