I occasionally can't remember if George Foster is a Hall of Famer or not. He is not. He was a great player, but just not Hall of Fame worthy.
He had an 18-year career with five All Star appearances, earning the All Star game MVP in 1976. He was the NL MVP in 1977, NL Silver Slugger in 1981, hit 52 home runs in 1977 and won two World Series with the Reds. Those stats start to sound like a Hall of Famer, but he really had seven excellent years from about 1975 to 1981 and would have had to stretch those great years out to a few more to be considered Hall-worthy I think. Also, you don't hear too much about his defense.
He retired with 348 homers and a .274 batting average. He was inducted into the Reds Hall of Fame in 2003, which was well deserved considering his peak years aligned with his time there.
He is pictured on batting leaders cards in the 1977, 1978 and 1979 Topps sets, which are still quite easily and inexpensively since he is pictured with Larry Hisle and Jim Rice. In 1977, he is pictured with Lee May, who has passed away.
In this request, he signed the 1973 Topps NL Playoffs card, as well as his 1971, 1973 and 1975 Topps cards for his $10 per card fee.
8 comments:
From 1976 to 1981 we was probably the send best player in baseball just behind Mike Schmidt and just ahead of Brett, RIce and Jackson.
I had the chance to meet Foster at a Twinsfest. Super cool and nice guy.
@Crocodile Wow! Do you recall when that was? I was a pretty regular TwinsFest attendee for a while a don't remember him being there. We saw Rollie Fingers, Bob Feller, Phil Niekro, J.R. Richard and Jeff Reardon, but not Foster.
I also met Feller and Fingers there. IIRC Fingers appeared at Fergie Jenkins booth, but Feller set up his own. I met Foster in the waning years of the Dome, but I don't recall the exact year. I think he shared a booth with Andre Dawson. I missed out on Niekro and JR - I don't remember ever seeing them at Twinsfest. However Denny McClain and Bobby Hull also use to set up a booth there.
Wow, I missed out on a lot of guys. The last few years of the dome was my peak of getting autographs at TwinsFest. since my boys were young enough that they were still interested in going and my wife would go with us as well. I miss TwinsFest at the Dome!
Me too. It's hasn't been the same since the move to Target field.
Add Maury Wills to the list of players we met at TwinsFest. Do they even have non-Twins at TwinsFest anymore since it's moved to Target Field?
Totally forgot about Wills, but I met him there too. The last time I was there Fergie Jenkins had his usual table in the basement corridor (it was cold down there). He had Mudcat Grant, Jim Perry, Rollie Fingers and himself signing most of the day. I haven't been to a Twinsfest in years so can't really say if anyone non-Twins still show up. The Dome really was the best place for it.
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