Topps Cards That Should Have Been: The 2008 Rookies

 

...well, since blogger took away the ability to caption photos...I guess I've gotta do away with the obvious.

2008 Topps is a weird year in terms of their rookie selection, because there is personnel that appears in Upper Deck sets, premium sets, and even their hobby-exclusive Red Hot Rookie program, and yet still fails to receive a card in actual flagship. 

Alexei Ramirez is one of the biggest rookie stories of 2008, bursting onto the scene in Chicago as a compact little shortstop with a 2.5 WAR, and notching 77 RBIs and 21 home runs, both admittedly career highs, while also coming in second during Rookie of the Year voting. Topps does not give him a rookie card in Update. What they DO give him is a World Baseball Classic short-printed gimmick hidden in the set along with Yasuhiko Yabuta and the set's rookie giant Kosuke Fukudome. All three players were supposed to have regular cards in the flagship set, but were reduced to gimmicks. 

Only Fukudome got an actual Update Series base card. Ramirez did get a card in Update, but it was a World Baseball Classic insert. Meanwhile, Upper Deck was producing base rookies of him like it's nothing. It was a maddening affair that robbed a genuinely good player of an official rookie card.

Not every rookie I made for this project comes off like Ramirez'. Daniel Murphy got an official Topps rookie in 2009's flagship set, but he still appeared in 49 games in 2008, hitting .313 with 17 RBIs in 49 games, which isn't bad at all. Sadly, a lot of this production came after the cutoff, so his chance at a 2008 Topps rookie card dissipated. 

But this one looks nice. The black Mets uniforms were underrated. And it's odd to see someone affiliated with mid-2010s Mets success wearing one. Kinda like how odd it is to see Jose Altuve in 2011-era Astros uniforms. 

We go slightly more obscure for this next rookie.

Ernesto Frieri is best known for his role as the fun-loving Angels closer in 2013, and his eventual trade to Pittsburgh in 2014 for Jason Grilli. Before landing in LA, Frieri was a staple for the Padres' bullpen, and while he didn't debut until 2009, a Spring Training photo does exist from the 2008 season, and by the rules of this project, that totally counts. Topps has based rookie cards on far less. 

So Frieri gets a rookie card in 2008. Because why not?

Similarly present in 2008 Spring Training but absent for most of the actual season was future A's DH and power-hitter Brandon Moss. Moss was among the squad that played overseas for a few games in Spring 2008, as he was being primed for an infield position that would eventually go to Jed Lowrie. 

The reason he doesn't have a 2008 rookie card with Boston, apart from Topps being harebrained and not giving him one after his 2007 debut campaign, is that after 34 games in Boston, Moss was traded to Pittsburgh for Jason Bay. Bay would be an outfield asset and All-Star for Boston, while Moss would continue his utility man role in Pittsburgh, where he would get his 2008 Update rookie card. 

Ian Kennedy has a rookie card with Upper Deck in 2008. As a matter of fact, he's all over Upper Deck's third quarter releases. Perhaps Kennedy was sought as the 'token Yankee rookie' that year, despite not getting a ton of playing time.

Despite his solid 2007 numbers, Kennedy would have an 8.39 ERA in 2008, and eventually be eased out of starting, and the majors. Topps wouldn't produce a card of him in 2009 either, and his 2010 Topps release would technically be his Topps rookie card. By 2010, Kennedy had already been traded to Arizona in the Curtis Granderson deal [but really we should be calling it the Max Scherzer deal at this point], and his career was already burgeoning as an ace in Phoenix.

Unrelated, but I bet Upper Deck would have rendered this entire project meaningless if they'd kept their license after 2009. 

Which leads us back to the 2008 Red Hot Rookie series, one of the charter members of which was Jeff Samardzija, a Cubs reliever with a funky windup and a funkier name. 

Unlike Kennedy, Samardzija's inclusion in this set does not mean he didn't receive any Topps releases in 2008. Topps liked him a lot during the last quarters of 2008, and included him in Finest and Heritage High Number. Yet he did not get a card in Update Series, and would have to wait until 2009 Topps to get an official rookie card [now that I am realizing this, neither did Pablo Sandoval, whom I always assumed has a 2008 Update card I just never pulled. So I guess I have to make one of him now].

Shark's 2008 number certainly would have warranted a rookie card, though. With a 2.28 ERA and 25 strikeouts in 27.2 innings, he was clearly one of the brighter relief options of the competitive 2008 Cubs team. It just stinks that Topps' silly quotas prevented them from actually making a rookie card of him that year.

Those are the 6 newest additions to the Should Have Been series. Now I, admittedly, have to go make a Pablo Sandoval one.