Pop Quiz! And Another Gem...

Time for a quick question...but no worries, I won't keep score and won't tell if you get it wrong.

Here's a quote:

"The trouble with baseball today is that most players are in it for the money; not for the love of it, the excitement of it, or the thrill of it."

These words were spoken by a Hall of Famer near the end of a storied career.  Can you guess who said it?

A) Robin Roberts, in 1965
B) Johnny Bench, in 1981
C) Nolan Ryan, in 1992
D) None of the above

Think it over for a second...and while you're doing that, here's another gem from my collection:

This is a high number from the 1952 Topps set. These usually sell for $150-250 and this one looks great, especially when you consider some of the other cards I've already shown here. I purchased this card for $4 and from a brick-and-mortar hobby store. Would you like to know how?

It appears the store owner didn't check to see what the number was. Since the back had damage from being placed in a scrapbook -- there's both missing paper and extra paper -- he priced it according to how the front looked. There really was no excuse, as he merely needed to scan one of the catalogs he kept on hand for Hearn's name.

That was quite a surprise when I took it home and went to look at my own checklist.

Now for the answer to the question above:

The answer is...D) None of the above.

The quote was a statement made by Ty Cobb in 1925! So when somebody tries to tell you about how players were more into baseball for the love of the game during the 1950s/'60s, you can tell them that as long as players needed to pay their bills...money has been an issue in the sport. For what it's worth, even when the game was an amateur sport during the 1800s, there were certain players who had "agreements" with club owners where they would be given a job title and salary with the owner's business specifically in exchange for filling a roster slot on the baseball club.

I guess the saying is true; the more things change, the more they stay the same.