CURT FLOOD - AUTOGRAPHED SIGNED BASEBALL CO-SIGNED BY: JOE TORRE, TONY OLIVA, AL "MR. SCOOP" OLIVER, BOB GIBSON, MIKE TORREZ, DICK "MULE" DIETZ, LOU BROCK, SMOKY BURGESS, ROY HOWELL, BOBBY THOMSON, FRANK BOLLING, ROBIN ROBERTS, RALPH GARR, RICK BOSETTI - HFSID 291297

CURT FLOOD, ROBIN ROBERTS, JOE TORRE, LOU BROCK, BOB GIBSON, BOBBY THOMSON, TONY OLIVA and OTHERS
Toronto Blue Jays baseball signed by 17 players active from the 1950s to the 1980s. Includes 4 members of the Hall of Fame (Roberts, Torre, Brock and Gibson).
Baseball signed: "Robin Roberts" (sweet spot), "Rick Bosetti", "Al Oliver", "Roy Howell", "Dick Dietz", "Joe Torre","Frank Bolling", "Tony Oliva", "Lou Brock", "Mike Torrez", "Curt Flood", "Bobby Thomson", "Bob Gibson", "Smoky Burgess", "Ralph Garr" and 2 unidentified signers. Souvenir baseball imprinted with Toronto Blue Jays logo. In all 17 signers. ROBIN ROBERTS (1926-2010) ranks as the winningest right hander in Phillies history. In his first full season, Roberts won 15 games. In 1950, he helped pitch the Phillies to their first pennant in 35 years, going 20-11. When he won his 20th on the final day of the season at Brooklyn, in a pennant-deciding, 10-inning game, he became the Phillies' first 20-game-winner since Grover Alexander in 1917. He was an All Star 1950-1956 and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1976. Center fielder RICK BOSETTI (b. 1953) played in the Major Leagues from 1976 to 1982, with his best seasons in Toronto (1976-1981). He led AL outfielders in putouts in 1978, and in putouts and assists in 1979. Bosetti achieved his goal of urinating in the outfield of every Major League ballpark. Outfielder/first baseman AL OLIVER (b. 1946) played for 7 ML teams, but is best remembered for his decade with the Pirates (1968-1977) He batted over .300 nine straight times, and is among the Pirates' all-time leaders in doubles, home runs and extra-base hits. He won the NL batting crown with the Montreal Expos in 1982. Oliver was the first player to amass 200 hits and 100 RBI in a season in both the AL and the NL. ROY HOWELL (b. 1953) was a Major League third baseman for 11 seasons (1974-1984), breaking in with the Texas Rangers and finishing his career with the Milwaukee Brewers. He played for the Blue Jays from 1978 to 1980 and was an All-Star in the first of those years. In 2011, he was named manager of the Road Warriors of the Atlantic League, a team that plays exclusively on the road. DICK DIETZ (1941-2004) caught in the National League for eight seasons (1966-1973), mostly for the San Francisco Giants. His best season was 1970, when he hit .300 with 22 homers and 107 RBIs and homered in the ninth inning of the All-Star game. Dietz was involved in one of baseball's most controversial calls in 1968. With the bases loaded, Dietz was apparently hit by a pitch from Don Drysdale, which would have denied Drysdale a fifth straight shutout, tying a record set in 1904. The umpire ruled, however, that Dietz had not tried to get out of the way of the pitch. In an 18-year Major League career beginning in 1961, JOE TORRE (b. 1940) made the All-Star nine times, playing for the Braves (in both Milwaukee and Atlanta), Cardinals and Mets. In 1971 with St. Louis, he was the National League's Most Valuable Player. The versatile Torre caught 903 games, while playing 787 at 1B, 515 at 3B, and two in the outfield. Beginning in 1977, Torre managed the same three teams he had played for. Then, in 1996, he took over the reins of the New York Yankees, leading them to six pennants and four World Championships through 2006. In the first half of the 2007 season, he passed Miller Huggins (1,796) and Casey Stengel (1,851) to become the second longest-reigning Yankees manager (1,862 at mid-season), trailing only Joe McCarthy (2,348 games). Declining a new Yankees contract at a reduced salary, Torre became manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2008, taking the club to the National League Championship series in each of his first two seasons. FRANK BOLLING (1931-2020) played six seasons each with the Detroit Tigers and Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves (1954-1966). A fine defensive second baseman, Bolling won a Gold Glove in 1958 and was an All-Star in 1961 and 1962. When his brother Milt joined the Tigers in 1957, Frank became one of only four pairs of brothers to play middle infield together. (Since then, only Cal and Billy Ripken have done it.) Bolling hit a grand slam homer off Sandy Koufax in 1965.TONY OLIVA (b. 1938), who played 15 seasons (1962-1976) with the Minnesota Twins, retired with 1,917 hits and a .304 career average. An 8-time All-Star, Oliva the only player to win batting titles in his first two seasons, and led the league in hits five times. Oliva was the 1964 American League Rookie of the Year. Arm and knee injuries hobbled Oliva in the latter half of his career, shortening what would probably have been a Hall of Fame career. Outfielder LOU BROCK (1939-2020) spent 20 years in the Majors, the last 16 with the St Louis Cardinals. (The transaction that sent him from the Chicago Cubs to the arch-rival Cardinals in 1964 makes most lists of all-time one-sided trades.) A 7-time All-Star, Brock was baseball's all-time leader in stolen bases from 1974 until1982, with 938. (He remains the all-time National League leader.) He set a major league record by stealing over 50 bases 12 times and a N.L. record with 118 steals in 1974. Brock led the N.L. in stolen bases 8 times. He collected 3,023 hits during his 19-year career and holds the World Series record with a .391 batting average in 21 post-season games for the Cardinals. Only 27 players in baseball history of reached 3,000 Major League hits. Brock entered the Hall of Fame in 1985. MIKE TORREZ (b. 1946) won more than 15 games six seasons in a row (1974-79) for five different teams. The 6'5" Kansan first achieved consistency with the Expos in 1972, winning 16 games. In 1975 with Baltimore, he went 20-9 with a league-leading .690 winning percentage. He was sent to Oakland in the 1976 seven-player trade that brought Reggie Jackson to the Orioles. Torrez won 16 that year (including three straight shutouts) and 17 in 1977 for the A's and Yankees. He helped New York to a pennant with seven straight wins in July and August. He threw two complete-game victories in the '77 World Series against the Dodgers. CURT FLOOD (1938-1997), who roamed the St Louis Cardinals outfield from 1956 to 1969, was one of the best defensive center fieldersof all time, once playing 223 consecutive games without an error. A 3-time All-Star and 7-time Gold Glove winner, he played in all seven games of three World Series for the Cardinals. His challenge to the "reserve clause" was unsuccessful, by a 5-4 vote in the US Supreme Court, but helped pave the way to free agency five years later. BOBBY THOMSON (1923-2010) hit what is perhaps the most famous home run in baseball history. His dramatic "shot heard 'round the world" on October 3, 1951, a three-run, ninth-inning homer off Brooklyn pitcher Ralph Branca, capped the Giants' historic comeback to win the NL pennant. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, the Staten Island Scot hit 24 or more homers six times in his seven full seasons with the Giants. Thomson had a comeback season for the Cubs in 1958, when he hit 21 homers and collected 82 RBI while batting .283. BOB GIBSON (1935-2020) holds the major league record for lowest single-season ERA of 1.12 in 1968, the year he was the National League's Most Valuable Player and Cy Young Award winner. He also won the Cy Young Award in 1970. In his 17-year career, all with the St. Louis Cardinals, Gibson won 251 games including 56 shutouts. He was the first pitcher to strike out at least 200 batters in nine seasons and, in 1974, became the second pitcher in major league history to strike out at least 3,000 batters in a career (he joined Walter Johnson, who first notched 3,000 Ks way back in 1923!). Gibson was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1981, his first year of eligibility. A 6-time All-Star, Forest "SMOKY" BURGESS (1927-1991) caught for six Major League teams (1949-1967). Always a fine hitter, the stocky Burgess became primarily a pinch hitter late in his career, accumulating the second highest total of career pinch hits (145) in Major League history. 1959 was the year in which Burgess caught the famous game in which Harvey Haddix pitched a perfect game for 12 innings, losing 1-0 the to Braves in the 13th. Outfielder RALPH GARR (b. 1945) played 13 seasons for the Braves (1968-1975), White Sox (1976-1979) and Angels (1979-1980). In 1974, Garr led the National League in batting (.353), hits (214) and triples (17) and made the All-Star team. A free-swinging leadoff hitter who enlivened clubhouses with his antics, Garr was nicknamed "the Road Runner" for his base running skill, stealing over 25 bases four times. Fine condition.