#21T Rick Cerone

CARD

Well there are two insanely crazy things about the photo on this card:

1) We have an up-the-nose photo of a player! Are you kidding me???

2) We have a photo featuring a catcher going after a popup, and someone on the card is discarding their face mask, and it's NOT the catcher! It's the umpire!

STAT

From 1981 to 1991, Cerone was by far the part-time-iest player in the big leagues, registering far more seasons with 200 to 300 AB than anybody else.

CAREER

Cerone is one of those guys whose impact went far beyond his stats. Offensively, he was not very good. True, in his only season with 500 AB, he had a very nice 107 OPS+, but he didn't hit well enough in any other season to warrant so much playing time. He also had a number of years with an OPS+ below 65 (ouch.) But he stayed in the big leagues for a long time, a sure sign that he was of value to his teams. After his playing career, among numerous other things, he founded the Newark Bears, a prominent independent team.