Earlier this year
I resurrected a blog series where I play a variation of the "6 Degrees Of Kevin Bacon" game and connect a random card in my collection to Red Sox All-Star Rafael Devers. Not only am I matching players that have played together, but also those players need to appear in a card set together (it's a lot more difficult when you can't use those journeyman-type players!) How long will it take me to get to Raffy? Let's find out!
We start with a randomly generated card from my collection:
I find it ironic that the first two players I randomly get both have last names starting with the same 5 letters (The first being Joe Pettini). If Andy Pettitte comes up next time, I'm going to seriously question the algorith used at the TCDB.
When this card came out, Pettis was coming off a season where he had won his fifth and final Gold Glove. The speedy outfielder averaged over 30 steals per season over the course of his 11 year career.
Taking a look at the other Rangers cards in this set, I settled on a particular 20 year old who would go on to have a very lengthy and Hall of Fame worthy career:
| Teammates in the 1992 Fleer set |
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In 1992, "Pudge" was in the season of a 21 year career, which is nothing short of remarkable for a catcher. Towards the end of that career, he bounced around teams a lot, but one of those times was a return to Texas, where he got to play with a future member of the Red Sox World Championship team.
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Teammates in the 2010 Topps set
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Kinsler was a Red Sox trade deadline acquisition in 2018, where he provided stability at 2nd base down the stretch. That makes Kinsler our final connection!
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Teammates in the 2018 Topps Holiday set
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Kinsler and Devers earned World Series rings together during that magical 2018 season, making that holiday off-season a merry one indeed!
I might have to turn in my Red Sox Fan card for this, but... when I first read your post title I thought "Rafael Palmeiro played with Pettis on the Rangers. Done." lol
ReplyDeleteThe holiday cards were a nice way to end this.
Degrees of Raffy. I love it.
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