Steve Carlton's 329th Win, August 8, 1987

Press photo and ticket stub from August 8, 1987 game: Minnesota Twins versus the Oakland A's, at the Metrodome. The game was Steve Carlton's 329th and final win in the major leagues. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

Ticket stub for the August 8, 1987 game. (Photo by Mark C. Taylor)

On August 8, 1987, Steve Carlton won his 329th major league game. It would prove to be his final win in the majors. It was Carlton’s only win with the Minnesota Twins. I wish Lefty could have won one more game to finish at 330 instead of 329, but so it goes. Lefty has such a Zen attitude about life, I’m sure he doesn’t care if he finished with 330 wins or 329. 

1987 was a frustrating season for the future Hall of Famer, but Carlton still had moments of brilliance on the mound. Over 4 starts in June for the Indians, Lefty threw 2 complete games, and had a sparkling ERA of 2.56.  

Carlton was traded to the Twins at the deadline on July 31st, and his first start for the Twins came on August 4th, against fellow 300-game winner Don Sutton of the Angels. Sutton won that game, as Lefty surrendered 9 runs in 5 innings.  

But on August 8th at the Metrodome, Lefty turned back the clock and held the Oakland A’s scoreless for 8 innings, needing just 74 pitches to get through 8 frames as he tried for his first shutout since August 15, 1983. In the top of the 9th, the A’s scored 2 runs off Steve, and manager Tom Kelly called on George Frazier to get the final out of the game. Reggie Jackson was pinch-hitting with the bases loaded, and Frazier got him to fly out to left field.  

After the game, Lefty talked to reporter Howard Sinker of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. In a 2017 article, Sinker recounted that he had talked to Carlton before, off the record. Fitting with Lefty’s reputation as a thinking man’s ballplayer, they chatted about Being There, the Jerzy Kosinski novel made into a great film starring Peter Sellers. Sinker thought that Carlton was breaking his decade-long media silence by talking to him, but that wasn’t the case. Carlton actually gave press conferences when he was signed by the Giants and the White Sox in 1986.  

So, what did Steve say about the game? “That felt good...it was frustrating (losing the shutout) I have 3 complete games, but not a game like this, not a shutout for 8 innings. Not even close.” Tom Kelly said of Steve’s performance: “I thought he did an outstanding job.” Kirby Puckett also praised Lefty: “He was going right at the hitters and did his job. He got us off the field real quickly and gave us chances to swing the bat.”  

Lefty struck out Mark McGwire twice for his only strikeouts of the game.  

Pictured is a ticket stub from Lefty’s 329th win, and a press photo from that game, two of the highlights of my Steve Carlton memorabilia collection.  

A Box of 833 Steve Carlton Cards

 

833 more Steve Carlton cards! Woo-hoo!

Carlton's 1983 O-Pee-Chee card, and his 1984 O-Pee-Chee All-Star card, or "Etoile" card.

Lots of French on the back of Steve's 1984 O-Pee-Chee card. Steve is a wine collector, or an "oenophilie." This has to be the only baseball card that mentions wine collecting on the back.

A while ago, I bought a lot of 833 Steve Carlton baseball cards from eBay. I know, more Steve Carlton cards? But these were too cheap to pass up. All of the cards were from the 1980’s, and there were some fun oddities included, like some O-Pee-Chee cards. O-Pee-Chee was a Canadian candy company that had an arrangement with Topps to sell Topps baseball cards in Canada under the O-Pee-Chee name. O-Pee-Chee cards can usually be distinguished from Topps by the thinner, cheaper cardboard they were printed on, and the lighter backs of the cards. Also, from 1970 onwards, O-Pee-Chee cards had text in French! It’s thanks to O-Pee-Chee that I know a pitcher is a “lanceur,” and an outfielder is a “voltigeur.” I hardly ever remember buying packs of O-Pee-Chee during my childhood, or even seeing them for sale, but somehow I’ve ended up with some random O-Pee-Chee cards here and there. I also bought the complete set of 1987 O-Pee-Chee, because the 1987 Topps set is the most beautiful set of cards in the history of baseball cards.

Two extremely similar pictures on Carlton's 1985 Topps Collectors' Series and 1985 Drake's Super Pitchers cards. If I were a batter, I wouldn't feel too confident seeing this picture, since it probably means there's a slider coming at me.

The back of Carlton's 1985 Drake's card. Much easier to read than the awful green of the 1985 Topps cards.

There were some other fun 1980’s oddities, like Carlton’s 1985 Drake’s Super Pitchers card, which was included with Drake’s snack cakes. According to Wikipedia, Drake’s is largely distributed in the Northeast, which explains why I’ve only heard of them because of these baseball cards. Drake’s had some kind of licensing deal with Topps, as their cards used the same backs as Topps did. But the front of the Drake’s cards had different photos from Topps cards, making them a desirable oddity, at least in my eyes. Drake’s cards featured “Big Hitters,” and in 1985 they expanded it to also included some “Super Pitchers,” like Steve Carlton. The 1985 Drake’s cards also featured a red back, rather than the awful green back found on 1985 Topps cards, which made them extremely hard to read.

Cards number 1 and 10 in Star's 14-card Steve Carlton set, from 1987.

The back of card 10, showing Steve's amazing 135-55 record at the Vet in Philly.

There were also two cards from the 14-card Steve Carlton set issued by Star in 1987. Star issued sets of well, star players throughout the 1980’s. I don’t know how these were distributed, if you bought packs that had different players in them, or if you bought sets of the same player, or what. Star had also issued a 24-card Steve Carlton set in 1984. On the back of Carlton card number 10 from the 1987 set, you can see Carlton’s amazing dominance at Veterans Stadium: he was 135-55 at the Vet, for a winning percentage of .711. Wow. The 1987 Star set also features a rare card: Steve Carlton giving a press conference after he signed with the San Francisco Giants in 1986.

Steve Carlton's last card as an active player, his 1988 Fleer card, which is also the only card that shows him with the Minnesota Twins. Steve doesn't look too thrilled with the photographer.

The back of Carlton's 1988 Fleer card. When you pitch for so long that they run out of room on the back of your baseball card.

In this lot there were 121 cards of Carlton’s 1987 Topps card, and 50 of Carlton’s 1988 Fleer card, which was his last card as an active player, and the only card that pictured him with the Minnesota Twins. Even today, in 2021, there’s never been a card commemorating Carlton’s time with the World Champion 1987 Minnesota Twins. Which is kind of surprising, since Topps clearly has no shortage of random cards of retired players. So, Topps, get on that already! Yes, I know, Carlton was out of gas by the time he joined the Twins, and he only won one game for the team, but it was still a World Series-winning team, even if Carlton was left off the postseason roster. At the very least, we need a card commemorating the Twins’ visit to the White House after the World Series, where Carlton was listed in photo captions as an “unidentified Secret Service agent.”

It was a lot of fun to sort through these cards and find the fun oddities contained therein, as I continue my look into the baseball cards of Steve Carlton.