First Card Friday: 1978 Lou Whitaker (RoY)

I think every true baseball fan has those special moments with their favorite team. I’m not necessarily talking about championships and unique experience, though those are certainly important. I’m talking about the moments spent in your backyard, in the neighborhood with friends, or playing Little League ball when a favorite player is mimicked. I did this with my 1980s Detroit Tigers teams. I remember standing on a tennis court with my brother playing one-on-one baseball and imitating the star players on those teams. In my impersonation arsenal, I had Lance Parrish, Alan Trammell, Darrell Evans, Chet Lemon, Kirk Gibson, and Lou Whitaker.

It was so much fun watching Lou Whitaker in my boyhood days. He was a slick-fielding second baseman with the arm of a third baseman, who developed a potent power bat as he aged. Whitaker was a five-time All-Star, three-time Gold Glove Award winner, four-time Silver Slugger Award recipient, 1984 World Series Champion, and 1978 Rookie of the Year. Sweet Lou received 75% of the AL Rookie of the Year Award votes, beating out Hall of Famers Paul Molitor and Alan Trammell.

This first APBA card reflects a time when it was impressive for a middle infielder to hit .285 as a rookie with minimal power and defensive skills. The voters probably saw Whitaker’s potential and contributions to the Tiger organization’s new direction. Overall, this card seems pretty accurate. I project it to produce a .281 average and collect seven steals with its second-column 11s. Though this card won’t hit for power, it will get on base at a nice clip with four 14s. Whitaker’s .361 OBP makes this a solid card.

For most of his career, Whitaker was the Tigers leadoff hitter. He was an effective leadoff man, excellent at drawing walks (averaging 81 BB per 162 games), quick and smart on the bases though not much of a base stealer, and able to drive the ball with power to all fields, especially the right field overhang at Tiger Stadium. He is only one of nineteen players to hit a ball over the roof in right field at Tiger Stadium. In his 19-year career, Whitaker batted .276 with 244 home runs, 1,084 RBI, 1,386 runs, 2,369 hits, 420 doubles, 65 triples and 143 stolen bases in 2,390 games. Defensively, he recorded a .984 fielding percentage playing every inning of his career at second base. He retired following the 1995 season as part of the longest running double play combination in Major League history.

In 1985, Whitaker set a record for Detroit second basemen with 21 homers. That doesn’t seem impressive by today’s standards, but remember, in the 1980s a middle infielder with 20+ homer power was rare. In 1986, Whitaker was a member of a Detroit infield in which every member hit at least twenty home runs. Though the Tigers finished 8.5 games behind the Boston Red Sox, it was a fun summer to watch the boys in the old English D. Lou Whitaker hit a career-high 28 home runs in 1989, one of four times he reached the 20-HR mark, upping his record for the most homers in a season by a Tiger second baseman. Whitaker now shares the season record with Ian Kinsler, who hit 28 bombs for Detroit in 2016. The 1983 season was arguably Whitaker’s best when he was an All-Star and hit .320 with twelve home runs and seventeen steals for the emerging Tigers.

In 1992, Whitaker became only the second second baseman to play 2,000 games, hit 200 home runs, and collect 2,000 hits. Joe Morgan was the first. With modern metrics, he grades out as the 11th or 12th best second baseman in baseball history, somewhere between Ryne Sandberg and Roberto Alomar. Anyone who studies baseball history knows that Lou Whitaker should be in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Unfortunately, he was snubbed again by the Modern Baseball Era Committee in 2020. In response, the Detroit Tigers plan to retire Whitaker’s number 1 in August 2020, as they do for many of their Hall of Fame players. Pandemic aside, it’s a fitting tribute to a player who will always be number 1 in my mind…and on the tennis court.