Monster Card Monday: 1946 and 1948 Stan Musial

With his passing, you had to know this was coming.  In fact, I got a few emails this weekend suggesting that Musial be the choice for this week’s Monster Card.  Fortunately, ‘Stan the Man’ made the job easy.

I was picking through my APBA set collection and found a few Musial cards but I eventually asked Mike Bunch, commissioner of the Illowa APBA League and rabid Cardinals fan to pick one out.  Mike’s also big Musial fan and he did him proud.  He picked out two cards based on two of his best seasons.

1946 Great Teams of the Past set

In 1946, Musial not only won his second MVP with the Cardinals but helped them to a World Championship.  Musial dominated NL pitching leading in every major offensive category except homeruns and rbis.  He hit .365 with 124 runs scored, 228 hits, 50 doubles and even rapped 20 triples.  As a result, he led the NL in slugging while only hitting 16 homeruns.

With five 0s and three more 7s, this card is a threat in any era.  Add to that the three 31s, just one 13 and no 24s and this card is a great number three hitter.

1948 All-Time “B” Set

If you like the previous card, Musial’s 1948 card is definitely one to savor.  It’s from his 1948 MVP year.  That was the year he found his power, hitting 39 homeruns.  Again, he led the league in most categories including hitting (.376), rbis (131), hits (230), runs (135), doubles (46), triples (18), slugging (.702) and OBP (.450).

It’s hard for APBA not to be kind to a player with those stats.  Musial received nasty power numbers (1-1-3-6-6) plus a rare 51-7.  It was especially rare in combination with his four 14s.  With this card, Musial has 17 chances to get on base against a D pitcher with the bases empty (not counting the error number).  Probably more daunting, he has 13 on base chances against an A pitcher.

Instead of just displaying the stats for each year, I’m just going to show Stan Musial’s entire career hitting stats.  It’s amazing how consistent he was with the bat.

In case you’re wondering, one Musial card I found from my sets was from the 1962 reprint set (left).  By no means was 1962 Musial’s best year seeing it was towards the end of his career but most APBA players would love to have that card. He was 1-5-6 with a 55-7 and a 26-14.

Thanks to Mike Bunch with his help in choosing these cards.  I’m glad I was able to enlist the help of a Musial fan for this.