Terrible Card Tuesday: 1978 Don Werner

78 Don Werner

This Tuesday, I’m featuring the 1978 APBA card of catcher Don Werner. 

To his credit, Werner lasted seven years in the majors.  He played five seasons for the Cincinnati Reds and two more for Texas Rangers.  Throughout those seven years though, his 1978 season was the only one where he batted more than 100 times. 

That’s not to say the 25-year old Appleton native totally excelled as the backup to Johnny Bench in 1978.  He batted .150 with nary a homer and a .186 slugging percentage.

Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB BB SO BA OBP SLG
1978 Totals 50 37 132 113 7 17 2 1 0 11 1 14 30 .150 .242 .186
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/10/2013.

 

Werner has just one zero and as expected, he doesn’t have a 1 in the second column.  With hit numbers 8-8-8-9-9, that means he has unusual play numbers at 15 and 25. 

Werner did walk 14 times in 1978 and that’s enough for four 14s which increases his offensive value a little bit.  He also garners a 35-22 as a result of getting plunked once. 

Ugly numbers:  11-8, 15-36, 25-38

Say what you want about Don Werner but he can always tell his grandkids that he started 37 games at catcher for a team that had Hall of Famer Johnny Bench on the roster. 

Thanks, Tom Zuppa!

Thomas Nelshoppen

I am an IT consultant by day and an APBA media mogul by night. My passions are baseball (specifically Illini baseball), photography and of course, APBA. I have been fortunate to be part of the basic game Illowa APBA League since 1980 as well as the BBW Boys of Summer APBA League since 2014. I am slogging through a 1966 NL replay and hope to finish before I die.

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