Current Collection - 1970

This year's collection will be a priority, since it portrays the team I first remebering rooting for and watching play on television, in the year I collected my first cards, all those years ago, racing out of kindergarten to arrive home to watch hopefully the last inning or two of each of that year’s World Series games. I can still vividly remember having a certaint feeling (as naive as it may have been) that in rooting for the Orioles that year that there was no way they would lose. For some reason in my young mind, despite the menacing Reds' lineup, the Orioles seemed invincible(obviously I was blissfully unaware of the events just one year prior). Fortunately, it played out just that way as the Orioles wrapped up the Series in five, were crowned champions, and solidified a very pleasant memory that still lasts 40 years later.

I'm now in pretty good shape with this year's collection, just missing a few key pieces, all of which should be fairly attainable (read: affordable) - save for Frank Robinson, who in addition to being a star also has a very high number, and thus is a more rare card, on the back. Front-page sheet looks like this:

LF - Don Buford
CF - Paul Blair
RF - Merv Rettenmund
SS - Mark Belanger
SP - Jim Palmer
RP - Eddie Watt
3B - Brooks Robinson
C - Elrod Hendricks
1B - Boog Powell

Needed on this sheet, in addition to F. Robinson is second baseman Davey Johnson and possibly catcher Andy Etchebarren (need to research if he or Ellie was the primary catcher that season).

Among my favorites there is perhaps an unlikely one, since he's not as well known as many of the many other names - virutally all really - etched forever in Oriole lore: Eddie Watt. Why? His was one of the very first baseball cards I ever got, and can still remember holding it like a precious jewel when I was a young kid, even taping it (gasp! I know...but gasp even greater when you realize I also taped a Roberto Clemente card to the display table) to the wall as you went down the stairs to the cellar, into my "Baseball Card Hall of Fame." Being that he was an Orioles pitcher, from such a great team, I figured then his card must hold quite a high value. While maybe my perception of the card was a little misplaced, particularly in light of many of his teammates, I did later discover when looking back on his career that he was, as one of his cards pronounced on the back, "the ace of the bullpen."

Second sheet so far contains:

IF - Chico Salmon
Mgr - Earl Weaver
Rookies: Fred Beene (P) Terry Crowley (OF)
A.L. Playoff Game 1 - Orioles Win a Squeeer!
TSN 1969 World Series - Game 1: Buford Belts a Leadoff Homer

I also have a card from 1975 that shows the two MVPs of 1970, the A.L. one being Powell (Johnny Bench was the N.L. MVP.)
Rookies

Current Collection - 1969

Fortunate to have a number of cards already in the 1969 set, the first of three dominating years for the Orioles, where they eclipsed the 100-win mark each year, made three World Series appearances, and won one of them. While the memory from this year will well be the deflating five-game Series loss to the Mets, this 109-win regular season team, remains one of the team's and baseball's best of all time.

I don't quite remember how I acquired most of these cards, since the first year I collected as a kid was in 1970. Somewhere over the years I came into the good fortune of being given many from the list below, several of which are the team's prime players, including the starting outfield of Buford, Blair and Robinson, shortstop Belanger, and two aces in Cuellar and McNally. Thus, the sheet currently looks as follows:

LF - Don Buford
CF - Paul Blair
RF - Frank Robinson
SS - Mark Belanger
SP - Mike Cuellar
2B - Dave Johnson
RP - Eddie Watt
OF - Dave May
SP - Dave McNally
RC - Mike Adamson (P) and Merv Rettenmund (OF)

Among the most difficult I anticipate to acquire on the wish list will be those missing in my collection from the starting lineup:

1B - Boog Powell
3B - Brooks Robinson

As well as:

SP - Jim Palmer
C - Elrod Hendricks
Mgr - Earl Weaver

And would very much like this year's special card:

Bird Hill Aces, featuring Tom Phoebus, Jim Hardin, McNally and Cuellar

What about Andy Etchebarren? Was he the catcher this year, and does he have a card for the year?

Also would be nice to add some of the pitching staff, such as Tom Phoebus and Pete Richert. (Were they both still on the team?)