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Monday, February 18,1991
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Alan Lehmann
Sports Editor
eakness for cardboard.
I’ve even driven 500 miles to get free
laseball cards at a Texas Rangers game.
Crazy things.
But I haven’t been this way for long.
A little over a year ago, I thought
aseball card collecting was stupid. I
ised to laugh at others who spent big
ucks on thin cardboard slices, and I
/owed that the sickness would never
itrike me.
Last year it did. Stuck in my
mmetown over Spring Break, I decided
to check out the baseball card shop near
tny house, just for laughs.
But I wasn’t laughing long. I had
always been a big baseball fan, and I was
suddenly surrounded by cards of all my
favorite players. I bought a Rangers
learn set, 1990 Fleer.
I didn’t realize until later that the five
v bucks 1 spent on it was an outrageous
1C jrice. But I didn’t care, I still wanted to
' ^ lave Rangers cards to admire.
So I started hanging around the card
bhop, and by the end of the week, I was
iv have enc. 100 k e( i j bought a Ruben Sierra rookie
quences, s: :arc [ (jggy fleer) and a couple of boxes
HU ! a n ' eeE of 1990 cards, trying to put together
lation for it pi eer an d Score sets.
:e - | My obsession started innocently
comes n® I enough, as I opened each pack of cards
lmquencvar| s | ow |y anc j exam i ne d each card. I
or, she saw [ enjoyed looking at the pictures and
examining the statistics on the backs.
•e reported:
University
ired 23 pte
iren
Rude awakening
, But then I bought my first Beckett
, /;) smu Baseball Card Magazine, the ‘bible’ of
abused.
j from page
lore Klim
int to see
mother pro
late stuoeit
mew how i(|
t the troop'
ed. “Does!
rt the war,oi
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rom pagel
baseball card price lists and checked the
alue of my newfound treasures. I
ooked on in horror as I saw that most of
the cards that I had just shelled out for
ivere worth next to nothing in the
of the regP- ? Beckett guide. *n
Thinking it was a mistake, I took the
ards that I had duplicates of back to the
laseball card shop, hoping to swap some
if them for more Sierra cards. I had all
the good cards, a Dwight Gooden, a Jose
Canseco, a Cal Ripken and two Bo
s to work tl Jacksons.
the soldiej I was dismayed when the card dealer
hook his head and told me my cards
were worthless.
“I’ll give you a quarter each for the
Bos,” he said, “but I’ve got plenty of the
others.”
I protested that the Bo cards were
worth almost a dollar each in Beckett,
but to no avail. He just pointed to a stack
of Bos and said he already had more
than he can use.
A couple of little boys — they couldn’t
have been older than 10 — laughed at
my ignorance.
“Rookie cards are the only ones that
are worth anything,” one of them said.
"Don’t ya know anything?”
I didn’t, but I soon learned. I rounded
up some rookie cards — a player’s first
card in a regular issue set is his rookie
card — and took them in for trade. I
didn’t get as much in return as I had
hoped for, but I got enough to wet my
appetite.
jeed of the
inability to
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ind not see
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;r searches
ice Depart-
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Rookie Fever
I had rookie fever. I ripped through
packs of cards, seeking the all-important
rookies and tossing all others into a pile.
Blinded by greed, I no longer cared
about cards with beautiful pictures or
thrilling stats. Heck, I even lost interest
in Ranger cards.
All I cared about was getting more
rookies so that I could trade them in for
more packs of cards so that I could get
more rookies.
But, one day I looked around my
room at the hundreds of crumpled up
wrappers and realized that I had gone
too far.
I told myself that I would sell my
valuable cards and stop this foolishness.
So I took my rookies down to the card
shop, and got a rude suprise.
The dealer wouldn’t pay as much for
'ookies, even though they had gone up
n Beckett. It seemed that everyone else
as selling their best cards too and there
is a glut on the market.
(Dejected, I looked down at a basket
l of commons — cards that have little
to value because they are in short
tand — and spotted a Geno Petralli
marked for only a nickel,
re Ranger catcher had always been a
nental favorite of mine,
e Bob Uecker, Petralli has survived
major leagues for a long time with
sible talent. Furthermore, he once
’ for Dr. Pepper, just like my dad.
1 a collection of his cards, and
tat I could get a dozen of them
x»r a hot rookie,
care that Petralli’s cards are
hing to other collectors, I
t to sell them. And even if the
IN Rrd industry falls apart
THE v > I’ll still enjoy having them.
Sports
7
The Battalion
Sports Editor
Alan Lehmann
845-2688
Aggie tracksters
improve, still fall
By Douglas Pils
The Battalion
FORT WORTH — In keeping with the
plan for the 1991 Southwest Conference
Indoor Track Championships, Texas
A&M’s track and field teams improved
upon last year’s performance, while Arkan
sas and Texas ran away with the men’s and
women’s titles, respectively.
Finishing fourth, the Aggie men’s team
slipped a notch from last year’s perfor
mance, but their 53 points was a five-point
improvement from a year ago. Arkansas
won its 11th straight indoor championship
with 151 points as it heads to the Southeast
ern Conference next year.
Baylor was second with 93 points on the
strength of its 4x400 relay team and Texas
was third with 60 points.
The women’s team took fifth place, an
improvement from sixth last year, with 30
points. Juniors Gwen Buck and Amy Paul
sen paced the Aggies with second-place fin
ishes in the high jump and the shot put.
Buck cleared 5-8 3/4 as senior Sandra
Hines, who went in as the meet favorite,
was scratched from the with an in
jury.
Paulsen, a freshman from Norfolk, Ne
braska, tossed the shot 48-2 to surprise the
.field.
Texas won it’s seventh straight women’s
title with 141 points, followed by Arkansas
with 80, Baylor with 76, Houston with 67
and A&M
Placing three hurdlers in the top four of
the men’s 55-meter hurdles turned out to
be the Aggies’ highlight of the finals, which
were held on Saturday.
Senior Richard Bucknor, running in his
last SWC meet, started slow but finished the
last three hurdles strong for his third con
secutive championiship in 7.32 seconds. Ar
thur Smith of Baylor took the second spot,
but senior Greg Williams and junior Nic
Pollard finished third and fourth with times
of 7.40 and 7.41, respectively.
Bucknor, who transfered from Central
Arizona Junior College and hails from
Kingston, Jamaican, said he wasn’t real
happy with the race, but he’s glad it’s over.
“It wasn’t the best race I could’ve run,”
Bucknor said. “My start wasn’t that good
and I was slow over the first couple of hur
dles, so I had to work hard on the last few
hurdles.
“Fm happy it’s over. My coach in high
school went to Texas, so I feel good about
being able to go back and tell him that I
won five SWC championships.”
Pollard said that while he was pleased
with the race, things could’ve gone better.
“I felt pretty good,” Pollard said. “It’s ex
citing to see everyone do well, but it could
have been better if (Ricky) Barker had
made it to the finals.”
Barker, a decathlete in the outdoor sea
son, finished seventh in the long jump and
just missed qualifying for the finals after
making it to the semifinals.
Aggie head coach Ted Nelson, coaching
in his first SWC championship after the re
tirement of longtime coach Charlie
Thomas, said the teams over-acheived their
goals but some golden opportunities were
missed.
“We did good and even did a little better
than we thought,” Nelson said. “But with a
little bit here and there we could have done
better.
“We missed a few chances in the pole
vault, I was dissappointed with the nigh
jump and we were close in the 600 yard
dash and the 400 meters. Those are all
small things, but if you add those things, we
could have been third.”
Nelson praised the efforts of the wom
en’s team, especially Paulsen’s shot put.
“Amy Paulsen competed very well in the
shot against some really tough competi
tion,” he said. “They did good, we just need
to move up a couple of notches.
Other Aggies scoring points were:
Women
Long Jump — Sheryl Pavelka, Jr-2L,
fifth, 19-2.
Shot Put — Robin Westbrook, Jr-2L,
sixth, 43-0 3/4.
5000 M — Michell Byrne, Fr-HS, sixth,
17:34.74.
3000 M — Melissa Weaver, Jr-1L, fourth,
9:47.49.
800 M — Ginger Hoot, Jr-2L, sixth,
2:17.3.
55 hurdles — Kalleen Madden, So-IL,
KARL STOLLEIS/The Battalion
A&M runner Richard Bucknor clears the final hurdle of his collegiate indoor
career. Bucknor garnered the only Aggie victory at the Southwest Conference
Indoor Track Championships Saturday in Fort Worth.
fourth, 8.26.
4x400 relay — Kina McMillian, Jr-2L,
Pavelka, Kafi Carter, Fr-HS, and Stacy
Stuart, Fr-HS, sixth, 4:04.72.
Men
Pole Vault — Dan Signorelli, Jr-2L, sec
ond, 16-10 1/4.
Long Jump — Kevin Sims, Sr-2L, sixth,
23-8.
Shot Put — Steve Collier, Sr-IL, fourth,
56-11 1/4.
High Jump — Lee Pool, Fr-HS, sixth, 6-
11 3/4.
600 yard — Mike Miller, So-Sq, fourth,
1:10.45, Rick Smith, So-1L, sixth, 1:13.34.
400 M — Howard Davis, Sr-2L, fourth,
47.72.
55 M — Kary Vincent, Sr-Sq, third, 6.33.
4x400 relay — Richard Murphy, Fr-HS,
Miller, Davis, Ray Griffiths, Jr-2L, fourth,
3:15.04.
No. 14 Aggies sweep NLU; improve to 7-2
JAY JANNER/The Battalion
NLU’s Jay Nelson (1) tries to convince the umpire that A&M’s Sittichoke Huckuntod is out at second base, while Tim
Fiene awaits the call. Huckuntod safely stole the base Friday at Olsen Field and the Aggies won 13-2.
By Steve O'Brien
The Battalion
The boys of summer got a taste of Old
Man Winter Saturday afternoon, and for
the Aggies it was a feast.
A&M gobbled up Notheast Louisiana in
both games of a twinbill in front of 979 fans
at Olsen Field as the temperature dropped
to 50 degrees. A driving rain delayed the
opener an hour and nine minutes.
A&M head coach Mark Johnson was
pleased with how his team responed to the
challenge.
“We’re talking about a positive reaction
to a negative situation,” Johnson said. “To
night I thought our guys did a real good job
with that.”
The two victories on Saturday completed
a three-game sweep of NLU after a 13-2
victory in the series opener Friday night.
The Aggies pushed their record to 7-2
and NLU dropped to 3-5.
A&M hosts Westmont College today and
Tuesday to conclude the eight-game home-
stand. Both games start at 3:00 p.m.
In the opener Saturday, A&M righ-
hander Steve Hughes got the win and
evened his record at 1-1. He came out of
the bullpen in the fifth inning to relieve
starter Jason Bullard as the Aggies won 8-5.
Hughes threw five shutout innings, giv
ing up four hits and striking out five.
“I thought it was an outstanding perfor
mance by (Hughes),” Johnson said. “I made
it a point to tell the team I thought he did a
greatjob.”
Even though the Aggies were behind
when Hughes entered the game, he wasn’t
worried.
“I had confidence in our hitters that they
were going to come back and win it for us,”
Hughes said. “I just went out there and
tried to shut them down.”
A&M equalled its season high with 13 hits
in the game, but they still had to come from
behind to win.
NLU had built a 5-2 lead after four in
nings before a three-run fifth brought the
Aggies back.
During the comeback, Aggie right fielder
Dan Robinson drove in two runs on a two-
out double and finished the game 3-for-4.
“That’s a positve,” Robinson said. “Every
chance we get we need to come back like
that.” •
“The ball just looked a little bigger today.
Hopefully it’ll stay big the rest of the sea
son.”
The Aggies took the lead in the sixth
with a RBI single off the bat of second base-
man Sittichoke Huckuntod.
“That was a real boost for us,” Johnson
said. “We got some clutch hitting and when
we had a man on second base we seemed to
make something happen. It’s encouraging.”
In the nightcap, right-hander Jason Hut
chins threw a seven-inning complete game
shutout to lead A&M to 4-0 victory.
Hutchins got his first decision of the sea
son, making his his record 1-0.
Leading the offense for A&M were cen
ter fielder Brian Thomas and shortstop Ja
son Marshall.
Marshall went 2-for-3, pounding an RBI
double in the second inning to start the
scoring for A&M.
Thomas scored on Marshall’s double,
and in the fourth inning Thomas hit a solo
home run over the right field wall to make
A&M’s lead 3-0. Robinson drove in the final
run of the game with a sacrifice fly in the
fifth.
In Friday night’s action, A&M starter
Ronnie Allen allowed only one run in seven
innings of work, as the Aggies bit into NLU
pitching with a 13-hit attack. With the vic
tory, Allen goes to 2-0 and improves his
ERA to 1.29.
3-for-4 with two RBI’s and designated
hitter David Rollen drove in two runs with a
double in the fifth inning.
In one inning of work, left-hander Jay
Hogue allowed one run and right-hander
Chris Messick closed the game in the ninth.
The Aggies’ weekend feeding frenzy
comes after a disappointing two-game split
with Southwest Texas earlier in the week.