Boys and their Balls - Part 49

Baseball Cards

Here's another in my series of real and fake baseball cards.  I've taken the real cards and, with a bit of Photoshop legerdemain, I've substituted a different real photo of the player.  It's just not the type that you'd normally see on a baseball card.

A real card.  Bob Allison (above) was a rookie for the Washington Senators in 1959.

My fake card, using a real photo of Allison in 1959 with Hal Griggs and Harmon Killebrew off to the right.  (I confess I colorized the image.)   And what's that peeking out of Allison's shirt down there?

Hanley Ramirez played for the Miami Marlins in 2010.

My fake card shows a 2010 photo of him, discreet compared to some other players you'll see later.

Jose Bautista played for the Toronto Blue Jays in 2012.

And the ESPN Body Issue featured him that year.

Jose Reyes played for the Mets in 2011.

And he made the 2011 ESPN Body Issue.

In 2014, Prince Fielder was with the Texas Rangers.

And he was in the ESPN Body Issue that year.

Delino Deshields played for the Cleveland Indians.

And he took this selfie.

Matt Festa was a pitcher for the Seattle Mariners.

But he's pitching something else in this selfie.

We end with Aroldis Chapman, relief pitcher for the New York Yankees.  His pitches were very high velocity, known in baseball as "heat."

And here he is working up some heat.  You can't see all of his face, but that's him – positively identified by his tattoos.

I never collected baseball cards as a kid, but I would have if they looked like this.