Random Baseball Cards ... Eddie Murray 1989 Donruss Traded #T-12

Eddie Murray 1989 Donruss Traded #T-12

This was our first look at Hall of Famer Eddie Murray in Dodger Blue. "Steady Eddie" was traded by the Orioles to his hometown L.A. Dodgers following the 1988 season, after 13 seasons and 333 home runs with Baltimore. He was 32 at the time, but would remain productive at the plate for the next 5 years, averaging 21.6 HR and 94.4 RBI during that span for the Dodgers (1989 to 1991) and Mets (1991 and 1992). Murray also had stints with the Indians and Angels, and a second-go-round with both the O's and Dodgers before retiring after 21 years in the bigs. He finished with a .287 BA, 504 HR (26th all-time), and 1917 RBI (10th all-time). ... This was the first and only Traded set that Donruss printed to compete with other limited run extended sets like Topps Traded and Fleer Update. Other notable players appearing in this set include Nolan Ryan and Rafael Palmeiro. Apparently, card collectors didn't like Donruss Traded sets because they only included players that were, you know, traded ... [Long pause] ... and not like rookies and stuff, which is what Topps and Fleer were doing. To me, Donruss and Fleer both had it right. If you call it a Traded set, only include traded players; If you want to include non-traded players like rookies, call it an Update set. As for Topps putting non-traded players in their Topps Traded sets? Well, that's an error in my scorebook.