Final Card: Ruben Gomez

Ruben Gomez (#427) was a starting pitcher for the New Your Giants during the 1950s, and later had 2 tours of duty with the Phillies. Gomez had a Topps card every year from 1954 to 1961, then not again until this final card in 1967. Somehow, he got this late-series card on the strength of being on the Phillies roster for a few weeks in April.

After playing for several seasons in Canada, Gomez was signed by the (old) Washington Senators in 1950 and assigned to their Havana, Cuba minor-league team. In mid-1951, he was returned to his previous team.

After the 1951 season, he was drafted from his Canadian team (this time by the Yankees) and assigned to their Kansas City farm team. In mid-1952 he was released.

Finally the yo-yo stopped. Gomez was signed by the New York Giants in January 1953 and spent 6 seasons as one of their starting pitchers. In 1954 he won 17 games.



After the 1958 season, San Francisco traded him to the Phillies for pitcher Jack Sanford. After Gomez left the Phillies, his career crashed and burned. What happened? Maybe he was injured, or maybe it was just being on a bad team.

Ruben spent all of 1959 with the Phillies but only pitched in 20 games (half in relief). He spent most of 1960 and all of 1961 in the minors.

In 1962 he was traded to the Indians, and then to the Twins. When Minnesota released him before the 1963 season, he was quickly re-signed by the Indians, but spent the entire season in the minors.

Before the 1964 season, the Indians shipped him to the Mexican League, where he played for the next 4 seasons, except for a brief stint with the Phillies in April 1967.

Johnny Podres (#284)

Johnny Podres is probably best known for winning 2 games in the 1955 World Series, (including the deciding game 7) to give Brooklyn its only World Series championship.

After 3 seasons in the Dodgers farm system (including 1 with the triple-A Montreal Royals), Podres joined the Brooklyn Dodgers at the start of the 1953 season. At age 20, he was the #5 starter on a staff led by Carl Erskine.

After helping the Dodgers to the World Series championship over the Yankees in 1955, "Pods" missed the 1956 season due to military service. He returned in 1957, and led the league in ERA and shutouts (7). He never won 20 games, but in 1961 his .783 winning percentage was tops in the NL.



Podres never rose above being the #3 starter (first behind Erskine and Don Newcombe, then after returning from the service, behind Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale).

Johnny missed most of the 1964 season, making only 2 starts (both losses). [I've never seen another card indicating that a player was on the disabled list for part of the season.] Podres returned in 1965 as the #4 starter, but pitched far fewer innings than Koufax, Drysdale, and Claude Osteen.

In May 1966, he was traded to the Tigers, and appeared in 36 games (18 starts).

The comment on the back of this card mentions Podres having the lowest ERA among Tigers lefties in 1966. Unfortunately, in 1967 his ERA was higher than 10 other Tigers' pitchers. He was released following the season.

Normally, this would have been the end of Johnny's career, but after being retired for 1968, the expansion Padres signed Podres, and he pitched for one more season.

Johnny went on to be a pitching coach, winding up as the Phillies' pitching coach during Jim Fregosi's managerial tenure (including 1993). Then due to failing health, he cut back to being a part-time minor-league instructor.

Final Card: Bob Buhl

Bob Buhl (#68) began his minor-league career back in 1947, with the White Sox and then the Braves. After 2 years in the service, he made the Milwaukee Braves team in 1953, winning in double-digits for 6 of the next 8 seasons. Those 2 "off-seasons" were not what they appear to be. In 1954 Buhl was used primarily in relief, and in 1958 he appeared in less than a dozen games due to injury.

For most of the 1950s, he was the #3 starter behind the great Warren Spahn and Lew Burdette. Buhl usually gets short-changed by most people nowadays as the washed-up stiff that the Phillies acquired for Fergie Jenkins, but he apparently was quite a good pitcher back in the 1950s.


In April 1962, he was traded to the Cubs, where he continued to win. It wasn't until 1966 that he slowed down. Unfortunately for the Phillies, he was in their employ at the time.

Buhl's last game was on April 30th. The Phillies released him on May 16th, as part of their early-season purge of ineffective, aging relievers that included Ruben Gomez (May 8) and Pedro Ramos (May 31).