no. 413 - pat kelly

Who is the man: Pat Kelly spent the 1970 season with the Royals. He was traded to the White Sox on Oct. 13, 1970.

Can ya dig it: One of the stranger cards in the 1971 set. How they got Kelly to pose with his cap that far up his head I don't know. Also, he is shifted so far down (to obscure the Royals script on his jersey) and so far to the right (to get the signature in there) that the entire card looks out of kilter.

Right on: Kelly is featured on his 1970 Topps with a blacked out cap. He doesn't appear on his own card with a cap with a logo until the 1972 set (He is wearing a K.C. logo on his 1969 Topps card, but he shares that with two other players on a rookie stars card).

You see that cat Kelly is a bad mother: Kelly had been in the majors for 10 years already when he won fame as one of the Orioles' platoon hitters in 1979. He hit .364 in three games for the O's against the Angels in the ALCS.

Shut your mouth: In an article by Skip Hollandsworth of the Dallas Times Herald, he relayed a conversation between Kelly and manager Earl Weaver. Kelly asked Weaver if he could use his office to hold chapel. After Weaver said yes, Kelly said, "Don't you want to join us?" Weaver responded with "Hell, no."

Kelly persisted: "But Earl, don't you want to walk with the Lord?"
Weaver said: "I'd rather have you walk with the bases loaded."

No one understands him but his woman: Kelly is the first of three Pat Kellys to make the major leagues.

(A word about the back): A word about the "total bases" column. I'm so used to RBI following HR that it's jarring to see a stat splitting up the two. Hell, baseball-reference.com doesn't even do that.