Almost a decade ago I was hired into a super interesting role. I worked at it and did well. We were able to expand and the number of positions ahead of my role grew from two to three. I slotted into the newly opened spot, brought in a replacement for my old role, and generally saw things go well.
One day, a flurry of hushed meetings took place down the hall. One of the other two guys on my team had just informed the other that he was jumping ship for a better offer. I found out about my taking over the outgoing guy’s chair when our CIO texted me this image during a meeting:
It’s a professional origins story as old as dirt. The Mummy’s Rick O’Connell becomes a commander in the French Foreign Legion when his CO is seen running away in the background. I stepped up a rung when a coworker bailed for the opportunity to run a rival organization, and the Cleveland Indians’ Ray Boone got his chance to start a family baseball dynasty when Lou Boudreau took a break from the player part of “player-manager.”
The fact that makes the Boudreau to Boone transition so memorable is that Boudreau was a shortstop and the latter was an outfielder. Despite what Mookie Betts is currently doing for the Dodgers, the outfield to shortstop route to success is not something you often see. Looking at these stats, it seems like Cleveland executed a pretty successful handoff of responsibilities.
As with almost anyone in new role tasked with replacing a Hall of Famer, there was a bit of drop-off in production. Boone’s tenure with the Indians was marked with roughly replacement level batting and decent but not overwhelming defensive skill. His performance markedly improved after being dealt to the Tigers in a 4:4 swap in 1953. He thrived in the Motor City, seeing his home run production triple (Brady Anderson, anyone?) while racking up 18 WAR inside of 5 years. By 1955 he was the American League leader in RBIs.
Boone Cards
Before turning to my ’52 Topps Ray Boone card, I want to take a moment to highlight another interesting bit of cardboard. While Boone’s family can be traced back to the pioneer Daniel Boone, the downstream end of his line extends to his grandchildren Aaron (current Yankees manager), Bret (Rangers coach), and Matt (former minor league manager).
Ray’s son is Bob Boone, a catcher with decidedly Hall of Pretty Good credentials. Now, many catchers get one or two cards in their careers featuring them chasing down a pop-up. Boone does so in the 1983 Topps release, but does so with a little more going on in the picture. Not only are we treated to a skyward looking catcher who has just thrown his mask into the dirt, but the batter as well taking in the same sight. The visual affect of the card is amplified by the empty area of the bleachers, almost as if fans were scrambling away from a ball that will soon return in flames from a visit to the upper atmosphere.
The Ray Boone card residing in my 1952 Topps set is shown below and was issued when future catcher Bob was 4 years old. The card is one of the names in the checklist where there is a distinct difference in color quality on the front between red and black backs. My black back version has more muted tones than is usually seen, particularly in the yellow background. There is some notching just above the name “Raymond” on the back indicating this example spent some time in some kids’ rubber-banded stack of cards.
Looking at my completion chart, it seems my Indians team set is now more than 80% complete. It helps that the team checklist keeps its stars out of the high number series and is filled with a ton of underrated guys like Ray Boone.
