In The Cards: 1990 Calgary Cannons

It was the summer of 1990 and life was good for Calgary baseball fans.

If you went to Foothills Stadium to take in a Triple-A game that season, the odds were good that you’d get to see shortstop Omar Vizquel pick a ball out of the infield dirt and fire it over to first baseman Tino Martinez to record an out.

If you were really lucky, you might show up on one of the nights that outfielder Jay Buhner suited up for the Cannons that year.

For those who collected baseball cards, the sports collectibles business was booming.

The Pat Came Back

Pat Casey may have thought he was done with the game of baseball, but the sport had different plans for him.

On a number of occasions, when baseball looked like it offered only dead ends, the Oregon product discovered there was more for him.

The result was a fulfilling career and the realization of a dream he never had.

Hall Monitor

The National Baseball Hall of Fame electorate have had their say.

Adrian Beltre, Joe Mauer and Todd Helton have been deemed worthy for glory in Cooperstown, New York by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA).

A pair of alumni of the Calgary Cannons, meanwhile, will have to wait at least another year before their fate is determined.

In The Cards: 2000 Calgary Cannons

The Cannons were in their second year of serving the parent Florida Marlins and their final few seasons of existence as a minor-league team.

An appearance in the Pacific Coast League (PCL) championship series in 1998 – their third franchise loss in the finals – was barely visible in the rearview mirror.

There were, however, bright spots on the 2000 roster, as we discover in this edition of In The Cards …

OPINION: Five Famed Names for the Canadian Baseball Hall

“You have to know the past to understand the present.”

As we continue to beam about the state of baseball in Alberta, it’s important to acknowledge and celebrate our past.

It’s time for the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame to consider some of the builders who helped bring the Pioneer League and Pacific Coast League to Alberta.

Sweet and Sour Lou

They call him Sweet Lou.

It was a nickname that Lou Piniella earned as a player because of his silky swing.

He later became one of the great managers of the game, although he drew the ire of Calgary Cannons supporters while he managed their parent team, the Seattle Mariners.

Hyers Learning

In order to claim a World Series championship, you have to make the right hires.

For the Texas Rangers – who coaxed manager Bruce Bochy out of retirement with impressive results – that included luring Tim Hyers to the Major League Baseball (MLB) organization.

The NeverEnding Torey

He has all the ingredients of a great manager.

And Torey Lovullo – the long-time skipper of the Arizona Diamondbacks – picked up a lengthy grocery list of those ingredients through his minor-league travels, which included stops in Alberta.

Plum Job

It’s a thankless job, short on accolades and glory.

The medals are bruises and the trophies come in the form of approving nods from the mound.

Author Tim Brown didn’t just focus on catchers for his book with Erik Kratz, The Tao of the Backup Catcher. Instead he examined the guys who don’t get regular at bats or crouch behind home plate every day. It’s these second-string and third-in-line backstops who are the true glue guys in a major-league organization – players like Kratz, who began his professional career with the Medicine Hat Blue Jays in 2002 before donning a mask for nine MLB teams.

In The Cards: 1993 Calgary Cannons

As far as rosters go, the 1993 edition of Calgary’s Triple-A squad was not the best that the Cannons had to offer the Stampede city.

However, they did offer up a new look with some pinstripes.

Take a look back at the roster and the uniforms in our latest In The Cards.