Hey Twins fans! This is the sixth post in my series about Minnesota Twins baseball cards. Please share your opinions, stories, comments, and memories below.

1976 Topps

Well, I feel like this entry is a bit of a dud. Few star players and few interesting cards. The 1976 Topps baseball card design is just OK in my opinion. I do like the colored bars on the bottom of the card showing the name of the player and team. I also like the player silhouette, but overall, I can’t say it’s one of my favorite designs. The 1976 set has 660 cards with 28 Twins cards including rookie cards of Dan Ford and Lyman Bostock among others. The images below are courtesy of www.tcdb.com.

MOST OBSCURE PLAYER

I found about half a dozen possibilities for the most obscure Twins player in the 1976 Topps set. After extensive review, my choice is pitcher Jim Hughes.

Hughes was born and raised in California and was drafted by the Twins in the 33rd round of the 1969 draft. He was used primarily as a starting pitcher working his way up through the minor leagues. He debuted in September of 1974, starting two games and completing one. In 1975 and 1976 he was a member of the Twins’ starting rotation. He started 34 games in 1975 and had a winning record of 16-14 pitching 249.2 innings. He had an amazing May of that season being named American League Player of the Month (this was prior to the existence of the separate Pitcher of the Month award). During that magical month he was an incredible 6-0, with five complete games and two of which were shutouts. In the other game he pitched, he entered in the third inning and gave up no runs the rest of the way and picked up the win. What a month!

Hughes went 9-14 in 1976, then pitched only two games in April 1977 before being sent to AAA Tacoma for the remainder of the season. He would pitch two more years in the American minor leagues and one season the Mexican League in 1980. It seems arm troubles ended his career (https://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Jim_Hughes_(hugheji03)). Seems like he was quite the flash in the pan – one great month, but what a month it was.

THE BEST

The Rod Carew #400 is the most valuable Twins card in this set. And I agree it’s probably the best card in the set. It’s an interesting picture of Carew in the dugout with the AL All Star label. Carew has probably the best Twins card in many of the 1970s sets. Boring, I know.

PERSONAL FAVORITE

My favorite Twins card in the 1976 set is the all-star rookie cup card of Disco Dan Ford (#313). That choice may be based solely on the sideburns alone. And is it just me or did athletes, heck maybe even all people, just look way older in the 70s? I feel like Ford looks about 35 in this picture; he was 24.

There you have it folks, a review of the Twins cards in the 1976 Topps set. This is the shortest blog entry in my series. I’m sorry to say I don’t find 1976’s Topps design to be particularly interesting and in my judgment most of the pictures on the cards are dull. If you disagree, please, I would love to see your opinions and comments below. And Go Twins.