Welcome to my review of the 1978 Topps baseball card set and the Minnesota Twins. There really are not any Twins superstars in this set other than Rod Carew. It’s easy to see how the Twins weren’t world beaters in the late 1970s.

In my judgment, the 1978 Topps baseball card design is one of their better designs during the late 1970s. I like the script team name in the lower left corner, the small baseball in the upper right corner listing the player’s position, and the player’s name at the bottom of the card in plain black. It’s a straightforward design that works well in my opinion. It’s not busy and the result is a focus on the player picture. There are 726 cards in the set with 28 Twins cards.

My focus here is on Twins cards, but I will mention the set has the rookie cards of two local boys who later played for the Twins, each of whom were inducted in the Hall of Fame – Jack Morris and Paul Molitor. Each shares their rookie cards with three other players. The Molitor card famously includes a second Hall of Famer, Alan Trammell.

MOST OBSCURE PLAYER

During a preliminary review, I narrowed it to five options of who could be the most obscure Twin in 1978 Topps set, but four of those players played four years or more. While not great or even good, those four did manage to play at least four years in Major League Baseball. Bob Gorinski only played one season and he has only one Topps card, so he seems the obvious choice as the most obscure Twins player represented in the 1978 Topps set.

Gorinski was a first-round pick of the Twins in the 1970 draft out of high school in Pennsylvania. He was picked 22nd ahead of a couple relief pitching Hall of Famers – Goose Gossage and Bruce Sutter – who were each chosen a round later.

Gorinski slowly worked his way up the Twins’ minor league system. Baseball Reference shows he played part of the 1975 for the White Sox AAA affiliate, but I cannot find details on how he got there. In 1976 he was back with the Twins AAA affiliate in Tacoma. According to Wikipedia, Gorinski led his league in home runs in 1970, 1972, 1974, and 1976. Seven years after being drafted, Gorinski finally debuted with the Twins on April 10, 1977. He played 54 games that season as a backup corner outfielder. He batted an underwhelming .195/.226/.322 and hit three home runs. He never appeared in Major League Baseball after that season.

THE BEST

Here we go again with the obvious choice of Rod Carew as the best card in this set. There just are not a lot of Twins stars in this era.

But is Carew’s card really the choice as best Twins card in the set? What if there is a 1978 Topps Twins card showing a rookie who might make and probably should make the Hall of Fame? Shouldn’t that card be the best Twins card of the 1978 set? Well, I believe Lou Whitaker should and will make the Hall of Fame someday. Yes, he never played for the Twins, but he does share his rookie card with Sam Perlozzo of the Twins and two others. Anytime you have a rookie card of a Hall of Famer or potential Hall of Famer, you have to say that’s a special card. We’ll see if Mr. Whitaker is ever selected.

The Perlozzo/Whitaker rookie card is my choice for best Twins card of the set.

PERSONAL FAVORITE

I have two options for my personal favorite Twins cards in the 1978 Topps set.

I have an autographed Dave Goltz card in my collection. Anytime I have a signed card, it’s got to be in the running for a personal favorite card of mine in any particular set.

However, I’m going in a different direction for my 1978 selection as my personal favorite card. Gene Mauch was a backup infielder for nine MLB seasons and six franchises. He later had an extensive managerial career of 26 years. His 1978 Topps card shows pictures of him as a player and many years later as the manager of the Twins. I love that the back of the card has his statistics as a player. I can’t say with certainty, but suspect this will be the only time in my blog series about baseball cards where I will select a manager as my favorite Twins card of that year.

I would say the 1978 Topps set is better than 1977, which I deemed better than 1976. What do you all think? Does anyone have any memories of Bob Gorinski? I would love to see your opinions and comments below.

Go Twins.