"I like playing for Oakland. They have a very colorful uniform."
Rickey Henderson had a knack for giving hilariously obvious comments, but there's truth to be found in the deceptively simple statement above. He started his career playing for the Athletics: he wore the uniform for six years, then returned to Oakland in 1989 for another four year tenure. By the end of his career he'd end up playing for nine different teams, but the A's are undeniably where his legend shined most luminously. The drab colors of the Yankees uniform that he wore in between appearances for the A's not only made him look old, it made him look slow. He wasn't - his feats in the hitting and base stealing departments were no less impressive during his time in New York - but something about batting for the Bronx Bombers took a little of his shine away. He just didn't seem as iconic wearing both uniforms the way Reggie Jackson did; in fact I'd say the only guy who belonged on the Yankees less was Wade Boggs. I prefer my Rickey looking like a green and gold cheetah, or a streak of yellow moving almost imperceptibly from one base to the next. And their "colorful" uniform blended in pretty well with several classic sports card designs from the legendary first decade of Henderson's career. As such, here are the 10 coolest looking cards released in the 80's, while Rickey baby was still leaving cleat marks in California.
THE 10 COOLEST RICKEY HENDERSON CARDS AS A PLAYER FOR THE OAKLAND A'S IN THE 1980'S
10. 1984 Topps
"If you watch a pitcher's move and get a good jump, sometimes you don't have to run as hard and it's easier to steal second."
Indeed, Rickey looks here like he's ready to stroll to second. Then again Rickey strolling is probably the same speed as a regular player running! The Topps '84 was a classy design, a full-length action shot complimented by a window close-up shot of the player. Rickey's white uniform goes great with the borders, and the green font spelling the team name down the side of the card is parallel with the slightly-inclined runner, accentuating him in the act of getting ready to claim another base in the name of history. Would have scored more points if we could have gotten a frontal shot like the classic Mattingly rookie card, but at least the ladies can appreciate it.
9. 1984 Donruss
"I'm a walking record."
You know Rickey's got to have some great cards if his '84 Donruss, one of the best looking series of the decade, is so low in this top 10. Although he's offering a winning smile, somehow the sterile portrait shots don't work for this man of action. Not to mention the fact that we're missing most of the uniform. What we can see however is the confidence of a champ, one that can justify the years of talking himself up (and talking TO himself). There's nothing wrong with believing you're a great ball player if that helps you make it a reality, which in Rickey's case it obviously did. There's also a wholesomeness in his expression that makes you long for the days of old fashioned gentleman-ly baseball, when players looked friendly and weren't trying to come off as the most hardcore guy on the field. And goddamn if Rickey doesn't have a million dollar smile to win you over. It's unquestionably the visage of a future Hall of Famer who's ready to go out there and do his thing while simultaneously charming the basemen and pitchers he's about burn.
8. 1983 Donruss
"A player can steal as many bases as he wants to. The question is whether he wants to."
I like this card because you can see two things happening in the image that are easily taken for granted in an all-star as successful as Rickey Henderson: focus and uncertainty. From his face you can see that he's concentrating hard on what's happening in the game, but his body language betrays his indecisiveness in taking that base. That's not a flaw in his athletic ability, it's actually the reason he became such a legendary runner. No player in the game has ever been as hungry for dirt as Rickey, but he didn't collect all those stolen yards of ballpark by moving heedlessly between the bags. He read the opponents' defense, their bluffs, their reaction time, and only then made a decision whether or not to go for the steal. As I said, Rickey was such a superman and a cock-sure player that this ability is often overlooked, but it's this method of deduction that defined his career - the perfect balancing of determination and hesitation.
7. 1989 Topps (traded)
"I found that if I squatted down real low at the plate, I could see the ball better. I also knew it threw the pitcher off...Last year Ed Ott of the Angels got so frustrated because the umpire was calling balls that would've been strikes on anybody else that he stood up and shouted at me, 'Stand up and hit like a man!' I guess I do that to people."
Here he is, back in the uniform he was meant to wear after his stint with the Yankees during his dynamite half-season in '89 in which his 52 steals and 72 hits helped lead Oakland to a 'Series sweep of the Giants. His card from the proper '89 Topps series in Yankee blue did a fine job portraying him hustling to score at home, but what really needed to be focused on this year was Rickey on the other side of the plate: .400 average in the postseason (for which he was named MVP of the AL Championship), a record 126 walks (hey, you gotta know when not to swing) and a stunning .895 average in the Series (he also became Nolan Ryan's 5,000th strikeout victim - not a boast-worthy achievement but as Rickey said, "It's just another paragraph for me in the baseball books!") So when Topps reissued his card in their traded set, we got to see him not only looking lean and tight in his old uniform but in his signature batting stance.
6. 1983 Topps
"They kept that shit a secret from me. I wish they had told me. My God, could you imagine Rickey on 'roids? Oh, baby, look out!"
The '83 Topps set was, I believe, the best designed series of the 80's, incorporating the most shapes and colors into its scheme without being over-complicated. What you get in this great shot of Rickey is the sleekness and power in his hitting. Even though he isn't as well known as a power hitter, he still managed to score over 20 home runs in four different seasons with a steadily decreasing strike zone which Jim Murray described as "small than Hitler's heart." You can see the cleanness of his swing and the thrill of connection on his face. It is simply a crisp, clean card with an astonishing action shot. It might have made the Top 5, except the choice of insert image is disappointing: did Rickey think he was having his passport picture done? Only on his '89 Fleer card while he was a Yankee does he look more like he doesn't even want to have his photo taken. Compared to any of his other cards from '83 or '84 he looks so subdued - and why doesn't his helmet fit? That helmet is as small as Hitler's heart!
5. 1985 Donruss
"You have to keep running. I always believed I was going to be safe."
Crouching Rickey Stolen Bases #1. For whatever reason 1985, the year he left Oakland for New York, produced the coolest of Rickey's cards from all three major manufacturers. And of course the all-time unchallenged base stealing hero's most famous stance is the one on display here, the Spiderman squat. Likening the player to a super-powered webslinger is particularly apt looking at this image, with his bright A's uniform at its most spandex-y: he looks like an old school X-Man with that bright yellow shirt, white gloves and loud stirrup socks. Throw that darkened badass battle-ready stare into the mix and...well, I don't know if John Byrne could have illustrated this picture any better. Henderson always said he was a force of intidimation for whatever team he was playing for: hard to believe when you see him smiling and good-natured, but looking at this card makes you glad you're not playing second base against him. The circled A's trademark, used in all three 1985 card designs, is also a handsome touch.
4. 1982 Topps
"You have to stay low, like a sprinter."
Crouching Rickey Stolen Bases #2. The earliest card to capture the animal-like speed and agility of Rickey Henderson. He's not moving but you can already feel the movement. You don't know where the ball is going but you know it's not going to catch him. The streaks on the left side of the card seem to symbolize the straight-line/abrupt turn blur of colors that the crowd would be seeing when the runner made his move to grab second base. The 1982 Topps design always held a special place in my heart - it was the first "old" series I was introduced to when I started collecting in '89 - and the tasteful placing of team name, playing position, company logo and signature across the image really allow the attractive coloring to stand out. The Cal Ripken rookie from that series' traded set is my favorite card of the 1980's for sentimental as well as aesthetic reasons, but Rickey's is every bit as cool looking.
3. 1980 Topps
"This is Rickey calling on behalf of Rickey. Rickey wants to play baseball."
Where it all started. This was one of the great unattainable cards from my youth, which I proudly display today. What's notable is that none of the card companies in the 80's showed Rickey in the outfield with his glove on - they knew his legend would be forged as a batter and a runner (although he did patten the impressive "snatch catch" playing left field). He went 2-for-4 with one stolen base in his debut game against Texas on June 24, 1979, an auspicious yet (in hindsight) unsurprising start for a man who would steal another 100 bases in his second year of professional ball, under the tutelage of Billy Martin. His stance really throws you off looking at this card: it looks wavy, like he's at bat in the middle of the desert or on a shaky boat at sea. The photographer did a nice job lining up the shot so that his helmet hit at right about the top of the dugout so that his figure is visually linked to his fellow players sitting in the background, a subtle representation of the loyalty for which he would teach himself such strict fundamentals.
2. 1985 Fleer
"If my uniform doesn't get dirty, I haven't done anything in the baseball game."
Crouching Rickey Stolen Bases #1. Color coordination in a card's design simply doesn't get any better than this. The blue of the stands in the background reflect the runner's pants, the green of the grass his shirt and helmet and team border, both colors beautifully complimented by the gray frame of the '85 Fleer design. Just an all-out great looking card, but what does it say about Rickey? Even moreso than the similarly-posed 82 Topps and 85 Donruss shots, here it looks like he's ready to get down and dirty, with every attribute I've already mentioned - power, speed, concentration - on full display. With the wide shot holding him in the middle with plenty of space surrounding him, it looks like he's literally the only player in the game, which I'm sure was Rickey's mentality most of the time he was on base.
1. 1985 Topps
"My biggest theory is being able to hit with two strikes, being able to put the bat on the ball."
This great image of Rickey makes the card a classic on par with the best looking Willie Mayses and Roberto Clementes. It perfectly represents that contemplative moment before stepping up to the plate, one that never gets attention from fans unless it's captured by a shrewd sports photographer. And when you take away the boasting and the record-setting what you're left with is a man - one who has the kind of selfless commitment to his team and that rare brilliant strategic mind to become the greatest leadoff hitter in baseball. More than any other card, it brings to mind that quote from sportswriter Allen St John: "The Rickey Rally — a walk, two stolen bases and a sacrifice fly — was purist baseball at its best. Scoring runs, after all, is baseball's bottom line, and no one's better at it than Rickey." Again, this finds our boy at a crossroads just before leaving his original team for the first time, and that giant "A's" emblem on the card seems stamped on there like a fact - this man and his legacy forever belong to Oakland!
Honorable mentions: 81 Donruss, 81 Fleer, 81 Topps, 82 Donruss, 84 Fleer, 89 Fleer (traded), 89 Score (traded) and 90 Fleer, which I know is not technically an 80's card but needs to be mentioned such is its awesomeness.
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