Opening 25-year-old baseball cards with John Axford
This right here is the most Canadian episode in the history of our 25-Year-Old Baseball Card series. It stars Oakland Athletics relief pitcher John Axford, who grew up in Ontario and was a big Toronto Blue Jays fan as a kid in the early ’90s.
As we opened up our packs of 1992 Topps, the Baseball Card Gods put him in a tough spot: He was forced to choose between one of the most iconic players (and moments) in Blue Jays history and one of the best MLB players to ever come from Canada. It makes for a fantastic episode of our nostalgic baseball show.
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Axford — a 34-year-old playing for his sixth MLB team in nine seasons — is one of the more personable players in the game. He’s friendly on social media and, off the field, is perhaps best known for his love of movies and his acumen when it comes to predicting the Oscars. He’s not bad with baseball cards either. Even spotting baseball players with boogers. (watch the entire episode and you’ll see).
If you’re new to this series, we open 25-year-old baseball cards with baseball people of all sorts — current players, managers, stars from the past, famous fans. It started with a few boxes of cards that my grandma left unopened from the early ’90s. They were worthless and sitting in my garage, so I decided to open them with baseball players and see what kind of stories and memories they produce.
If you dig the series — and I hope you do — we’ve got plenty more episodes you can watch below:
Previously in 25-Year-Old Baseball Cards
MUST-SEE EPISODES: Bronson Arroyo | Eric Davis | Dusty Baker | Hank Azaria | Alex Rodriguez | Scott Boras | A.J. Ellis
MANAGERS/COACHES: Terry Francona | Joe Maddon | Bruce Bochy | Clint Hurdle | Buck Showalter | Brad Mills
CURRENT PLAYERS: Noah Syndergaard | Kyle Hendricks | Clayton Kershaw | Todd Coffey
STARS FROM BACK IN THE DAY: Frank Thomas | Sandy Alomar Jr. | Delino DeShields | Cliff Floyd | Dan Plesac | Aaron Boone | Bobby Bonilla
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Mike Oz is the editor of Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at mikeozstew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @MikeOz
