TTM Stats
- Sent: 8/3/2020 | Received: 8/17/2020 | 14 Days
- ’80 Topps, ’87 Donruss, ’87 Topps, ’88 Topps
- Address: Home
The Story of the Autograph
Don Sutton was a hall of fame starting pitcher who recently passed away on January 18, 2021. His career lasted more than two decades and he played for the Los Angeles Dodgers (twice), Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers, Oakland Athletics, and California Angels.
Sutton was born in Alabama and raised in Florida. He played baseball, basketball and football in high school and helped his team to the small school stat finals two years in a row in baseball. He wanted to attend Florida but the coach was not interested. He instead went to Gulf Coast Community College and then Whittier College. The Dodgers signed him as an amateur free agent on September 11, 1964. He made his major league debut with them two years later on August 9, 1988.
While Sutton had several good years in baseball, his time with the Dodgers saw his greatest success. From 1972 to 1978 he made his four All-Star appearances and was in the Cy Young or MVP voting in every year except 1977 and 1978. He also played his three World Series during those year, unfortunately not winning any of them though. Also in 1972 he started a string of years in which he won at least 18 games for four out of the next five years, including 21 games in 1976.
Overall he had a 324 and 256 record with a career 3.26 ERA. He had over 3,500 career strikeouts with five years of at least 200 strikeouts and the first 13 years of his career with at least 150 strikeouts. He led the league in ERA in 1980 but his lowest career ERA was 2.08 in 1972. I think some would say he was a “compiler” and that he won 300 games but only by pitching for 23 seasons. 17 of those 23 seasons he had at least a .500 record and he put up a better than 6 WAR in 1972 and 1980.
After his playing days he went into broadcasting. He started in 1989 by splitting time between the Dodgers and Braves. In 1990 he became the full-time commentator for the Braves. He continued broadcasting through his cancer treatments later on and would be with TBS through 2006. From there he worked with the Nationals and then moved back to the Braves to work the radio broadcasts. He was also a golfer and a wine enthusiast.
The Score on Don Sutton – 6.5
I felt the need to go ahead and post this one with his passing. I didn’t want this to show up months later and it seem insensitive that I posted it. That’s the downside to me just posting once a day and having a backlog. I saw someone else who got cards back from him the day after he passed away.
Sutton has a great signature and I only wish that I’d sent to him sooner and with more Dodgers cards. I think these came out pretty good although the facsimile autograph getting in the way on the 1980 Topps card is always annoying. My favorite might be the 1987 Topps.
Rest in peach Mr. Sutton and thanks for signing my cards.
>>> READ MORE ABOUT MY AUTOGRAPH SCORING SYSTEM <<<
Thanks for visiting BravestarrCards.com: Card Collecting and TTM Autographs.
Information gathered using Wikipedia and Baseball Reference.