Monday, May 18, 2009

1989 Topps Major League Debut #93: Greg Olson



Greg Olson

PHOTO: This guy is quote obviously a catcher, making it easy to differentiate him from Gregg Olson the pitcher. Catcher photos without the face mask or protective gear freak me out a little. Would you want a catch a 95 MPH fastball without a mask or chest protector?

STAT: Check out Tom Glavine's career numbers by catcher. The last column, tOPS+, breaks out Glavine's own offense-allowed numbers by catchers. Olson's figure of 88 means that batters did far less against Glavine when Olson was catching him as compared to the rest of the catchers. Javy Lopez also did well (but not as well as Olson) with a 93. Mike Piazza and Paul LoDuca were both over 100. Here's the same stuff for John Smoltz. Here, Olson was average with a 99. Smoltz did better with Lopez (90) but was generally quite close to 100 for most of the otehr guys (Berryhill 102 and Estrata 108 for example.)

ANAGRAM: Greg Olson = Loser gong (failed game show contestant)

CAREER: 3/10

Olson couldn't stick long in the majors thanks to arriving when he was already 28 and just not hitting much at all. He did hit pretty well in the 1991 playoffs includin the most important hit of this 1991 NLCS game.

2 comments:

  1. Never seen a card with Olson in a Twins uni. Awesome.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I never even knew he played for the Twins until I saw this card.

    ReplyDelete