Magazine Cover Derby (split from Pop Culture)

[Benjamin Grimm]

Tom Seaver makes a stealth appearance on Mannix in the fall of '74. http://i65.tinypic.com/2z820rd.jpghttp://i65.tinypic.com/2z820rd.jpg

Speaking of that...



COMING THIS SPRING:



http://leaptoad.com/mets/covers/images/magazines/shelby_and_casey.png>

[A Boy Named Seo]

heck yes!

[G-Fafif]

Best thing to happen to magazines since periodical rate postage.

[bmfc1]

YES!!!!!!! Just don't fold the edges while getting in the mailbox. I hate that.

[kcmets]

I have some obscure Mets magazines covers I can contribute images of.

[Centerfield]

Psyched for this.

[Guest 41Forever]

Brilliant!

[MFS62]

Any Commie Pinko bed-wetter who votes against Casey Stengel is obviously an agent of Russia and should be sentenced to having to get all his (or her) baseball coverage from ESPN forever. *

Later



* = strongly worded post to follow

[Benjamin Grimm]

Psyched for this.

So is Shelby's daughter Daenerys! (She's the one on the right, soiled by fingerpaint.)



Here's how it's going to work. There are (so far) 112 covers. We'll have 32 first-round polls, with each poll offering three or four covers. In the first round, we'll be able to vote for one cover. (Unlike in the Tabloid Cover Derby, where we can vote up to three times.)



The 32 covers that advance will be ranked according to the percentage of the vote received and from there we'll have the typical single-elimination bracket.



Some of the covers are well-known and iconic, like the one that Shelby is holding. Some are quirky. Some are surprising. There was one that I was almost sure was a gag cover that someone Photoshopped, but I verified that it was real.



The winning cover won't be hanging in the lobby in Stockholm; MIDNIGHT BADNESS has been guaranteed twelve months in its prime spot behind the reception desk. But maybe, like last year's Yearbook Cover Derby winner, it will end up on Maja's shower curtain. Or maybe someone else's shower curtain. Maybe YOUR shower curtain!



http://leaptoad.com/mets/covers/yearbooks/showercurtain.jpg>



We'll get started in a couple of weeks.

[Centerfield]

It's so funny. I was just thinking about Mets covers this past weekend.



When I was a kid, I loved this SI cover of Darryl Strawberry.



https://www.sicovers.com/content/images/thumbs/0002793_darryl-strawberry-of-the-mets_415.jpeg>



It hung on my wall for years until he later signed with LA. Then I took it down. I was home recently and noted that I never got around to replacing him. You can see the bare spot where it used to hang.



https://uniim1.shutterfly.com/ng/services/mediarender/THISLIFE/000056792747/media/124490933740/large/1551981635/enhance>



I was 15 years old when he left the Mets, and at that age, still old enough to care who was on my wall. I guess by the time the Mets got someone worthy of replacing him, I had stopped caring.



It's funny to go home and look at my childhood wall. It's like this weird time capsule/tribute to the 80's. I thought about taking it down once when I was in my late 20s. Now I just kinda want to keep it there forever. Check out the fake rookie card I made for Gooden. It's not Zvon. But I'm still proud of it.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

that's great!

[A Boy Named Seo]

Cool stuff, CF. Amazing it's all still there. I have no idea what happened to 98% of my childhood Mets crap. I had pennants and multiple posters of Straw, Gooden, Keith. Starting Lineup figures of all the dudes. My mom, bless her heart, bought us so much shit we didn't need.



I was a teenager living in SoCal when Straw bolted, so it stung even worse with everyone at school celebrating his arrival (defection!). I used to wear this t-shirt all the time and retired it that year. Wish I still had it.



https://i.pinimg.com/originals/0d/61/62/0d61627a66b2b5c62567e134e2cabb63.jpg>



Even though I was already 17 the next year, I still printed out a long-ass horizontal banner on my dot matrix printer that read "METS SIGN BOBBY BONILLA!" and I strung it across my bedroom wall as some sort of redemption celebration that we got a new, bigger slugger! That thing must have spanned like 30 sheets of paper. Using up all the printer ink to own the Dodger fans at school who would never see my cool banner was a questionable idea in retrospect.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I should also add that we're including only weekly, monthly, or quarterly publications, but not the annual baseball preview issues that come out each spring. And we will only see covers from publications that are not exclusively devoted to the Mets. So no Street & Smith, etc. And no Mets Magazine or Mets Inside Pitch.



There are more Sports Illustrated than anything else. KC has contributed some additional covers today, and there may be more to come, but at the moment SI will comprise 38 of 113 covers, and two others will be variants of SI.

[Edgy MD]

Piazza was a regular at Baseball Weekly.

[TABLE][TR][/TR][TR][/TR][/TABLE]

[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/9ZAAAOSwNuxXXxT8/s-l300.jpg>[/TD]	[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/EW0AAOSwHIlZ1Rrq/s-l300.jpg>[/TD]	[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/7HwAAOSw44BYb8yH/s-l225.jpg>[/TD]
[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/c14AAOSwxN5WaEFV/s-l225.jpg>[/TD]	[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/OjUAAOSwnipWaD~X/s-l225.jpg>[/TD]	[TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/pMkAAOSwW9dZxRZY/s-l225.jpg>[/TD]

[Centerfield]

I always wanted to get this one for my wall.



https://i.pinimg.com/originals/57/be/2d/57be2d8fc4432776b2e367bd753a934d.jpg>



And to a lesser extent, this one, but I didn't like the picture as much.



https://i2.wp.com/www.banishedtothepen.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Gooden_1.jpg>



It's hard to imagine now that a kid could want a magazine cover to hang on his wall but wasn't able to get a physical copy of it.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I should also add that we're including only weekly, monthly, or quarterly publications, but not the annual baseball preview issues that come out each spring. And we will only see covers from publications that are not exclusively devoted to the Mets. So no Street & Smith, etc. And no Mets Magazine or Mets Inside Pitch. There are more Sports Illustrated than anything else. KC has contributed some additional covers today, and there may be more to come, but at the moment SI will comprise 38 of 113 covers, and two others will be variants of SI.

Good. I was thinking this exact same point to myself when I read this thread. I think that including regional covers, that have proliferated greatly over the last 15 or 20 years, would probably cheapen the derby. I own a ton of Met themed magazine covers that I'd bet you don't have and 'd be really impressed if you did. I'd give you photos but I haven't scanned them, and my scanner broke down about a week ago. I haven't gotten around to getting a new scanner yet so at the moment I'm scannerless. Plus, I'm not really in the mood anyways because it would be a tremendous task for me to gather all those mags from wherever they are so I'll stick with scannerless at the moment.

[batmagadanleadoff]

I always wanted to get this one for my wall. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/57/be/2d/57be2d8fc4432776b2e367bd753a934d.jpg> And to a lesser extent, this one, but I didn't like the picture as much. https://i2.wp.com/www.banishedtothepen.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Gooden_1.jpg> It's hard to imagine now that a kid could want a magazine cover to hang on his wall but wasn't able to get a physical copy of it.

Here's my favorite Gooden cover image. I can't say that the cover, overall, is my favorite Gooden cover, but I like that photo. Gooden's body language really captures his energy being unleashed, I think.



https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51sXQ7gIUNL.jpg>

[Benjamin Grimm]

=batmagadanleadoff post_id=3956 time=1551994409 user_id=68]I own a ton of Met themed magazine covers that I'd bet you don't have and 'd be really impressed if you did.

[Guest 41Forever]

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/PcgAAOSwb-1cP6Ny/s-l500.jpg>

[Edgy MD]

July, '76.



https://d1w8cc2yygc27j.cloudfront.net/-7325257006572852611/-1643656226094574266.jpg>

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy MD wrote: July, '76. https://d1w8cc2yygc27j.cloudfront.net/-7325257006572852611/-1643656226094574266.jpg>

Wow. The monthly sports magazine. Do any of those even exist anymore?

[MFS62]

Hmmmm, no Baseball Digest covers?

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

Oops, forgot to mention Baseball Digest. Actually, we'll see 16 covers from them.

[Edgy MD]

Edgy MD wrote: Piazza was a regular at Baseball Weekly. [TABLE][TR][/TR][TR][/TR][/TABLE] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/9ZAAAOSwNuxXXxT8/s-l300.jpg>[/TD] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/EW0AAOSwHIlZ1Rrq/s-l300.jpg>[/TD] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/7HwAAOSw44BYb8yH/s-l225.jpg>[/TD] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/c14AAOSwxN5WaEFV/s-l225.jpg>[/TD] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/OjUAAOSwnipWaD~X/s-l225.jpg>[/TD] [TD]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/pMkAAOSwW9dZxRZY/s-l225.jpg>[/TD]

Do I guess correctly that BBWeekly, as a pulp rather than a glossy, won't be participating?

[Edgy MD]

Young Tom Seaver, looking over his shoulder like a badass, wearing a batting helmet and still carrying himself like he's the man to beat, even at the plate. A sidebar box on his shoulder, but no header or footer text floating over him.



Hard. To. Beat.



https://i.pinimg.com/236x/e0/27/0d/e0270d6a2cd3d58796046ddfc7edf357--sports-art-sports-illustrated.jpg>

[Benjamin Grimm]

If you keep sharing these covers you're going to spoil all the fun!

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy MD wrote: Young Tom Seaver, looking over his shoulder like a badass, wearing a batting helmet and still carrying himself like he's the man to beat, even at the plate. A sidebar box on his shoulder, but no header or footer text floating over him. Hard. To. Beat. https://i.pinimg.com/236x/e0/27/0d/e0270d6a2cd3d58796046ddfc7edf357--sports-art-sports-illustrated.jpg>

This terrific cover also annoyed the living shit out of me. It's Seaver's only TSN cover as a Met. Are you kidding me, TSN? TSN, the weekly that featured baseball players on its covers virtually year round. TSN would cover a marginal player over the NBA championship because it was baseball season. I mean, a player, if he was a baseball player, could get on that cover just by having two hot weeks. Ken Reitz was on the cover of TSN. So was Jorge Orta. And Milt Wilcox. And Gary Alexander. I'd bet anything that every one of Tom Seaver's contemporaries that was a first ballot no doubt about it Hall of Famer -- I'm talking guys like Bench and Reggie and Rod Carew and Steve Carlton -- probably made the cover of TSN at least three times. And Seaver, the greatest pitcher of his generation, maybe even the best player of his generation, gets just one Met cover. What a gyp.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy MD wrote: Young Tom Seaver, looking over his shoulder like a badass, wearing a batting helmet and still carrying himself like he's the man to beat, even at the plate. A sidebar box on his shoulder, but no header or footer text floating over him. Hard. To. Beat. https://i.pinimg.com/236x/e0/27/0d/e0270d6a2cd3d58796046ddfc7edf357--sports-art-sports-illustrated.jpg> This terrific cover also annoyed the living shit out of me. It's Seaver's only TSN cover as a Met. Are you kidding me, TSN? TSN, the weekly that featured baseball players on its covers virtually year round. TSN would cover a marginal player over the NBA championship because it was baseball season. I mean, a player, if he was a baseball player, could get on that cover just by having two hot weeks. Ken Reitz was on the cover of TSN. So was Jorge Orta. And Milt Wilcox. And Gary Alexander. I'd bet anything that every one of Tom Seaver's contemporaries that was a first ballot no doubt about it Hall of Famer -- I'm talking guys like Bench and Reggie and Rod Carew and Steve Carlton -- probably made the cover of TSN at least three times. And Seaver, the greatest pitcher of his generation, maybe even the best player of his generation, gets just one Met cover. What a gyp.

I can't let this one go. In the 70s, Seaver, as a Met, won two more Cy Young awards. He was also Cy Young caliber in 1971 and in his last (half) season as a Met, 1977. He led the NL in strikeouts virtually every single season. He led the Mets to another pennant. He was all-star caliber every single season, including in 1974 when he was 11-11 and would be the first person to tell you that he was extremely disappointed by his production that year -- even though he was, without a doubt, one of the league's best seven or eight pitchers that year despite his W-L record. And how many TSN covers did Seaver appear on in the 1970s as a Met?



Zero. None. Even SPORT magazine featured Seaver, as a Met, on its cover three times. And SPORT was a monthly that featured all sports equally. You wouldn't see more than three or four SPORT baseball covers in an entire year, whereas TSN, depending on how the calendar fell out in a given month, might publish five baseball covers in just one single month.

[Guest 41Forever]

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/81VUZgfNU6L._SY445_.jpg>



I know this won't qualify, but it's always been one of my favorites -- a 1985 cover with Seaver, Ryan and Koosman. It had a two-page photo of Seaver in motion, with an insert of him as a Met, that I laminated and hug above my desk at work for years.

[Benjamin Grimm]

We'll get started on Monday, March 18.