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Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Brooklyn: Mystery of the 1988 Score Paul Kilgus

So, my wife and I went to Brooklyn to see the Brooklyn Cyclones and, as my wife points out, to see some friends of ours. I recently detailed the ballpark trip, but I left this detail for its own post.

This detail forms The Mystery of the 1988 Score Paul Kilgus.

The mystery begins the morning after the game, as my wife and I went to pack up for our return home. We stayed at the friends' place, the place of my wife's friend Sara from roller derby and her husband Jon.

Being Brooklyn, everyone parks on the street, if they have a car at all. Our friends, being from Upstate NY, still had their car and they park it on the street, as we parked ours.

So that morning, Jon goes out to move their car as parking was barred later that day, and he comes back in and casually mentions something he found on his windshield, under a wiper.

It was a baseball card. And he left it in the car.

Neither Sara, nor Jon are baseball people. I think Jon said he had had cards as a kid, but they were long gone. He saw it and just assumed I had put it there.

But I hadn't. Intrigued, I asked him to go out and retrieve it. He did and I recognized it immediately: It was a 1988 Score card, and the player on it was Paul Kilgus.

So, get this: Not only was it a baseball card, but one from 1988 and one of a player I've featured here.

Kilgus was actually one of the earlier players featured here, his post going up in June 2010. Kilgus was a member of the 1990 Syracuse Chiefs. By that point, Kilgus already had experience in three major league seasons, including the previous year with my favorite team growing up, the Cubs.

So, the question was, where did this card come from?

I have no idea.

With none of the four of us taking credit for it, that means somebody just randomly stuck a card on a windshield in Brooklyn and that card just happened to find its way to probably the only guy in the borough who would fully appreciate such a card, and the player on it.

How crazy is that?

Anyway, read more about Paul Kilgus' career, his feature from June 2000: Paul Kilgus, Throw Strikes

2 comments:

  1. What are the odds? All I know is that it wasn't me.

    Sounds like you had a good trip. Nice job seeing Keyspan (yes I still call it that).

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  2. I remember this story, pretty funny. Don't think I will be quite so brazen as to stick cards on windshields.

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