The Story of The Bird
“Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
It’s rare for a rookie card to be an All-Star card, but the meteoric rise of Mark “The Bird” Fidrych caught Topps off-guard in 1976. No card was issued for the pitcher that year. Although he made the Detroit Tigers’ roster coming out of spring training, he had pitched only one inning before May 15, 1976. Remarkably, by July, The Bird was the starting pitcher for the AL All-Star team. He went on to win the Rookie of the Year award that season, posting a 19-9 record and a 2.34 ERA.
If you’re looking for Fidrych’s rookie card, it’s #265 in the 1977 set, and it’s an All-Star card. If instead you’re looking to acquire The Bird’s last card, check the 1981 set. At the end of the 1981 season, Fidrych having just turned 27, the Tigers released him. The cultural impact of the memorable rise and fall of Mark Fidrych certainly outshines his career statistics, and his enduring appeal raises compelling questions about how card values are determined.
The most striking thing about watching footage of Mark Fidrych — plainly evident even in the grainy 1976 clips — is not the wicked bite on his curveball or even his numerous eccentric mannerisms. Instead, what one chiefly observes in Fidrych is a childlike sense of wonder and joy. At 21-years old, he was not far removed from childhood, and he still lacked the stultifying self-consciousness that marks adulthood for so many of us. The Bird unmistakably enjoyed the game, the big stage, and the semi-psychedelic ballet of pitching as he performed it.
A Unique Career and Personality
While Fidrych fits alongside promising players whose careers ended too soon due to injury — players like the Cubs’ Mark Prior or football’s Bo Jackson — the impact and brevity of Fidrych’s career seem rather to place him with Janice Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and Jim Morrison, who all died at the age of 27.
The back of Fidrych’s 1981 card includes a pair of small cartoons. One of these explains that it was his resemblance to Sesame Street’s Big Bird that earned him the nickname, and the other says, “He’s fascinating to fans for talking to [the] ball and repairing [the] mound on hands & knees.” These and other dramatic flares gave Fidrych a curious appeal that transcended sports. A colorful non-conformist, some of The Bird’s mannerisms were brought back to life when Tim Robbins played Ebby Calvin “Nuke” LaLoosh in the 1988 film, Bull Durham.
Following a knee injury from which he gradually recovered in 1977, a torn rotator cuff occurring only six weeks later would be the injury that gradually ended The Bird’s career. Some fans blamed manager Ralph Houk, noting that Fidrych threw (a now-unthinkable) 24 complete games in his rookie season, including back-to-back 11-inning victories early in the season. Whatever the cause of his injury, he pitched only two games in 1978, and made one final attempt at a comeback in 1980, but to no avail.
A Childlike Joy
When Sports Illustrated published a long retrospective of his career in 1986, Fidrych was interviewed on his farm. By then, he had become fervent about chainsawing trees and splitting wood, but he always maintained a headful of ideas: Maybe he could run a limousine service, or a carwash, or be a real estate developer. Until his death in a trucking accident in 2009, he remained upbeat despite a series of devastating setbacks.
Between descriptions of the farm and some fascinating quotes from their conversation (“You got a thousand dollars, you got a thousand problems”) the S.I. article details Fidrych’s on-field antics, including his habit of tending to the dirt around the pitcher’s mound.
Fidrych became a celebrity when he pitched at Tiger Stadium in a nationally televised game against the Yankees on June 28, 1976. He earned a complete game victory, and when it was over, the fans refused to exit the stadium until The Bird came back for a curtain call.
Retrospective: Evaluating a Singular Player
By some reports, the 1977 cards were printed on sub-par paper stock, leading to easily scuffed edges. Gem mint examples remain very rare and can get pricey. Still, for collectors who will accept a less than pristine card, the Fidrych rookie card remains within reach.
In Fidrych, there is the suggestion that card value might not correlate 1:1 with statistics. He was not a hall of famer, and his 5-year career totals are only mildly impressive. But some hobbyists have retained a sense that the career that might have been counts for something, especially when paired with The Bird’s singular and lovable personality.
Following Fidrych’s career, there have been a few pitchers who appeared to be in the same lineage. Tim Lincecum, Brian Wilson, and Max Scherzer brought their various personality ticks onto the mound, but perhaps because Fidrych had cleared a path, their quirky antics did not capture the attention of the American public the way The Bird’s did.
A Rolling Stone article published in May of 1977, still hopeful that Fidrych could repeat the magic in his sophomore season, noted that he was always listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Grateful Dead and suggested that he seemed “a clown, a savant or a moron.” Almost 50 years later, none of those descriptors seem quite accurate. Despite his injury problems and shortened career, The Bird will be remembered as an American original, one of the few, beyond comparison.
