I know, I missed yesterday's mustache post. I'm sorry. Expect another one later this evening to make up for it. In the meantime, we can all rejoice as we break into the Top 10. And what a better way to do so than with this guy:
Hail!
That also happens to be this guy:
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| 1984 Topps #427 Rick Leach |
Sadly, Ricky Leach is another in the line of great Mustaches that left the Tigers prior to the 1984 season, in this case via a release. Bummer. I'm getting a little down going through this 1984 team set, only to find that a bunch of the guys weren't even on the team that year. I guess that is the way it goes though. How many cards of Gary Sheffield have I had to endure this year, or guys like Dontrelle or Bonderman who've barely played at all. Sigh.
Still, although he wasn't on the 1984 team, the spectre of Leach as a great (ok, good) UM Mustache certainly must have had some impact on the squad. I refuse to believe that it was the jettisoning of mustachioed players from the team prior to 1984 was the cause for success. Rather, perhaps there is a critical mass of mustaches that leads to peak performance, but that once that level is reached, there is a worry of oversaturation. Clearly, with the addition of some players during the 1984 season (one player in particular) it is hard to say that the Mustache had no role in that season's success. Perhaps we just need to give up some of the lesser mustaches for the greater good.
Or, I should have done my research ahead of time instead of just looking at the cards and ranking players by how I saw them and put the guys who weren't actually on the team at the bottom of the list. Oh well. I was heading off to vacation at the time, and I do know that the remainder of the list is, for the most part, chock full of impact players with impact staches.
