1970 66 1969 AL Home Run Leaders Harmon Killebrew Frank Howard Reggie Jackson
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| 1969 AL Home Run Leaders Harmon Killebrew Frank Howard Reggie Jackson |
These numbers were very impressive for a lot of players. Most of the top dozen had similar HR totals in other years. They were either putting the finishing touches on or starting great careers.
For the fans, it was much harder to keep track of the career and year-by-year totals of the players that long ago. ESPN was nearly a decade away. The internet and its varied resources even longer. The daily newspapers printed only running totals for the current season. There was no instant access to the historical information at one's fingertips. There was no way to remember the exact numbers from the year before unless one saved newspapers and magazines or kept one's own records.
The cards, especially the league leader cards, provided the exception. The league leader cards were the 1970s version of baseballreference.com, mlb.com, cable tv sports and other instant sources. If we wanted to know home run totals from the previous year, we had our own internet in shoeboxes in our closets.
I do not know if they print league leader cards in this much detail today. If they do, the cards would be old news before the packs hit the shelves.
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