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Baseball Cards

Continued from preceding page

search of elusive cards. "It's
fun, and it helps bring back
my youth," he says.
But card collecting isn't
kid stuff anymore: Keller
goes about his hobby, uhm,
religiously, checking and
cross-checking the names of
Jewish ballplayers against
lists found in The Jewish Di-
rectory and Almanac and the
Jewish Athletes Hall of
Fame.
It's painstaking work, and
sometimes earns him only
strange looks from card
dealers.
"Dick Sharon?" they ask.
"You want a Dick Sharon?"
Sure, says Keller. And
Steve Hertz, Norm Miller
and Jeff Newman. Between
the two directories, there are
120 Jews listed as having
played in the big leagues.
Keller is not sure how
many of those were honored
with bubble gum cards, but
he now has cards from 35
players. They range from
Gordon, a jug-eared out-
fielder who played with four
teams in the '40s and '50s, to
Steve Rosenberg, who joined
the White Sox as a pitcher in
1988.
And those are just players
since 1950. Although he'd
love a card featuring Detroit
Hall of Famer Hank Green-
berg, Keller has been
cautious about dipping into
baseball's early years.
"I just bought a condo. I
don't want to get swept up
with buying cards at the
same time. Baseball cards
are a disease."
And an expensive one.
Baseball card collecting and
dealing has become a big
business in the past few
years, with the most
valuable cards fetching
prices in the thousands of
dollars.
Keller, for instance, has
what he thinks may be the
most valuable Jewish
baseball card — Sandy
Koufax's rookie card, when
the second and last Jewish
Hall of Famer was a bonus
baby with the 1955 Brooklyn
Dodgers. In good condition,
the card sells for $525; in
mint condition, $850.
But Keller, an auditor at
the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, says he's not in
it for the money.
"Being from Kemp Mill, it
was natural I'd do some-
thing Jewish," he explains,
referring to the center of the
area's Orthodox community.
"I thought I'd give these to
my kids one day."

Andrew Silow Carroll is a
reporter for the Washington
Jewish Week, where this story
first appeared.

Very nice, very selfless.
But remember, this collec-
tion involves Jews. Surely,
you're thinking, there must
be a controversial side to
this hobby, a dispute so frac-
tious that if another collec-
tor of Jewish cards were to
emerge, he and Keller would
not even speak to one an-
other.
And you'd be right.
"Remember 'Who is a
Jew?' I've got the same prob-
lem," Keller confides. "I
don't know. If you were a col-
lector, would you collect
someone if you didn't know
they were Jewish?"
Sometimes a player's
name appears on one of his
player lists but not on the
other, Keller explains.
Sometimes a player appears
in neither, but has an un-
mistakably Jewish name,
like Randy Schwartz, Bruce
Messer, Brad Edelman or
Dave Bergman. Keller has

Could that Yankee
be a Yankel? Is that
Mariner a Marrano?

compiled his own list of some
97 players with Jewish-
sounding names. He's
written dealers around the
country asking if they have
any information on their
backgrounds.
And what about converts?
Rod Carew and Elliott
Maddox, two black players
who became Jews by choice,
are both listed in Jewish
Athletes, but not in the Di-
rectory. Did the players fail
someone's halachic test?
(And when did they con-
vert? If a player became a
Jew after he joined the big
leagues, would a card from
his non-Jewish playing days
count? Are there any
responsa on this?)
So far, Keller has resisted
buying cards of players not
listed in his Jewish direc-
tories. But evidently it nags
him. Could that Yankee be a
Yankel? Is that Mariner a
Marrano?
"I hope he's Jewish," says
Keller, pointing to former
Oriole Moe Drabowsky, who
appeared in more games
than any Jewish pitcher
(589) and probably on more
teams (9).
Keller has 12 of the 14
cards available featuring
Drabowsky, including
Drabowsky's rookie card
from 1956, when the right-
hander was still known as
"Mike." The card says
Drabowsky was born in
Poland (a good clue) and
came to the U.S. when he