This card is kind of stuck in a bit of a neutral zone between being a Hitting card or a Base Running card — at first it sure doesn't look like Nava is running, yet.
But upon closer inspection, there is a definite amount of bright white there between Daniel's legs, which would have to be the bottom of his left leg. Which finally settles it for me — this is a Base Running card.
Further bits of confirmation of the true amount of kinetic activity here is the blurring of his right hand, and even some bits of, something, flying off his left hand. I scanned this card twice, thinking that was dust sticking to the card. Instead, it is dust now not sticking to Nava.
The only other realization that can be had about this card is that the photo was taken at night, given all the reflections on the batting helmet. It isn't all that exciting of a 'Night Card', but the card is still very workman-like and well done in that it shows the collector what Daniel Nava looks like, and most specifically, what he looks like while he is playing baseball.
Uniform Hero? Oh yes; again a bit of an accomplishment to work this trick this high in the uniform digits.
Where’d the egg hatch? Nava was a quite rare type of player in Major League Baseball today - an American player, who was never drafted. At all. As in, not even in the 49th round.
How about the migrations? Well, we are about to get some of the details here shortly. I will just borrow a bit from Nava's Wikipedia page: "...and signed with the Chico Outlaws of the Golden Baseball League. The Outlaws cut him after a tryout, only to bring him back a year later to fill a void." Which was Nava's experience with the very first baseball club that ever signed him, and a player/club dynamic that would follow Nava all the way through his career.
Don’t flip over real Turtles.
I love the detail that Nava did go to college before playing baseball for money, but at a junior college. Which is just exactly perfect as one begins learning the full story of Nava's career.
What is slightly surprising is that the card back writer doesn't bring up the easy money story of Nava; I will borrow another sentence from the Wiki writer here: "Nava is only the fourth player in MLB history to hit a grand slam in his first major league at bat and the second to do it on the first pitch."
This is actually only Nava's 2nd Topps Baseball card, and fortunately for all that is well and good and to be expected of perfect Topps Baseball card backs, his Rookie Card in 2010 Update does get to use that bit of Rookie glory on the back.
Can the Turtle Catch the Rabbit?
CAREER CHASE: With 104 hits, Nava is 4,152 from the all-time record of 4,256.
It has been awhile in this set since we have forgotten all about Pete Rose all over again, thanks to all those Pitcher cards. This was a prophetic pick, sort of, for Daniel Nava and the 2013 MLB season. No, Nava never entered any All-Time lists for most Hits by any category you wish, probably not even short-term Fan Favorite in Boston, which always has 1-2 such players at all times given the enthusiastic fan base.
2013 would be Nava's best in the Majors, turning in a .303 AVG (good for 8th in the AL), and a .385 OBP (good for 5th). But as can already be seen in the results on the card back above, Nava could just never seem to string together 2 consecutive good seasons. His 2nd-best year in the Majors, with Philly in 2017, was also his last year in the Majors as he could not crack the 25 Man roster the next year with Pittsburgh.
In 2019, Nava went back to Independent League play with the Kansas City T-Bones.
He finished his MLB career with 452 Hits across 7 seasons with 5 teams.
It has been awhile in this set since we have forgotten all about Pete Rose all over again, thanks to all those Pitcher cards. This was a prophetic pick, sort of, for Daniel Nava and the 2013 MLB season. No, Nava never entered any All-Time lists for most Hits by any category you wish, probably not even short-term Fan Favorite in Boston, which always has 1-2 such players at all times given the enthusiastic fan base.
2013 would be Nava's best in the Majors, turning in a .303 AVG (good for 8th in the AL), and a .385 OBP (good for 5th). But as can already be seen in the results on the card back above, Nava could just never seem to string together 2 consecutive good seasons. His 2nd-best year in the Majors, with Philly in 2017, was also his last year in the Majors as he could not crack the 25 Man roster the next year with Pittsburgh.
In 2019, Nava went back to Independent League play with the Kansas City T-Bones.
He finished his MLB career with 452 Hits across 7 seasons with 5 teams.
Subspecies? If Daniel Nava could have strung together consecutive starting seasons with the Red Sox, he probably would have been an easy pick for the Opening Day checklist, given his spectacular baseball 'origin story', as it were. However this was his first card in 3 years and that bit of non-career-continuity kept him off the other entry level checklists in 2013.
But I think Topps has always liked the Fan Favorites in Boston more than elsewhere, probably because Topps is from Mets country, bottom line. And thus Daniel Nava does appear in another Sea Turtle set: Update! Probably only a never-drafted American player can also pull off that feat of having a card in the Topps Baseball set _and_ the Update set, without ever changing teams. So this blog will see Daniel Nava again, many, many years from now.
The enigmatic luck results of Daniel Nava and Baseball (I really want to go on a deeper dive with his BABIP stats now; I suspect they might be pretty odd) continued right to the end - he also managed to appear on a card in the 2018 Topps Baseball set as a Pittsburgh Pirate, without ever appearing in a game for them.
But I think Topps has always liked the Fan Favorites in Boston more than elsewhere, probably because Topps is from Mets country, bottom line. And thus Daniel Nava does appear in another Sea Turtle set: Update! Probably only a never-drafted American player can also pull off that feat of having a card in the Topps Baseball set _and_ the Update set, without ever changing teams. So this blog will see Daniel Nava again, many, many years from now.
The enigmatic luck results of Daniel Nava and Baseball (I really want to go on a deeper dive with his BABIP stats now; I suspect they might be pretty odd) continued right to the end - he also managed to appear on a card in the 2018 Topps Baseball set as a Pittsburgh Pirate, without ever appearing in a game for them.
Bling That Shell Hitting a Grand Slam on your first Major League Pitch — that certainly seems worthy of probably the premiere parallels in Topps Baseball sets of the 2010s: the Topps Black. Perfect for a Night Card, too:
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