In 1990, scoreboard and baseball card manufacturer, Ted Justema Inc, made several mistakes that led to some interesting scoreboard error baseball cards being issued that year. The errors involved several high profile players having their stats and accomplishments incorrectly depicted on their 1990 baseball cards.
One of the more notable errors involved slugger Frank Thomas of the Chicago White Sox. Thomas had just come off a monstrous rookie season in 1990 where he batted .317 with 21 home runs and 70 RBI in only 108 games played. While those stats were certainly impressive for a rookie, his 1990 Donruss baseball card mistakenly listed even gaudier, and incorrect, numbers. The card stated that in his rookie year of 1990, Thomas had actually batted .455 with 98 home runs and 223 RBI. Needless to say, those stats would have shattered virtually every major league record by huge margins if they were real.
Another error involved veteran starting pitcher Bret Saberhagen of the Kansas City Royals. Saberhagen’s 1990 scoreboard error card inaccurately listed that in 1989 he had gone 24-0 with a 0.12 ERA. Of course, no pitcher in history has ever gone undefeated while allowing less than one hit per nine innings pitched over a full season. Saberhagen’s actual stats for 1989 were 14-12 with a 3.48 ERA – very good numbers, but nowhere near the otherworldly statistics printed on his scoreboard error card.
A third notable mistake involved Philadelphia Phillies relief pitcher Mitch Williams. On his 1990 card, it incorrectly stated that in 1989 Williams had appeared in 105 games out of the Phillies bullpen, pitching over 200 innings and racking up 35 saves. Phillies fans certainly wished that was true of their shaky closer, but the real stats show that in 1989 Williams had actually appeared in a more reasonable 70 games, tossing 111 innings with 26 saves.
What caused these glaring scoreboard errors? The man responsible was Ted Justema, owner and founder of the Ted Justema Inc scoreboard company that produced stats for various baseball card manufacturers including Donruss and Score in 1990. Justema had recently lost his supplier contract with Major League Baseball, meaning he no longer had direct access to the official stats from MLB. Instead, Justema had to compile stats from local newspapers, which apparently contained multiple incorrect figures that season. Without the oversight of MLB’s official stats, errors were bound to happen when compiling thousands of player stat lines from secondary sources.
The result were those famous 1990 scoreboard error cards featuring drastically incorrect stats for Thomas, Saberhagen, Williams, and a handful of other players. While embarrassing for Justema Inc. and confusing for collectors at the time, the mishaps have cemented these cards’ places in the lore of scoreboard errors in the hobby. Today, the 1990 error cards are highly sought after by collectors, often valued more than the players’ cards with accurate stats from that same year. They serve as a reminder of the perils that can arise when unofficial sources are used to compile baseball stats without the oversight of official numbers from MLB.
To this day, Ted Justema no longer produces baseball cards but still makes scoreboards. The 1990 fiasco was a learning experience, and in the decades since Justema has worked diligently to ensure accuracy by continuosly cross-checking stats with MLB. While the errors from 1990 will never be forgotten, Justema has largely redeemed themselves with collectors through diligent quality control. The notoriety of the 1990 error cards lives on as a quirky footnote in the history of baseball cards that shows how even small mistakes can have a big impact when they involve some of the game’s most iconic players.
The 1990 scoreboard errors forever immortalized on a handful of key players’ baseball cards live in infamy as one of the most glaring stat sheet botches in the hobby’s history. They serve as reminder of the need for official oversight and diligent fact-checking when compiling baseball stats independent of MLB – a lesson well learned by one chastened maker of baseball memorabilia.
