Cardboard Corner: Last Day Of The Year

Today's cards are from Rickey's first tenure in San Diego. The first is from the 1996 Upper Deck "Best of a Generation" subset, number 378. The other is his '97 Topps Stadium Club issue, number 66.

Going into what would be Tony Gwynn's final game, Rickey was sitting on 2,999 hits. Batting leadoff because he's Rickey Effing Henderson, Rickey came up first in the Padres' half of the first and promptly dropped a bloop into short right field and legged it out for a double. After the requisite delay and helmet-tipping, Rickey took third on an error and then scored on a single by Phil Nevin. Bochy replaced him on defense in the top of the second with Mike Colangelo so he could get one last ovation from the fans at The Q. This would be Rickey's last game with the Padres as well; he would go on to play sparingly elsewhere the next two seasons, amassing 81 more hits.

Oddly, much in the same way Tony got both his 2000th and 3000th hits on his mother's birthday, Rickey had also gotten his milestone 2000th hit in his final plate appearance of the 1992 season.