We’re happy to announce that the recipient of the 2026 SABR Jefferson Burdick Award is Gary Cieradkowski. In Pastime circles, Gary is greatest identified for his Infinite Baseball Card Set, an ever-growing, independently produced assortment of playing cards highlighting a mixture of baseball outsiders, ignored legends, and untold tales. For the readers on the market, think about if the League of Outsider Baseball by no means ended and took the type of baseball playing cards.
Only a sampling of Gary’s Infinite Baseball Card Set guidelines consists of Alta Weiss, Joe Schlabotnik, Pythias Russ, Andy the Clown, Dwight Eisenhower, Fran Boniar, and Jack Kerouac. And if you happen to discovered your self questioning who any of these topics are or what they need to do with baseball, that’s form of the purpose. Gary not solely has your curiosity lined with the perfect card backs within the enterprise however usually a companion booklet if not a blog post in addition.
Whereas Gary’s playing cards generate instantaneous visible enchantment, as with the whole lot Gary creates, there may be excess of meets the attention. Nearly nothing within the drawings is random. The colours, the uniforms, and the background particulars are as meticulously researched because the write-ups on the cardboard backs, whilst occasional Easter eggs may present up in a few of Gary’s items.
In the long run, nonetheless, the enchantment of Gary’s work goes past his abilities as an artist and researcher. Gary can also be one of many baseball world’s nice storytellers. There’s a high quality to his work that takes the medium of the baseball card to a completely new realm, one which transports its holder to a bygone time and distant place the place unknown heroes in unknown leagues come to life, awash within the magic of all that’s stunning in regards to the sport.
Benefit from the honor, Gary! It’s a pleasure for SABR Baseball Playing cards so as to add your identify to our checklist of Burdick Award winners.
Editor’s Be aware: To study much more about Gary Cieradkowski, try his fantastic interview with Dan Wallach on Episode 0504 of the My Baseball History podcast.
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