Just looking at Hoak's major league stats, you might think he came to baseball later than others of the era. Hoak broke in with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1954 at the "ripe old" age of 26. However, he had been toiling away in the Dodgers minor league system since 1947 (after a 2-year stint with the Navy as well). Sidetrack: most of the cards we've seen so far have looked like actual photographs of the players over a background painting. Something about Houk's card has an "uncanny valley" feel to it. As though the uniform was painted on over the top of a different picture. I'll spoil the fact that my next subject is one that's obviously a painting, and not a very good one. In his two seasons with the Dodgers, he split time with Jackie Robinson at third base. That's a tough act to break into, but Houk performed decently well. In fact, he was the third baseman when the Dodgers won Game 7 over the New York Yankees - the only postseason game in Jacki...