Mystery Solved?

I picked up a 1975 NST card recently that I hadn't actually been looking for, breaking my new rule of not buying anything that wasn't already on my want list, but, if you'll indulge me for a minute, you'll see why I got it.

I've written a lot about what I call the "Florida Project" - a series of 22 cards from the 1974/75 Calbee set that feature photos of the Yomiuri Giants from spring training in 1975 which they spent in Vero Beach, Florida, as guests of the Los Angeles Dodgers.  I've been working on picking up all the cards in the series and I'm down to only needing one.

I was aware that the 1975 NST "Mr. Baseball" set also included cards of the Giants in Florida although I've been less interested in getting them.  It's somewhat unclear to me how many there are and NST cards can be difficult to find.  There's a couple gems in the set, though, that I've been happy to find - one shows Tsuneo Horiuchi pitching to Ron Cey and the other shows Shigeo Nagashima with Gene Mauch.  I know from looking at Gary Engel's "Japanese Vintage Baseball Card Checklist & Price Guide" that there are also cards showing Nagashima with Stan Wasiak (the manager of the Dodgers' Triple-A team in Albuquerque at the time) and possibly Kansas City Royals manager Jack McKeon.  I had not seen either of these cards until the other day when the Wasiak card showed up in an Ebay search:

1975 NST #188

My eyes lit up when I saw the number on the back of Wasiak's uniform - it looks like it's 75.  Why do I care?  Because it may solve the mystery of who the Dodger's coach on this Calbee card is:

1974/75 Calbee #710

I want to stress that neither the Calbee card nor the NST album (the NST "card" is actually a stamp that is meant to be pasted into an album) identifies Wasiak by name.  The back of the Calbee card talks about shortstop Kazumasa Kohno (#29) although the Google translation appears to say something about Kohno getting training "by the coach of the 3A team himself":

The text of the NST album appears to imply that the other person on both card #188 (Wasiak) and #189 (Mauch) are Walt Alston who was Dodgers manager at the time:

But Alston's number was 24, not 75 so it's not him on card #188 and he wouldn't have been wearing an Expos hat so it's not him on card #189 either.  Engel's guide is the only place where Wasiak is mentioned by name (and only for the NST card).  I don't know how Gary determined who it was but I don't see any reason to doubt him.

So to recap the clues - Gary Engel's listing for 1975 NST card #188 says it's Stan Wasiak on the card with Nagashima.  Wasiak is wearing uniform number 75 which is the same number someone (who may have been referred to as the "coach of the 3A team") is wearing on the back of 1974/75 Calbee card #710.  Wasiak was the Dodgers' Triple-A manager at the time.  Assuming Gary's identification of Wasiak is correct, that's also Wasiak on the Calbee card.

Wasiak's an interesting figure that I didn't know anything about before writing this post.  He played in the Dodgers' organization in the 1940's, missing four years due to the War, and never made the majors.  He became a minor league manager in 1950 and managed at least one game every year for 37 years (he missed some time in the early 80's with some health issues but was able to keep his streak intact by managing one game in 1982).  He finished his career in 1986 with 2,530 career victories, the most ever by a minor league manager.