Baseball Card of the Day: Glenn Hubbard and serpentine friend

Player: Glenn Hubbard, Atlanta

Series: 1984 Fleer

Hubbard spent most of his solid 12-year Major League career with the Braves before joining Oakland in 1988 and winning a World Series ring the following season (though he was released before the postseason). The second baseman turned in his best campaign in 1983, hitting a career-high 12 homers and making his lone All-Star appearance at Chicago's Comiskey Park. Possibly emboldened by the career year, Hubbard set out to make a statement with this card a year later -- and did he ever.

The beard. The boa constrictor. The overall effect is like Ray LaMontagne recreating Britney Spears' performance of "I'm a Slave 4 U" at the 2001 VMAs. I don't know if the serpentine friend was Hubbard's or not, but this photo was not taken at his home park.

Look closer: the Phillie Phanatic is beyond Hubbard's left shoulder. He appears to holding a caramel apple-looking something up to his snout. There appears to be either a marching band or a color guard of some sort on the Veterans Stadium field. And look to Hubbard's right. In an appearance as confounding as a Roman statue head in a pre-Columbian Mexican gravesite, none other than Barney Rubble from The Flintstones was there.

Why? We may never know -- but we're fortunate that this wondrous scene will be preserved forever through cardboard.

-- Dan Wohl / MLB.com