Jay Bell, 1998 Topps Chrome

Name: Jay Bell
Team: Kansas City Royals
Position: Shortstop
Value of card: Four broken golf tees 
Key 1997 stat: Zero idea how to play golf
At the sound of the bell, please answer this pop quiz: What's Jay Bell up to here?

A) Getting ready to move to golf-friendly Arizona
B) Going from a former greenskeeper to a Masters champion
C) Playing golf with a base and a baseball. Duh.
D) Working on his putts
E) All of the above

Card submitted by John Stoddert

Jay Bell, 1998 Topps Chrome

Tiger Woods, 2001 Upper Deck (Christmas Day 2014 Special)

Name: Tiger Woods
Team: Umm, Team Nike?
Position: Golfer
Value of card: Getting your balls in the rough
Key 2001 stat: A much happier Christmas than, say, 2009
Merry Christmas from the Bust: Allow us to present a few Christmas carols influenced by Tiger Woods, the most randy golfer the North Pole ever knew.

• Do You Feel What I Feel?
• The Holly and the Ivy at the Same Time
• O Come, All Ye Unfaithful
• God Rest Ye, Merry Gentleman
• Whose Child Is This?
• Away, in a Stranger

Tiger Woods, 2001 Upper Deck (Christmas Day 2014 Special)

Dick Butkus, 1992 Pro Line Portraits (Football Friday No. 161)

Name: Dick Butkus (shush)
Teams: Chicago Bears, Bushwood Country Club Duffers
Positions: Linebacker, kneeling
Value of card: 7 over par
Key 1992 stat: Two black socks, two white golf shoes
10 "Caddyshack" quotes that could use the word "Butkus":
10) "Last time I saw a mouth like that, it had a Butkus in it."
9) "This Butkus still has marks from where the jockey was hitting it."
8) "In the immortal words of Jean Paul Sartre, 'Au revoir, Butkus.' "
7) "Hey, Butkus, you must have been something before electricity."
6) "Cinderella story, out of nowhere, former greenskeeper, now about to become the Butkus champion!"
5) "When you buy a hat like this, I bet you get a free bowl of Butkus, huh? Oh, it looks good on you, though."
4) "You're a lot of Butkus, you know that? Yeah, wanna make 14 dollars the hard way?
3) "Don't sell yourself short, Judge, you're a tremendous Butkus."
2) (Breaks wind at dinner) "Whoa, did somebody step on a Butkus?"
1) "It's in the Butkus!"

Dick Butkus, 1992 Pro Line Portraits (Football Friday No. 161)

Michael Jordan, Summer of '94 (Ball-Busting Basketball Week No. 1)

Name: Michael Jordan
Team: Chicago Bulls
Position: Shooting guard
Value of card: Over-under is 12 cents (Jordan took the over and lost)
Key 1993 stat: 994 ounces of sweat over 94 days of summer
Welcome to Ball-Busting Basketball Week: That's right, all you degenerate gamblers, it's NCAA tourney time, and things here at The Bust are heating up. While the nation watches its brackets get busted, we're about to treat our faithful readers (see: you, and about three other guys) to seven days of basketball cards that need their balls busted. So sit back, relax and try not to dunk your laptop in the garbage after reading these posts.
10 things Michael Jordan did in the summer of '94:
10) Stood in disbelief after one of countless terrible golf shots
9) Had someone else sign his name in gold leaf
8) Wore shorts that were long enough to be pants on normal-size human beings
7) Sweated under the heat of two suns and a basketball-orange sky
6) Caught so much air he ended up outside Mars
5) Wondered why the hell the Japanese flag's sun disk was included on a sports card
4) Worked as Paul Hogan's stunt double in the unreleased "Crocodile Dundee III: Drunk in Chicago"
3) Gambled. A lot.
2) Hit the links at his favorite country club on Tatooine under its twin suns
1) Spent hours working on his putts

Michael Jordan, Summer of '94 (Ball-Busting Basketball Week No. 1)

Mike Piazza, 1994 Rembrandt Ultra Pro

Name: Mike Piazza
Team: Los Angeles Dodgers
Position: Catcher
Value of card: If this were golf, it'd be a great score
Key 1993 stat: Never held a golf club before
A bad day on the greens: As noted on this blue-covered card, Mike Piazza was the 1993 National League Rookie of the Year. His manager, the often foul-mouthed and always full-mouthed Tommy Lasorda, didn't care spit about any of those words except "rookie," however. Lasorda made the young backstop caddy for him whenever he went golfing, but carrying Tommy's bag wasn't like carrying a normal golf bag. In the pockets where most duffers would keep extra balls, tees, an umbrella and a few beers, Lasorda instead kept loose items of food. Piazza would have to dislodge golf balls from smashed cannolis and extract tees from weeks-old meatballs. The bottom of the bag was filled with 6 inches of marinara sauce, meaning that after Piazza had dirtied Lasorda's lone towel with tomato-y foulness from the club handles, he would have to use his own shirt. The end of the season couldn't come soon enough for the catcher, who quickly hoisted his duties on some young Korean kid.

Mike Piazza, 1994 Rembrandt Ultra Pro

Craig Stadler, 1991 Pro Set (Another Alternative Sports Week No. 7)

Name: Craig "The Walrus" Stadler
Team: A man big enough to be his own team
Position: Ball hitter
Value of card: Three walrus whiskers
Key 1990 stat: 43 busted pants buttons
A fitting end to Another Alternative Sports Week: It has been a predictably underwhelming seven days, but we've managed to pick up a few readers who prefer sports that Europeans watch thanks to posts on golf, soccer and the like. So, in the end, we're all winners. (Except for the athletes. To them, our apologies. To the readers: Sorry to you guys, too.)
Fun facts about the Pacific walrus (O. rosmarus divergens) and Craig "The Walrus" Stadler:

• Save for orca and, in some areas, polar bears, the Pacific walrus is at the top of the food chain. Save for galaxy-devouring black holes, and, in some areas, polar bears, Craig "The Walrus" Stadler is at the top of the food chain.
• The whiskers of the Pacific walrus are a highly sensitive organ capable of differentiating among minuscule shapes. The whiskers of Craig "The Walrus" Stadler are a highly sensitive mouth eyebrow capable of storing weeks' worth of food for later consumption.
• The blubber layer below the Pacific walrus' skin is up to 6 inches thick. The blubber layer below Craig "The Walrus" Stadler's skin is, uh, see previous.
• The Pacific walrus spends a majority of its waking hours seeking its preferred meal, the mollusk. Craig "The Walrus" Stadler spends a majority of his waking hours seeking his preferred meal, the meatball hero.
• Partly because of its size and distinctive appearance, the Pacific walrus plays an important role in many Arctic cultures, most notably the Chukchi. Partly because of his size and distinctive appearance, Craig "The Walrus" Stadler plays an important role at many PGA functions, most notably the buffet line.

Craig Stadler, 1991 Pro Set (Another Alternative Sports Week No. 7)

Curtis Strange, 1991 Pro Set PGA Tour (Another Alternate Sports Week No. 5)

Name: Curtis Strange
Team: Teams are for suckers
Position: Golfer
Value of card: Strangely little
Key 1991 stat: Wore fuchsia
Here's what Curtis Strange stands for:

Clothes make the man ...
Under these circumstances, they make the man less manly.
Really tired of hearing jokes about his last name ...
That's too bad, Curtis, because ...
It's pretty strange for a guy to wear hot pink.
Skytel? Skyler? It's hard to read what's on his sleeve because his shirt has blinded us.

Staring off into the distance is one of the more action-packed things about golf.
That is, unless you're this guy.
Resembles Chevy Chase, vaguely.
And that's fitting, because that shirt belongs in a comedy sketch.
No point in stopping the pink shirt jokes now.
Getting a call from Curtis' wife      hang on.
Eventually, she says, she's going to need her top back (hey-o!).

Curtis Strange, 1991 Pro Set PGA Tour (Another Alternate Sports Week No. 5)