FREE: 1988 Donruss DeWayne Buice autograph card

The listing, 1988 Donruss DeWayne Buice autograph card has ended.

USA shipping only.
Autographed in black Sharpie.

DeWayne Allison Buice (born August 20, 1957) is a former professional relief pitcher. Buice played two seasons for the California Angels and half a season for the Toronto Blue Jays of Major League Baseball (MLB). He officially announced his retirement and played in his final game on June 27, 1989, but he continued to make appearances in the minor leagues into the 2000s, exclusively for teams in which he had an ownership stake.

Buice was one of the original managing partners of the Upper Deck trading cards company, and held that position from 1988 to 2000. Buice was in downtown Yorba Linda, California one evening in November 1987, looking for a particular Chinese restaurant in the area, and after looking around the neighborhood without success, he went into a baseball card shop called "The Upper Deck" to ask the person working there whether he knew the whereabouts of the restaurant.

Buice and owner Bill Hemrick struck up a friendship which led to Buice having an autograph signing at the store, and within weeks, Buice had become one of Hemrick's business partners.

Hemrick and then-partner Paul Sumner were starting a card company called Upper Deck. The two did not have the connections to help land them the necessary license from the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA), which would allow them to use the names and likenesses of the players on the card. The only response they could elicit was that the players union wasn't accepting another card company for three more years. Buice was told that if he could help them secure a license, he was promised a 12 percent stake in the card company. Buice would become a key figure in getting MLBPA officials to agree to a meeting. By the end of the 1988 season, Henrick and Summer received the license and were making baseball cards in 1989.