SOM took it upon themselves to purge all replacement game stats from their set in the strike year 1987. It was a move, I suppose, of convenience on their part to finesse those three games out of sight. I'd greatly prefer that they printed about 8 additional cards per team to represent those "replacement" players.

Those players were legitimate. They were because the league said so. The games counted, the records counted, their names are in the record books, etc. . They were free agents brought in by the teams to provide roster help as in any other situation.