The Ones That Got Away

In my previous post regarding eTopps, I alluded to the fact that Topps did not go forward with all of my suggestions. Now that that cat is out of the bag, here's the full list I proposed to Topps. The listings in bold are cards that will be part of the set.

1952 Ted Williams, Boston Red Sox
1982 Ryne Sandberg, Philadelphia Phillies
1984 Traded Roger Clemens, Boston Red Sox
1954 Stan Musial, St. Louis Cardinals
1951 Bowman Joe DiMaggio, NY Yankees*
1982 Balboni/Elway/Righetti, NY Yankees Future Stars
1952 Satchel Paige, St. Louis Browns
1962 Maury Wills, LA Dodgers
1976 Reggie Jackson, Baltimore Orioles
1974 Dave Winfield, Washington Nat’l.
1964 Masanori Murakami, SF Giants
1989 Jeff Bagwell, Boston Red Sox #4 Draft Pick
1985 Barry Larkin, Team USA
1976 Mark Fidrych, Detroit Tigers
1985 Cal Ripken Jr/Sr, Father/Son
1989 Sammy Sosa, Texas Rangers Future Star
1952 Ralph Kiner, Pittsburgh Pirates
1985 Will Clark, Team USA
1954 Ralph Kiner, Chicago Cubs
1991 Pedro Martinez, LA Dodgers Future Star
1969 Thurman Munson, NY Yankees
1976 Traded Cecil Cooper, Milwaukee Brewers

*DiMaggio will be on 1952 Topps

A Hairy State of Affairs

The national baseball media has given Manny Ramirez plenty of grief over the years over his hair. And yet for all their bluster, there’s nothing even slightly revolutionary about Manny’s hair. Manny is not simply being Manny, he’s being baseball. Baseball players and bad hair have gone hand in hand since Harry Wright refused to comb his beard for old food before the first Cincinnati Red Stockings game in 1869. Since then, bad hair has been a requirement for those who want to join a big league club.

Bad hair isn’t just an endearing facet of baseball; it’s struck other major sports through the years as well. Football? Been sufferin’ since the late Sixties, and hockey since the Seventies. Just because they wear helmets doesn’t mean the bad hair isn’t there. In fact, the NHL’s insistence on the helmet has only helped bad hair flourish (just look at Jaromir Jagr and his SuperMullet for proof).

And where does basketball fit, you may ask? I’d say that basketball players seem to be the most in tune with how normal, non-famous athletes wear their hair. I’d even go so far as to proclaim basketball players the most hair-conscious among players from the four major sports. And yes, I’m aware of what Rick Barry looked like in his playing days.

There are many reasons why I’ve placed basketball players at the top of the heap. First, baseball hair wasn’t just bad for a few years here and there—it’s been consistent. There’s never been any evolution in baseball hair; it’s never gotten better, just stayed consistently inconsistent. Johnny Damon’s Rip Van Winkle beard was just as bad as Cap Anson’s little tuft on his forehead, as bad as Bill Buckner’s encroaching neck hair and as bad as anything Steve Stone ever sported. Second, hockey and bad hair go together like hockey and missing teeth. It’s just a natural fit. Third, a football helmet is not designed to help keep your hair looking sharp—it’s there to keep your head on your neck. Even Burt Reynolds’ perfect coiff was no match for a helmet in The Longest Yard. Those reasons alone almost leave the NBA the clear winners. Here are a few others, in order of importance to the sport’s success:

• Artis Gilmore’s Afro Dr. J’s afro was good, but Artis Gilmore’s afro was great. You could argue that Gilmore dominated because of his size, his scoring touch and his tenacity in the lane. But don’t underestimate the power of the Afro. It added at least six inches to his already gigantic 7’2” frame, and it was never clear where his head ended and his hair began. He could have easily had an IQ over 300 with a brain that big.

• Dominique Wilkins’ Flattop Fade What made ’Nique cooler: his unbelievable skill and dunks or his kick-ass fade? I wanted to get something shaved into the back of my head badly for a very long time, but my hair was not made to accommodate that wish. This is one of my deepest regrets.

• Michael Jordan’s Shaved Head After Jordan became a national star, shaving your head became the biggest thing since short shorts to NBA players. This was only alleviated with the arrival of

• Darius Miles’ Cornrows Braiding never had a place on the national stage before, so that naturally made the appearance of cornrows huge. Like them or not, cornrows pushed the evolution of NBA hair to new heights.

Maybe the biggest reason for the dominance of NBA hair is that once a style gained acceptance in the NBA, players in other sports began to emulate it, thus giving the style legs across the country, and often not just within arena walls, but in popular culture as well. All of the styles I’ve mentioned here (the Afro, the shaved head, the fade and cornrows) existed before NBA players took them for their own. But none of them enjoyed as great a widespread acceptance until after the NBA player made it famous. None of the other sports can lay claim to something like that, simply because bad hair doesn’t need a famous subject to make it better. If anything, they’ll just make it worse.

eTopps Cards That Never Were

The real title of this post is Ben Sells Out, Part 2.

Back in January, Topps got in touch with me about helping them checklist a set for eTopps. Needless to say, I was torn. Working for and/or with Topps has been a lifelong dream, and yet here I was, routinely poking fun at their sets and being critical of their products. Lucky for me, they had no stipulations that I had to follow for participating (like no bad-mouthing the company). I think I've kept up my part of the deal over the past seven months; I've not held back with criticism of the situation surrounding Topps, nor about any of their products I've found fault with.

It's probably no big deal, but just so everything is out in the open, I wasn't paid. Actually, that's not true. They paid me in baseball cards, which may sound dumb to most people (my girlfriend thought it did), but I found kind of fun. But enough about my involvement.

If you read SCD, you've probably seen the ads for the all-encompassing VIP tickets offered at The National in Cleveland. Part of that package are a handful of cards from this eTopps set, dubbed the Cards That Never Were. I think the ones at The Nat are going to specially stamped or something. The ones available through eTopps are like other eTopps cards. I think the biggest difference is that these cards will be in that year's original design and (hopefully) won't be plastered with the gaudy eTopps logo.

Here's the official line on the product (I didn't write this):


Introducing eTopps "Cards That Never Were"!

eTopps has gone back in history and created a classic collection of cards that never were! Each card has a unique story and all together the collection will be an instant classic. The collection will include:

* The ultimate tribute card: a 1952 Topps Joe DiMaggio!
* A stunning 1952 Topps Ted Williams and 1954 Topps Stan Musial card! Both players had exclusives with Bowman in the early 50's and as a result did not have Topps cards. Now you can own them!
* Whitey Ford left baseball to serve his country in the Korean War; as a result Whitey never had a '52 Topps card. Now you can...
* Nolan Ryan broke into the Big Leagues in '66 with the Mets, but it wasn't until '68 that Nolan got his rookie card. Now you can get his '67!

All cards will be sequentially numbered and delivered on beautiful eTopps technology. We will offer autographs on many of these cards, which will make them even more special!

The Cards That Never Were will be offered starting Monday August 6th at 1pm EST. The collection will be offered weekly and over time so please be sure to visit eTopps often!


And while Topps didn't end up going with all the guys and issues I had proposed (I still think a 1951 Bowman DiMaggio would be cool, and a 1966 card of Masanori Murakami would go over huge right about now, what with the renewed interest in all things Japanese baseball), the checklist they did decide on is pretty strong, plus there will be autographed versions available. There are 12 subjects in the set, including the ones pictured in this post.

The set doesn't officially debut until August 6th, offered through the eTopps site.

Ben Sells Out, This Time For Real

I have some news. It seems the establishment understands the need for a fresh perspective, and so this week I started publishing on Beckett.com.

They asked that I join their site and I was happy to oblige. Starting next week, my writing will go up on Beckett.com on Mondays and Thursdays of every week. I will continue to write on the blog, and hope to have different content in both places (though there may be double-postings). I'm not sure exactly where on the site my commentary will appear. As of now it's listed with the other headlines and under 'Baseball Buzz,' though I'm not sure if that's a permanent placement.

I hope you as reader do not feel that I'm turning my back on you. If anything, my goal is to bring a more independent, critical voice to the very place that needs it most.

The (Long) Road to The Hall

Every time I go through a few stacks of loose cards, more and more old cards of Hall of Famers seem to pop up. It’s weird. Back in the mid-Nineties, these were the geezers either just retiring or getting ready to call it quits. Guys like George Brett, Paul Molitor, Nolan Ryan and Tony Gwynn, Andre Dawson, Cal Ripken and Dale Murphy. You wanted their card, sure, but it was obvious that the extended youth movement could only occur with their collective exit.

Well, it appears the joke was on us. Hideo Nomo? While it’s unlikely that he’s selling used cars somewhere or greeting guests on a riverboat casino, he sure as hell isn’t wending his way to the Hall of Fame. Neither is any guy named Jason Bere, Jeffrey Hammonds or Raul Mondesi. And what of those old timers? Now they’re baseball immortals. Regular cards of these guys used to be cheap (except Hobby Gods Ripken and Ryan), and now that they’re frozen in carbonite in Cooperstown, most rookie and early card prices have jumped accordingly.

Wait a minute… Dale Murphy’s not in the Hall of Fame. And neither is Andre Dawson. You know, it’s funny: I always just assumed that guys like Dawson and Murphy would waltz into the Hall. In fact, there’s a whole gang of old players who seem poised on the precipice of enshrinement (or at least eventual Veteran’s Committee acceptance), but whose denial wouldn’t surprise me.

From these same few loose stacks I pulled cards of twenty-nine ex-players who might fit this description:

Guys Who Once Had a Shot, However Minor, But Probably Not Anymore
Steve Garvey, Dave Parker
Vince Coleman, Dwight Gooden
Don Mattingly, Andy Van Slyke
Ron Gant, Tim Raines
Frank Viola, Mark McGwire
Jose Canseco, Lance Parrish
Fernando Valenzuela, Will Clark
Juan Gonzalez, Jack McDowell

Guys Who Will Probably Be Voted in By the Veterans’ Committee
Orel Hershiser, Jim Rice
Bert Blyleven, Lee Smith
David Cone, Dale Murphy

Guys Who Will Make It In
Andre Dawson
Rich Gossage
Fred McGriff

Guys I’m On The Fence About
Andres Galarraga, Joe Carter
Dave Stewart, Bernie Williams
Jack Morris

Also, I only found six guys who’ve retired in the last few years who I would say are a lock for the Hall: Roberto Alomar, Jeff Bagwell, Rickey Henderson, Barry Larkin, Edgar Martinez and Larry Walker (you know, I’m not entirely sure that Walker’s retired). And yet, if the case of Jim Rice has proven anything, it’s that you can be one of the game’s biggest stars, put up mind-blowing stats for your career (or at least three-fourths of your career) and still be denied entry, year after year.

So what about their cards? And really, by ‘cards’ I mean only those issued during the retired player’s active playing days. Being enshrined in Cooperstown can do wonders for the value of a player’s cards (just ask Bruce Sutter). But what about those players who don’t quite make it? It would follow that their cards aren’t really worth very much, if anything at all. That’s the problem with speculating in baseball cards: there aren’t many things an ex-player can do to validate his career. If a player falls just short of enshrinement, all the great stats in the world don’t really matter.

I really hate to be one for ‘all or nothing’ type arguments. I tend to think that there’s a large gulf of gray area in between the poles in any argument. But when it comes to value in baseball cards, there’s just no way that a card of Sam McDowell will ever be worth as much as a Bob Gibson, or a Jack McDowell as much as a Roger Clemens. Quite simply, for all the dominance of Sam and Jack on the mound, neither one is a Hall of Famer and neither one is ever likely to be a Hall of Famer. OK, I can think of one instance where it doesn’t matter if the guy’s in the Hall: Gil Hodges. Still, I’d bet you that if he were in, his cards would be worth more than they are.

Next time you’re scanning the box scores, reading the paper or attending a card show, watch the guys whose careers are drawing to a close. Are they still dominating, or are they coasting into retirement? I can think of maybe a handful of active players towards the ends of their careers who have a legitimate Hall of Fame shot:

Mike Piazza, John Smoltz
Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux
Ken Griffey, Jr., Frank Thomas
Craig Biggio, Roger Clemens

Barry Bonds deserves his own category, because while he truly dominated in ways that McGwire and Sosa could only dream about, what he does and how he handles himself in the next six to eight years will determine where he—and his cards—will spend eternity.

A Herd of Goatees

There has been nearly a ticker-tape parade’s worth of commentary and appreciation for ‘The Return of the Baseball Mustache, Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Grow Some Goddamned Facial Hair.'

But I’m sorry—is the rest of the country blind? Pro athletes have had a passion for facial hair for the past three or four years. Have others already forgotten that Johnny Damon lived under a rock for an off-season and grew an Old Man in the Mountain, Father Time birdhouse beard? And have they not noticed the plague of the goatee that has spread across professional sports? I hold in my hand a stack of 59 cards, taken from 2006 and 2007 Topps, of players and managers sporting a sideless beard.

I, for one, am happy that the mustache is coming back. I was just watching Sean Penn in The Assassination of Richard Nixon and his character’s mustache comes to symbolize the pent-up desperation and aggression rattling around inside. What are baseball players if not vehicles for our vicarious expression of emotion? And hell, any college senior can tell you the goatee won’t help you score…unless you hang out at a Viennese coffee house, trading Marxist barbs and passing off variations on permanent revolution theory as your own with your fellow Trotskyites, or you have a card table on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley and sell “Don’t Blame Me, I Voted For McGovern” bumper stickers. Then you need all the help you can get.

Question from Reader

I get a lot of email from readers. Sometimes I can answer them and sometimes I need to enlist the help of others. If you have an idea of a card for this reader, please leave a comment on this post or email me and I'll make sure they receive it. A time capsule is a good idea (God knows I tried it at least once) so try to get past the part about being able to predict the future in terms of prospective card value. -Ben

Dear Card Blog:

I am putting a time capsule together for my grandson who just turned 2 in June. I am placing a variety of items in the container (letter from great grandparents, grandparents and momentos from them, some of his baby items, info/pics of his parents, comical adult size Tshirt, 18 yr old birthday cards, etc.) and I want to include Andy Pettitte baseball cards when he was an Astro in 2005. My grandson was born June 18, 2005 in the same hospital at around the same time as Pettitte's son. A picture was taken of the nurse's assignment board that displayed both of their names. Also, Andy Pettitte pitched at the first Astro baseball game my grandson attended.

What I would like for you to tell me is, are there any worthwhile card(s) available of him during that time that could possibly be of some value by 2023 when he will open his capsule?

Willie "The Dupe" Dipkin

Why am I only finding out about this card now? I'm serious, this is awesome. Given out at Comic Con in 1994 by Bongo & Skybox to promote the upcoming Simpsons set (which is a great little set, if you're a Simpsons fan, and can be had today for under $20), this is an almost perfect parody of the Bill Ripken '89 Fleer card. Also, does anybody know where one can buy a fitted Springfield Isotopes hat?

Speaking of the Ripkens, recent pictures of Cal make it seem that he just has to learn to smile with bottom teeth sticking out and make his eyes real wide to be able to start his second career: as an Uncle Fester impersonator.

Michael O'Keeffe Reading: 7/19/07, NYC

I'm not sure if this will happen given the weather, but for those of you who live in the New York City area, author Michael O'Keeffe will be doing a reading tomorrow (Thursday, July 19) at 6:30pm in Madison Square Park (23rd Street @ Broadway).

It's part of Madison Square Reads 2007. O'Keeffe is joined on the bill by Jonathan Eig, author of Opening Day: The Story of Jackie Robinson’s First SeasonOpening Day: The Story of Jackie Robinson’s First Season.

Reader Pack Blogging: The Joys of Bait-n-Switch

When it gets hot in New York City, I get clumsy. It's like my muscles forget how to move in the correct fashion. I bump into things, I get sloppy at my job and I can pretty much forget about typing a sentence, let alone an essay. So while I wanted to write about the hobby's recent lack of iconic cards, I just couldn't muster the strength. Lucky for me, I received this in email yesterday. Reader Andrew learns to find baseball card love as he takes us through a shitty bait-n-switch eBay buy. Enjoy.


I saw an auction on ebay where someone was selling a bunch of old wax packs from anywhere from the late 70's to early 90's. The seller had testimonials posted of people getting good rookies in these packs (Mattingly, Boggs, Ripken, Griffey Jr, etc) and they received good overall feedback. I bought two lots for 15 bucks each and hoped for the best.

Well, they came and I was pretty unimpressed. A bunch of 1988 topps, 1990 score, 1988-1990 donruss, one pack of 1992 stadium club, one 1990 fleer ultra, some 1990-1991 fleer was mostly what I got. I don't want to say I felt cheated...but yeah.

Thought I'd go back and recap some of the cards I got live blogging style. Hope you enjoy.

1990 Fleer Larry Walker- Looks like an albino in this picture. I'm assuming this was a rookie card for Larry, as the stats on the back of him are from a limited stint in 1989.

1990 Fleer Craig Biggio- Pretty cool, just got his 3,000th hit. I often wonder what the percentage of active players would be if you were to go back to a set from 1990 or so. I can think of 5 that'd be active from 1990 Fleer: Biggio, Clemens, Griffey Jr, Bonds, Sosa...am I missing anyone?

1990 Fleer Steve Balboni- This guy always cracked me up. Looks like the Yankees found him hanging outside of the corner Italian restaurant on the way to the Stadium and told him to suit up. On this card, it looks like he's looking into the dugout trying to see if anyones stealing his leftovers.

1990 Score Bo Jackson ASG MVP- Great card. The front has pic of Bo just crushing that pitch to lead off the game, the back has a nice pic of Bo with the MVP trophy. it's simple, the pictures are great and it hearkens back to a time where Bo was on top of the sports world. Never seen this card before, but it's already one of my favorites. How can you not like Bo Jackson?

1990 Score Dave Dravecky- This is a nice card with Dravecky tipping his hat to the crowd, his arm in a sling. The back is pretty cool, its just one line of career totals and it reads like a newspaper column with GIANT COURAGE as the headline and goes on to talk about his battle with cancer. Instead of a face pic, its him throwing in the pen and has a caption in tiny tiny print. It's like a common tribute card. I kind of like 1990 Score for some reason.

1988 Fleer Slugging Sophomores Joyner & Snyder- Man, I bet this was a hot card. "Wally World" was in full effect and um...Cory Snyder had that 1987 SI baseball preview cover and was kick ass on a Nintendo game. Snyder looks like he should be trying to pick up underage chicks at a drive in movie theatre instead of being a big leaguer. Thats what the pic reminds me of anyway.

1988 Fleer Barry Bonds- Skinny arms and a skinny head. Pre-roids Bonds.

1989 Fleer Candy Sierra- Who the fuck is Candy Sierra? That's a porn star name if there ever was one.

1992 Stadium Club John Kruk- Krukkie looks like he's booking it towards the buffet line at Sizzler. Big shocker. Stadium Club cards always smelled like ass, did anyone else ever notice that? Other than that, I liked this set, good photos and a simplistic, borderless design.

1989 Donruss Kirby Puckett- I could go on, but I'll end this live blog here. I know I wasn't initially thrilled with the years of packs I got, but I pulled some good cards. I was hoping I'd get some more packs from the early 1980's but whatever.

The 1989 Donruss Puckett card was on top of the pack that I opened and...I was 8 years old in 1989, collecting cards like a fiend. Puckett was in his 5th year or so...and now he's a dead Hall of Famer, gone way, way before his time. I haven't looked at my old cards in awhile and maybe I will here shortly, but one of the things I felt when ripping through these packs was a sense of nostalgia, not just for opening packs but for baseball and the players that were on the cards.

Here's Puckett in what looks to be a spring training game in the late 80's and he has no idea what lays ahead of him for the rest of his career. I liken this feeling I have to how Ray Kinsella talked about his father when he saw him as a younger man at the end of "Field of Dreams"... "He's got his whole life in front of him, and I'm not even a glint in his eye." Makes sense in my head.

I thought about how I was opening these packs and pulled a Bo Jackson, a Roger Clemens, Puckett, Bonds, Strawberry, Brett, Biggio...and even to a lesser extent other players like Gregg Olson, who was the 1989 Rookie of the Year and one of my favorite Orioles. It's like I flashed back to how I felt as a kid when I pulled one of these guys in a pack and felt a little thrill, I still felt that thrill...then that moment was gone as I realized I'm 25 and now know the outcomes of these guys that no one could have predicted 16, 17 years ago, not even them. I felt that thrill when I pulled a 1990 Score Darryl Strawberry and saw his sweet follow through and then realized he wasted his career. I felt that thrill when I pulled a 1989 Donruss MVP George Brett with his trademark intense look and felt satisfied that he saw his career all the way through to Cooperstown. I felt that thrill when I pulled a Barry Bonds, smiling at me...and realized that this guy cheated, took steroids and is a few days away from breaking a cherished record. I felt that thrill when I pulled a Cal Ripken and remembered how I felt when I was at those games where he tied and broke the Streak. I felt that thrill when I pulled a Gregg Olson rookie and realized that only die hard Orioles fans probably remember who he was and his amazing 12-6 curveball.

And I felt that thrill when I pulled that Kirby Puckett, young and brimming with potential, still in the first half of his Hall of Fame career that would be cut short, standing in the batters box in a spring training game, captured in such a simplistic moment and realized that he's no longer with us.

And I realized why I love baseball cards and why they still mean so much and somehow, some way they can still have an effect and tug at your heart.



Do you have a baseball card experience you'd like to share? Email me and I may post it on The Blog!

Topps Archives: The Commons

If you don't read Chris Harris's Stale Gum, then you're missing out on about half of your daily allotment of baseball card-related reading (The Baseball Card Blog being the other half). Harris recently answered my post "The State of the Hobbyist" with a post on Stale Gum asking collectors to assume the role of Baseball Card God and create the brand lineup for 2008.

It's a fun idea, one that got me thinking less about what I would or would not include in my set lineup and more about the sets that the companies should be making. Here's one for the Topps Company.

OK, hear me out: Topps has pretty much exhausted the 'Let's Make Money Off Our' Archives product line, right? Wrong. OK, here it is: Topps Archives: The Commons. I'm thinking this set would be just like the jumble of cards that is Archives, only without stars. Or even semistars. And maybe not even minor stars. Well, maybe some minor stars. Just think how great it would be to rip open a pack and get Joe Sambito, Rey Quiones, Dave Ricketts, Ike Delock, Daniel Cabrera, Haywood Sullivan and Bruce Bochte. Now that's a helluva pack right there.

And the beautiful thing about this set (for Topps) is that you could literally produce this set for five or ten or twenty years without ever repeating a card. They wouldn't even need to reproduce the cards. They could just go to their warehouse, scoop up a random bunch of cards and send them through the foilstamper. Or, they could be hand-stamped with a rubber stamp. How could you lose? And I've got the insert set and parallel all worked out (not that you'd need them, since a set like this would practically sell itself):

• Insert set: Flags of the World (60 flags from the 1960s) (10 per box)
• Parallel set 1: Creases: creased cards (50 per box)
• Parallel set 2: Tape'n'Tacks: cards marked with distinction (and with tape and tacks) (3 per box)

Oh, I almost forgot--autographs! What's a Topps Archives set without a billion autographs? Well, here's where this set will be really special: Instead of randomly-inserted autograph cards, there will be redemption cards featuring ex-major leaguers. Each redemption card will be for an afternoon with the pictured ex-major leaguer.

Just think of all the fun to be had! Your afternoon could possibly include:
-A Visit to Family Court
-Picking Up Dry Cleaning
-Drinking at a Bar
-Waiting in a Doctor's Office
-Driving Around!

(Your afternoon will most likely be spent Sittin' n' Spittin')

I'm thinking Topps would initially greenlight two series of 1,000 cards each. Boxes would look like shoeboxes and there would be 500 cards per box. I don't know how many packs that would be, but the packs would be wax, not foil. Hell, maybe the cards wouldn't even come in packs. Maybe they'd just be loose. That might make it more fun.

The State of the Hobbyist

Are collectors happy?

It’s hard to give an easy answer to such a difficult question, but after reading this week’s messages, it seems a change from today’s status quo wouldn’t be so bad. In fact, it may even be preferred.

If you haven’t been on The Baseball Card Blog over the past week, readers have been sending in their input on what makes a set great and what the perfect, yet-to-be-produced set should include.

Whether or not they come right out and say it, collectors want a set to be easy. Give a set enough base cards so that everybody on a team’s 25-man roster gets a card, a few subsets, one or two base insert sets and a few ‘valuable’ relic/autograph cards and that’s enough. Throw in rookie cards of actual rookies, All-Stars and team cards and that’s it. Really.

The Thesis of The Modern Card Collector

The writing is on the wall: Collectors are tired of confusing, multi-tiered parallel sets, endless ‘mirror’ sets (like Topps’ Mickey Mantle Home Run History), useless and worthless inserts and other bells and whistles that take their energy away from completing the set and needlessly drive up the cost of packs and boxes.

From the sound of it, give the average collector cards that look and feel like 1986 Topps or 1990 Upper Deck and they’d be content. Stuff 15 cards into a pack and charge less than a dollar per.

But it can’t be so simple, can it? I mean, The Hobby is not in the same place today as it was in the late 1980s. A manufacturer can’t simply stop producing relics, autographs and other insert sets that drive today’s pack sales. They’d be out of business.

But what they can do is ease up. Go back to the years right before the Upper Deck Era started (1986-1988) and learn from the great sets of the Eighties. Sets with iconic photography, full stat lines and Minor league stats for the younger guys. Sets where a rookie card meant something. Take the great things out of these sets and create a new take on the remaining Flagship brands: Fleer, Topps and Upper Deck. Don’t push a thousand insert cards through the Flagship; make collectors go to other brands for those. Ease up on the mirror cards and make a parallel set that’s easy to collect (if you make one at all).

The funny thing about all of this is that for all the woe-is-me gloom and dooming I do around here, I’m still the Guy Pushing Thirty Spending More Time Than Necessary In The Baseball Card Aisle At Target/Kmart/Wal-Mart/Toys’R’Us. And as much as I outwardly hate the idea of pouring money down the drain for new cards, I still want new cards. I like opening packs. I like putting together sets. I’m guiltily addicted to That New Card Smell.

And like many other collectors, I’m concerned for my hobby. I don’t want companies to stop making new cards. I just want them to make them better.

That’s not so much to ask, is it?

What Do Collectors Want?

Thanks to a never-ending stream of mainstream news articles, we are aware of what's going on in the boardrooms and back rooms of our favorite card companies. But what about in the product development departments? What are they up to? Presumably, Upper Deck will have a lot on its shoulders should it capture Topps: if the cards aren't right for 2008 and beyond, wouldn't it follow that collectors would show their disgust and demand better cards? Or spend their money on other things?

But what is it, exactly, that makes a card set great to today's collectors? Admittedly, what I would consider the cornerstones of a great set are probably not relevant to the collector weaned on inserts, autographs and relic cards, short prints, parallels and refractors. Do today's collectors (and by 'today's collectors' I mean collectors that specialize in new sets) really want insert sets like Topps' 'Generation NOW', or do they want it because they are told to want it? I don't know if I have a definite answer, though I'm leaning towards the latter.

We all want to see the hobby flourish, right? When even the most pessimistic readers write that they see card collecting as a dead hobby, there's a pang of sadness in their words. No one wants to see the hobby die. So wouldn't it follow that the card companies (or company) would make it a habit of listening to collectors before they create another crappy set that no one can afford?

And even if it turns out the companies don't want to add it to their agendas, I want to know. That's why I'm writing today.

Leave a comment to this post and tell me what you want to see in a set and what you think makes a set great. Ask your friends, go into the shops and ask dealers, other collectors, guys at shows, the message boards you post on, the guys and girls you trade with or even the man on the street. Everybody's got an opinion on what baseball cards and the act of collecting means to them. Now's the time to express it.

Early Nineties Countdown: #53 to 50

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
The Pyramids of Egypt.
The Great Wall of China.
The Astrodome.

When you think of the great wonders of man, these items usually float to the surface. Well, I’d like to add one more to the list: The Jeff Bagwell Rookie Card.

Why should the Bagwell be on the list? I’m glad you asked. When Bagwell is inducted into the Hall of Fame, he may be the first Hall of Famer whose rookie card is worth less than ten dollars. Tell me: how do you explain that?

I’m sure the first thing you’ll mention is that Bagwell came on the scene at the height of card production in 1991, so his cards are worthless because there were so many of them. Maybe you’ll add that because there were so many of them, everybody had one so no one would pay that much for something they already had. Or maybe you’ll say that Bagwell wasn’t that big of a deal when he broke in, so there’s really no point in getting worked up over nothing. Also, didn’t he hit a boatload of home runs during the steroid era?

It’s true, all of these things are going against him, but the facts are like this: Bagwell was National League Rookie of the Year in 1991, he consistently excelled for over ten years, he was a perennial All-Star and all of his home runs were clean. Plus, he played for one major league team for his entire career—not too many guys of his generation can say that (I’m looking at a checklist of 1991 rookies right now and only Tim Salmon and Chipper Jones fit that category).

#53. 1991 Upper Deck
Including Bagwell in the regular set was a smart move for Upper Deck, as it provided added oomph to the high series and allowed the Final Edition to stand on its own as a look-ahead to 1992, featuring rookies Thome, Lofton, Klesko, Rondell White, Pudge Rodriguez, Dmitri “I Collect Only 10s” Young and of course Pedro J. Martinez (his only card from 1991).

In fact, the checklist for this set is incredibly well balanced in terms of debuting rookies. The Low Series had cards of Phil Plantier, Eric Karros, Mike Mussina and Chipper Jones, plus first cards (not rookies) of Mo Vaughn, Chuck Knoblauch and Frank Thomas giving everybody the finger. The High Series had Jeff Bagwell and Final Edition had everyone mentioned earlier.

But rookies alone can’t save this set from mediocrity. Enter the Heroes of Baseball insert series. Upper Deck really went hog wild with the inserts in 1991, with 45 different cards, plus five autographed cards (Hank Aaron, hobby workhorse Nolan Ryan, plus Harmon Killebrew, Fergie Jenkins and Gaylord Perry), up from ten inserts and one autograph in 1990.

And yet, even with the Bagwell Rookie, the Chipper card and the Pedro Final Edition card, plus the extra-curricular help from the Heroes, this set is still lousy. Who’s to blame? Maybe it was the cheap card stock that made the cards stick together. Maybe it was the crappy design that seemed to take up more front of card space than in years past. Or maybe it was that the hobby was catching on that Upper Deck, though expensive looking, autograph-loaded and hologram-encrusted, was a one-trick pony (insert autographs and they will come). And they were tired of that one trick.


#52. 1994 Stadium Club
Remember Stadium Club? Remember how it used to be three series? Jesus, they made a lot of cards in this set. And don’t forget that they made two parallel sets this year: First Day Issue and Golden Rainbow. And the funny thing about all of this was that I never knew a single person who cared. You know what I mean? Seriously, did anybody know someone who put together an entire Golden Rainbow set from 1994? And what kind of name is ‘Golden Rainbow’ anyway?

In 1991, when Topps debuted Stadium Club, no other set ever made had featured full-bleed color photography on every card. And yet by 1994, just three short years later, the full-bleed photo had become a sports card cliché. What had made Stadium Club the shit to rock in 1991 was keeping it down by 1994. Add a tired post-Grunge zine-style American Typewriter freeware font and faux cool ripped look on the front and ugly graphics, utterly ridiculous text treatments and nonsensical statistics on the back and you’ve got yourself a truly forgettable design.

I never could figure out what was worse: the prospect that because there were so many of these cards I could never ever complete even the most basic set, or the fact that I was repeatedly suckered into purchasing $1.25 packs even though I knew the first part was true.


#51. 1993 Topps
Topps ’93, in one word or less: disappointing. I had a lot riding on 1993 being a good year for The Flagship, but it was just, well… boring. And it had so much going for it: two-headed All-Star cards, four-headed rookies, a Draft Picks subset with Jeter and a Coming Attractions subset with Jim Edmonds, plus full-color headshot/mini-action shots on the back (Topps’ first set since 1971 with a back-of-card headshot and the first time ever in color). And who can forget the hologram explosion disco that was Topps Black Gold?

1992 Topps, with its clean, modern Craftsman-style lines and thin uncoated stock, is one of my favorite sets of all time, so I guess you can chalk up my lackadaisical attitude to the fact that Topps made a change for 1993 and printed the cards on a sort of thick, smooth coated cardboard stock. On the new cardboard, the whites seemed really white, almost teeth-gleaming white, while the other colors sort of all blended together, which made the white borders seem all the thicker. I also could never get the corners to bend and fray. That might seem like a godsend to most collectors, but as a purist it almost feels like Topps was cheating the system. I wonder how many graded 1993 Topps Jeters there are out there at 9 or better. I would bet quite a few, simply because those corners were made of steel. Coated white cardboard steel.


#50. 1993 Stadium Club
Topps Writer 1: There must be some mistake.
Topps Writer 2: I’m telling you, there isn’t.
Topps Writer 1: But…we just did one of these sets last year. Wasn’t that enough?
Topps Writer 2: Man, how long you been playing this game? It’s never enough. Just when you finish one they’re on you about the next one and the next one and the next. It never ends.
Topps Writer 1: Jeez… Do you think people really buy all this stuff?
Topps Writer 2: Who knows…
Topps Writer 1: Hey, I’m being serious here. Does anybody really even want another one of these sets?
Topps Writer 2: Hey man, I only work here…
[BEAT]
Topps Writer 1: …Do you ever feel like you’re wasting your life?

The funniest thing about Stadium Club circa 1993 was that their best set of the year wasn’t even produced for general hobbyist consumption, but in a specially boxed set distributed solely at Toys ‘R’ Us. The cards, despite sporting the trademark Stadium Club full-bleed photo, were flimsy, cheap, had beginner’s guide to graphic design front and back graphics and featured end-of-the-roll type photos, like this great one of Sheff striking out with a guy in a skirt in the background straddling part of the dugout, or whatever it is he’s doing back there. Plus, the cards were stamped with just enough gold foil to make them feel legit. It was a great set. I wish I could remember who was in it.




Baseball Funnies

What do you call Jose Canseco without the juice?


Ozzie Canseco


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