The Equation: Joe Oliver Edition

Here's today's equation.

Back in the early 1970s, Jim Henson and the Muppets adapted a few fairy tales, including The Frog Prince. In the Henson retelling, there is a character called Taminella Grinderfall. I think you can still find these TV specials on VHS, if not DVD.

Taminella Grinderfall 

+

Terry Gilliam in this cast photo of Monty Python's Flying Circus (far right)

 

=

Crazy Joe Oliver, circa 1992

"You want home plate? Come and take it!"

Besties

Mike Piazza, 1995 Upper Deck

Eric Karros: This guy is just too good at baseball! Argh! I’m going to strangle him with my baseball bat!

Mike Piazza: Ha, ha … dude, I’m on your team, don’t do it!

Karros: I don’t care, argh! Strangle … ha, ha!

Piazza: Ha … clears throat. Alright, man, that's enough. See you out there in a bit.

Cameraman: Hey, wait a minute. I like that good-natured ribbing about you wanting to strangle him with your bat. Can you come back here and do that again?

Karros: Oh, man, I don’t know. This is Mike’s card. I don’t want to be a card bomber. I mean … Mike?

Piazza: Oh, uh … no, man. Doesn’t really matter to me. You uh … sure that’s the shot you want? Him about to strangle me with a bat?

Cameraman: Oh yeah, it’s perfect. Since this is your All-Star card, my original thought was to have you heroically hitting a mammoth home run off into the distant sky, your muscles bulging out of your crisp uniform, mustache glistening in the setting sun. But now I think it would be better if we just had Eric Karros playfully trying to choke you with his bat.

Karros: You know, Mike, it would be cool to show everyone how well we get along. We ARE pretty much best friends ...

Cameraman: Exactly.

Piazza: Yeah, I mean, well ... okay, maybe I wouldn't say best friends, but I guess it would be nice to show kids I don't hate you or anything. Do you think kids assume I don't get along with Eric, like we need a contrived photo shoot to prove it?

Karros: Well, ya' know, I don't like mustaches, you do. I use a black bat, you use a brown bat. People may assume we reside at opposite ends of the clubhouse and that we don't we don't playfully bust each others' balls. But hey, if you're not comfortable, Mike, it's f--

Piazza: Oh NO, NO, NO. That's not it at all. I just ... my only worry is that kids may assume this is a checklist card, and not my own All-Star card, that's all.

Cameraman: Is that ... is that really a concern of yours?

Piazza: I mean, yeah, a little bit. I remember how much checklist cards sucked from when I was a kid, and I don't want some kid to assume this is a checklist card, NOT turn it over, and then never discover what awesome stat of mine you put on the back, ya' know? That's all.

Cameraman: I'll make sure everyone knows it's your All-Star card, m'kay?

Piazza: Just ... you're not gonna use a term on the back like "playfully bust each others' balls," are you?

Cameraman: I won't do that. I don't think I will do that.

Piazza: Okay, alright, that's fine, that's fine. Let's uh ... let's do this then, I guess.

Karros: Argh, gonna strangle this guy!

Piazza: Alright, Eric, whoa, hang on! He's not even ready yet. Relax, dude. And can you back up with that thing? You're supposed to be pretend choking me.

Karros: Yeah, okay, my bad. Just trying to recapture the moment.

Cameraman: Alright, the two of you, smile! Say "besties!"

Piazza: Through smiling teeth ... If this comes back to haunt me I am seriously going to stick that bat up your a--

Karros: Through smiling teeth ... BESTIES!

UPDATE: Note that I had Eric Karros as Brett Butler before astute reader and non-idiot JasonP alerted me to the error. I honestly can't tell them apart in this picture even though Brett Butler was 50 years old every year.

Card vs. Card: Monday April 30

Dwight Gooden wins a squeaker 15 - 14. Check back tomorrow morning for a new Card vs. Card!

Card vs. Card - Friday, April 27

Today's Card vs. Card Winner

1991 Upper Deck Bert Blyleven

We'll rejoin jovial Bert on Monday, where the competition will be tough!

The Lost Awkwardness of the Combo Card

1964 Topps "Bill's Got It"

The combo card just ain't what it used to be. Used to be, a group of players would stand around on the sidelines either before a game (most often the All-Star Game or during spring training) or during practice, and awkwardly pose with members of their own or another team. Included in every Topps set from 1957 through 1969 (with the exception of 1965), nearly every Fleer set from 1982 on, Upper Deck sets from 1990 to 1993, and random other sets (including 1960 Leaf), combo cards were exciting to receive in a pack, pushing collectors to further idolize players on their favorite teams. The photos were posed, and the titles were usually clumsy alliterations or hackneyed exposition — to entice the collector to flip the card and read the description on the back (see "Bill's Got It," 1964 Topps). The writing was usually terrible, and the connection between the players weak or nonexistent (many writers have highlighted this with great success, including Mike Kenny, our talented and hilarious contributor here at The Baseball Card Blog).

Still, it was something to get a combo card. It showed the manufacturer — and the players themselves — had a playful side, that baseball wasn't all business. We wanted our heroes to take the game as seriously as we did, but we also wanted to know they knew how to joke around. It's this idea — separation of business and pleasure — that made the combo card important to their respective sets.

2007 Topps "Classic Combo"

For Topps, the sets that included combo cards were mostly endless oceans of faces. And once the regular player photo moved off the sidelines and the action shot became de rigueur (around 1970–1972), the posed-combo-card playfulness disappeared. What makes this interesting is that when Topps re-introduced the combo card in its flagship sets beginning in 2006, the manufacturer brought it back as another vehicle for its action photography. The new Topps "Classic Combos" lack the very essence of what made those earlier examples so exciting: the inherent awkwardness of posing for a photograph as a couple or a group.

Collectors' brains are now tuned to action shots—action is all we see on sports cards. But awkwardly posed groups of players, often together for only that one photograph? You rarely see that these days. It seems like everything's scripted; that when not playing, players are ushered from one place to another by people with clipboards and headsets.

1963 Topps (left); 2012 Topps Heritage (right)

This last bit is important for how the combo-card concept has been approached in Topps Heritage sets. The Heritage brand emulates the original vintage Topps sets of the 1950s and 1960s. For combo cards, that means the awkwardness of the posed sideline group. Because of tight schedules or whatever other reason, however, players are hardly ever photographed together for Heritage sets. Instead, their images are layered over each other during production to create the illusion that they posed together. Or—and here it is again—an in-game action shot is used.

2007 Topps Heritage "World Series Batting Foes" - layered images

So to celebrate the lost awkwardness of the combo card, see below for some of my favorites. And make sure to check out The Baseball Card Blog's Facebook page for another combo card I'd like to see.

Notes on the Upper Deck Social Media Awards

I'm a little late to this, and I'm sure others have touched on the many interesting points the Upper Deck Awards bring up, so I'll keep it brief.

• There seem to be two camps in the small world of blogging about baseball cards: Topps fans and Upper Deck fans. I'm not sure where I fit in, because I feel I've been critical of both sides. So then the question I have is this: would Upper Deck include a blog/website of a Topps fan in their nominated site choices? I mean, it's their ball; they can decide the rules.

• Chris Harris raises the question: Can a blog be considered among "the best" if it has less than 20 posts? I'm going to withhold judgment on this one, simply because "the best" is a rather arbitrary ranking that shouldn't be measured by how long a person's been doing what they do, but the quality of their work. Which brings me to my next point:

• How many bloggers out there are doing quality original work? Live-blogging a pack is no longer an original undertaking. Holding up your cards to your webcam? Nope. Giving your take on a sell sheet? Try again. Writing about your "big hit"? Snooze. Want to be a news source? Read Sports Collector's Daily, because Rich Mueller does it better than anybody.

For most people, writing a blog is about what they want to write about, not about wracking their brains for daring new things. But giving an award for work that can no longer be considered original?

I'm not writing this to be snarky or to suggest that The Baseball Card Blog warrants an award. It doesn't, at least not to commemorate the work I've done in the last two years (ie, very little). But there's only so much you can do with a blog devoted to baseball (or any other sport) trading cards.

If you want to read truly original work, head over to Josh Wilker's site, Cardboard Gods. There is no better baseball card blog on this here or any other World Wide Web, and the fact his site wasn't included in Upper Deck's list of nominees is a travesty of justice.

Thoughts on the Last 3 Years in the Card Industry

The following is pure conjecture – not fact, and should be treated as such.

I get emails from my local card shop, and in it I read today that Upper Deck canceled the remainder of its forthcoming baseball products, including Goudey (this must be what happens when you settle out of court with MLB Properties). I also read that the USA baseball stuff it was going to produce will now be produced by Topps. All of this is incredibly interesting to me, and not simply because I collect sports cards. It's interesting to me because it all boils down to one person.

In my opinion, all of this movement of the last year – official licensing, lawsuits, and the like – stems from Michael Eisner's involvement in Topps. And I'd say that Major League Baseball wants to be in bed with a big guy like him – not some small-pond guy like Richard McWilliam.

At Disney, Eisner was a big fish in one of the biggest ponds. He's a brand name all unto himself, and in the non-card universe, I'd bet more people have heard of Eisner than have heard of Topps, and certainly more than Upper Deck.

This latest development brings back the question: in 2007, why didn't Topps cave to Upper Deck's bid of a dollar more than Madison Dearborn's? Did Shorin know something about a wind of change at MLB Properties? Or was he simply looking out for the best interests of the company and the brand by a) not selling to their number-one competitor, and b) by brazenly puffing out his chest and selling the company his way (albeit not in the best interests of the shareholders) without kowtowing to the upstart? It could be a little of both. The other question is: did MLB Properties have a preference in who bought Topps?

I think Eisner has ushered in more good changes at Topps – a shift to the Web, with video and more meaningful interactions with the collector (not just customer service stuff) – than Upper Deck ever would have, or would have had reason to.

For Upper Deck to ever seriously think that Topps could be beaten in a one-on-one for exclusive MLB licensing is preposterous, especially with a heavy hitter like Eisner in the mix. So when 2010 Upper Deck debuted earlier this year, it seemed like the company was on a collision course with a court date.

Seriously, I get it that baseball is the biggest sport with the most money at stake, but why did Upper Deck produce a regular set without being able to show team logos? If they had to fill shipping quotas, keep the cash flow going until they could get rid of their baseball team, and hoodwink the public in the process, why didn't they put out a set like Studio? Or an innovative, every-card-is-autographed, prom-photo set of everybody in tuxedos? Instead, every card read like Upper Deck was thumbing its nose at Major League Baseball.

Also, it feels like Upper Deck doesn't get it that a Topps exclusivity now does not necessarily mean a Topps exclusivity in the future.

Yes, Upper Deck is losing millions now, but possibly not future millions. So why burn your bridges?

How to Make Relics Mean Something Again

Here's a funny thing to consider: the term "relic" means something from a bygone era, or of historical interest. Only recently has it taken on the connotations of game-used memorabilia. And only really recently has the term come to mean both: cards with game-used jersey swatches and bat shavings are in such proliferation that the idea no longer seems fresh.

So how do we remedy the situation? There's the argument that companies create less of these cards, but telling someone interested in making a profit to create less of something rings too naive. Instead, what if companies begin Game-Date Stamping?

A year ago I was all up in arms because Topps rammed the Generation NOW insert set down the hobby's throat. But there was an interesting idea at the root of those cards: the celebration of an individual achievement. The problem was that it was replicated ad nauseam. But what if companies married the two––relic cards and Generation NOW--together?

I read yesterday that Major League Baseball is asking teams to collect all the bats that break over the course of this season. Card companies should buy up those broken bats, keep records of those games in which they broke, and then serial-stamp the date of the game onto cards containing a shaving of the broken bat.

Let me put it another way. Which would you rather have: A bat card of Jason Varitek, or a bat card of Jason Varitek stamped with the game date of the bat's final use? I think Game-Date Stamping would inject life into the state of game-used memorabilia cards.

On Upper Deck's 2008 SP Legendary Cuts

I'm at least a month late on this topic (what else is new, right?), but it's gotten me thinking. There have been a ton of errors and misprints that have highlighted card releases over the course of sports card history, but how many times have there been issues with the handling of image rights?

The two most famous examples I can think of are Ted Williams and Bowman in 1954, and the T206 Honus Wagner. It's more believable than the folklore of Wagner not wanting to inadvertently endorse cigarettes (Wagner had his own brand of tobacco).

There have also been a few instances where Topps recreated cards after the fact from lack of image rights at the time, like in a few instances for the MVPs subset from its 1975 set (Roy Campanella's card on the 1955 MVPs card was not in the original 1955 set as he was under contract with Bowman), and the fake 1962 Maury Wills card recreated for a Turn Back the Clock card from the 1987 Topps set (Wills was never offered a Topps contract until later in his career; his first Topps card comes in the 1969 set).

But I can't think of as serious an image rights problem in the last 20 years as the one going on right now between Upper Deck and Topps. If you're unfamiliar with the situation, it evolved from a contract Topps recently signed with CMG Worldwide, which grants the company exclusivity in creating cards with the likenesses of some of baseball's deceased all-time greats.

It's a major issue because apparently Upper Deck didn't get the memo: its 2008 SP Legendary Cuts product features cards (and memorabilia) of some of the players now under contract with Topps. Topps is suing Upper Deck over the issue, and has requested a halt to distribution of the product.

The problem? You guessed it: some of the product has already made its way to market. So while other sportscards sites were quick to dismiss SP Legendary Cuts as a lousy, overpriced set when the sell sheets came out months ago, you'd have to think that this will become a lightning rod set for the rest of the year.


Read more:

SP Legendary Cuts Preview (Wax Heaven)
Round 2? Topps Suing Upper Deck (Sportscard Daily)

The Year is 3 MGCE (Modern Gimmick Card Era)

I've been thinking about gimmick cards the last few days and about a comment left on a previous post. The comment asked how I could label something both 'tiresome and predictable' and 'fun.' Here's what I meant.

Gimmick cards, when handled individually, are fun. Whether a dopey parody, a card written in Japanese or an obviously doctored photo, it's fun to get a card that's different from the rest of the set.

But then step back and look at the Gimmick Card Era our hobby has fallen into. It's an idea that's now central to the livelihood of the hobby. Every year there's a new handful of cards that don't really have anything to do with the rest of their sets. Their presence feels a little cheap to me. Like maybe the hobby's hit hard times.

It makes me think that maybe companies have lost their focus and are a little too in love with generating publicity. That maybe instead of (or most likely in addition to) resorting to gimmicks a company should invest more in making their product(s) better. By 'better' I really mean 'less sloppy': cutting out unintentional errors, using higher quality photography and greenlighting a more cohesive card design.

By elevating the overall strength of the set, gimmick cards don't have to do too much of the heavy lifting and collectors don't feel as disappointed if/when they don't find one in their pack or box.

To summarize: Gimmick cards: Fun (individually). The Gimmick Era: a tiresome and predictable skein of publicity stunts that hides the true sloppiness of the products involved.



The title of this post refers to the current year in the Gimmick Card Era. I'm torn as to when the era starts, so I've slapped 'Modern' on the front and had it start in 2006.

Here's a Gimmick: Make Your Base Set Better

I'm on the road this week in the Pacific Northwest. So without complete and steady access to a computer, the first thing I did in my brief Internet session today was check out Stale Gum to see what's been on Chris Harris' mind about cards lately. After reading his complete rundown on Topps gimmick cards, I agreed with his assessment: these cards are bullshit.

Sometime last year after Topps rolled out their Derek Jeter "error" card, I warned that Topps should watch out or people would start to wonder about their motive surrounding the sudden appearance of other high-profile "error" cards. Well, patterns have developed. In 2006 we had Alex Gordon. 2007 brought us Jeter. And now for 2008 we're awash in a veritable tidal wave of errors, variations and gimmicks. It's that last word (gimmicks) that's really a slap in the face of the collector.

Maybe the card companies see the gimmick cards as public relations efforts within the base set, or loss leaders (like relic and autographed cards) to help sell packs. I don't know. What I do know is that their presence is tiresome, relentless and completely predictable. But are they fun? Sure, they're fun, but shouldn't the fun be in the base set? Shouldn't every card be fun?

I'm going to re-issue my warning: Card companies Topps and Upper Deck should know better, by now, of falling into the gimmick trap. You need to sell more cards? Make the core of your base set better.

Stuff to Read & Monitor

To read

• Head over to Slate.com to read Darren Rovell's piece on the glory that is the '89 Upper Deck Ken Griffey.

• Start reading Sportscards Uncensored if you don't already. The writer has a voice that should definitely be heard. Also, as the title suggests, he likes to swear. A lot.

• Read Adam McFarland's Sports Lizard Rant. He's much more eloquent than I'll ever hope to be.


To monitor

• The general consensus is that Toppstown is going to be stupid. But let me say this: if and when I start buying Topps Series 2, I'm going to start entering codes, if only to see if I can find the secret hatch that makes the thing disappear. (By the way, if Toppstown is a hit, that probably means The Upper Deck ain't too far behind. Also, an enterprising card blogger would get him or herself in there on the ground floor and start the Toppstown alternative weekly. Call it something like The Michigan Test-Wax Tribune and I might have my anthropomorphic baseball cards read it.)

Taking Bullshit to New Heights

Some heavy stuff 'round here lately, eh? Seems the hobby might not be as rosy-tinted as I'd like to believe. Lucky for me, the card companies are in an arms race for who can make the craziest bullshit cards. This has been going on for decades, but only now does it seem to be really out of control.

A few years ago I did an interview for Midweek's Take One where I said that I was waiting for a card of Johnny Damon's beard shavings from when he left the Red Sox to join the facial hair-less Yankees. And if not that, then a sweat-drenched card of anyone in particular, as that was the way things were going circa early 2006. So don't you love it when life answers your prayers?

First Topps included a strand of George Washington's favorite powdered wig. And now Upper Deck is taking it a step further: The Hair Cut Signatures series, to be released over at least two products (SP Legendary Baseball and Piece of History Baseball). You got your Babe Ruth, your George Washington, an Andrew Jackson, Abe Lincoln and Alexander Hamilton. What, no Chester A. Arthur?

Each card will include a strand of hair and a cut signature. See, I'd be more impressed if Upper Deck had built a time machine and sent a sunglasses-clad Richard McWilliam with Sharpie in hand back to get Hamilton et al to sign on the card. Also, it would be interesting to see if McWilliam's actions in the past changed the present enough to make Upper Deck disappear.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #8. 1990 Donruss

By 1990, Donruss and the other baseball card companies were beginning to understand that their industry was in a very different place from as little as three years before. Following the initial across-the-board quality of Upper Deck, the others suddenly found their market shares smaller. In order to stay competitive, they had to find the intersection between maintaining a traditional set and adapting to the competition with bells and whistles.

From what I can tell, Donruss’ idea of “bells and whistles” was to go red. Eye-catching, hellfire, mid-life crisis, love-it-or-hate-it red. That’s not to say their strategy didn’t work. I, for one, was both shocked and pleased to see them shake their black and blue funk (every year’s design from 1985 to 1989 had either been black or blue). The new color, coupled with the risk-taking cursive signature player name on the front, helped the set stand out in the crowd.

They made two other significant changes from the previous year. First, they put together a fantastic checklist with Diamond Kings you wanted, an intriguing “insert set” (MVPs), kick-ass ‘King of Kings’ and ‘5,000 Ks’ Nolan Ryan cards and one of the strongest Rated Rookie classes in years. Second, they let the presses fly without bothering to hire proofreaders.

Obviously that claim isn’t true, but consider the circumstances: just a year before, one of their competitors (Fleer) grabbed endless headlines after one of its cards (Billy Ripken) featured an obscenity. In order to prolong the news (or simply because they didn’t know how best to handle the situation), Fleer corrected the card not once but four different times throughout the season, resulting in five available versions of the card and guaranteeing a hard-to-find, highly collectible product.

Granted, it’s hard to monitor quality on every single card of a set, but 1990 Donruss featured eight error cards, with two of those being high-profile Nolan Ryan cards and one coming in the insert set (Glavine for Smoltz). Makes you wonder about motive.

Like other strong Donruss sets, in order for it to be truly great there had to be rookie balance over the entire checklist. This was certainly the case for 1990. Donruss had a track record of including great Rated Rookies since Bill Madden put together the first on-card-denoted subset back in 1984, but ran into trouble sometimes when it came to seeding rookies into the rest of the checklist. No such problem in 1990. With eleven desirable Rated Rookies (the most since 1987), the set found balance with rookies of Sosa, Larry Walker, Bernie Williams, John Olerud, David Justice, John Wetteland and flameouts like Junior Felix, Dwight Smith and Jerome Walton.

Yes, the base set lacked a Frank Thomas rookie (and so did the boxed Best of AL and end of year Rookies sets), but in this instance (unlike with 1990 Bowman or Fleer) it didn’t matter. Bowman nor Fleer had Rated Rookies to divert the attention away from the glaring Thomas omission.

Regardless, despite its overall quality and the changes the company made for 1990, this set finds Donruss at a crossroads. Yes, it has a checklist with more than a few highlights. Yes, it has the company’s third foray into insert cards. And yes, it was done with an eye-catching palette. But with the introduction of Leaf as a premium brand, created to compete and out-do Upper Deck on its own level, 1990 was the first year Donruss was the other brand for the company.

You know, it’s funny, but some companies seem to be able to cope year to year; their releases make sense as a cohesive whole. On the surface, this seems to be the case with Donruss (at least in terms of design). But if we dig a little deeper and examine the sets they released from 1990 through 1992—the first three in their role as secondary brand—the company seemed to go a few steps forward in 1990 (clearly their best set of the early Nineties, and their best since 1987) and then two or three giant leaps backward the next two years (crap in ’91 and more of the same for ’92).

It’s as if Donruss simply didn’t know what to do with the brand now that it was number two. Two series? Full color fronts and backs? Save rookies for an insert set? Did anybody even notice? Or care? Despite creating a great set for 1990, it was the beginning of a sad period for the brand.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #15. 1994 Collector's Choice

Its name said it all: collectors either loved or hated this set. I happened to love it. It was the perfect antidote to a hobby spiraling out of control. A throwback created not two years removed from the sets it emulated in spirit, it was the first in what would become a kind of weird tradition at Upper Deck: the ‘manufactured nostalgia’ set. It had a parallel worth collecting (the only appearance of any type of foil within the set). Its checklist was no-frills in a frilly way. It had rookies you cared about, players you revered and a simple, seersucker pinstripe design that brought sipping lemonade on the back porch and listening to the game on the radio, Disney World’s Grand Floridian Hotel and 1973 Topps to mind all at the same time.

The Collector’s Choice brand was the logical next step in the evolution of the Kids Kards sets (Topps Kids, Donruss Triple Play, Upper Deck Fun Pack): a brand with a buy-in point (99¢ a pack, if I remember correctly) that appealed to kids as well as empty-wallet collectors. With clean, sun-drenched photography, no-nonsense stat lines and simple blurbs that pertained to the player’s performance as opposed to his favorite hobby or TV show (inevitably Cheers or In Living Color), it elevated, instead of patronized, its audience. This is remarkable, considering we’re talking about the early Nineties, when there was a general crisis in how to get kids excited about a hobby in which they could no longer afford to take part. It’s also remarkable when you remember that we’re discussing Upper Deck, a company that had not only positioned itself as technologically superior to the competition, but more irreverent, fun-loving and self-deprecating—all qualities that are noticeably muted in this Collector’s Choice set (they would creep back onto the cards in subsequent editions). It wasn’t Upper Deck growing up (that had happened the year before), but it was Upper Deck taking all of its audiences seriously, which was perhaps more refreshing.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #16. 1993 SP

I didn’t know how to approach SP. Not in writing about it and its historical significance for a company like Upper Deck (I happen to believe that it redefined the company and together with Topps Finest pushed The Hobby at large down the deep, dark, foil-stamped, holographic tunnel from which it’s never re-emerged), but when I first saw it on the shelf at my local card shop. Don’t get me wrong; I like this set. It intimidated me to no end when it originally came out, but I’ve warmed to it as card prices in general have inflated over the last fifteen years. It’s just, well… When it comes to owning baseball cards, I have a bit of an inferiority complex.

Let me re-phrase that. When it comes to life, I have a large inferiority complex. I can’t tell you why… but I want to thank all those collectors who’ve loved and destroyed the crap out of their cards. Without you there would be nothing out there for me to buy.

I’m not ashamed to admit it: I love creased, dinged and frayed cards. Cards that show a lot of wear have always been friends of mine. Just this afternoon I re-sorted my vintage notebook and I’d have to say that about 90 percent of the cards in the book have paper loss, noticeably chipped corners, creases and/or sun damage. A personal favorite is my copy of Jim Bouton’s 1966 Topps Venezuela card: it’s covered in scribbles from the previous owner plus I can fold it twice and it doesn’t snap to pieces. And that’s one of the better cards in my collection.

The writing was on the wall for me when Score came out in 1988; that set did a lot of things that Topps, Fleer and Donruss weren’t doing at the time (full-color backs, photos on the backs, printed on a nicer, cleaner card stock, poly-bagging packs), and really it was only a matter of time before there would be a new set with packs that I couldn’t afford. That came sooner rather than later with Upper Deck the next year. After that it was Leaf in 1990, Stadium Club and Ultra in 1991 and so on and so forth until I could barely afford any packs by the time I stopped buying new stuff in 1995. But I digress…

Of the three ultra-premium sets that debuted in 1993, SP was the most subtle and most delicate. Maybe it was the etched copper foil stamp, or the simple two-color block pattern along the left edge —for me reminiscent for some reason of nautical flags and tags of preppy designer clothes. Or maybe it was ikebana design of the thin, circuit-like metallic ink line that traveled up the right side of the front to provide underscore for the team name along the top. (The light bulb filament-like bob and weave shape of the line would also lend visual cue to the die-cut edge of the Platinum Power insert set. See what they were doing there? It’s a nice touch that ties the insert and base sets together without working too hard.)

But most likely, it earned this distinction because instead of using the Upper Deck and individual teams’ logos, the company name and team names were spelled out in the same copper metallic ink. Because of the omission of these graphics, the SP aesthetic wasn’t piecemeal, and the designers had control of the entire layout of the card. (If you need a refresher course in ultra-premium card design in 1993, take a look for flaws in Topps Finest and Fleer Flair: Finest uses the same Topps logo as the company’s other brands, while Flair’s otherwise elegant design is taken down a few notches by the mostly-harmless-but-by-no-means-elegant team logos, positioned in the upper right hand corner on the back.)

With nine players from each team represented and a total checklist just shy of 300 cards, the make-up of SP was strong, and on the strength of design, overall checklist and availability was able to turn a relatively weak rookie class into desirable cards across the board. Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon (on his only rookie from 1993) lead the pack, but am I wrong or did Beckett have the Chad Mottola card somewhere around $5 at one point?

1993 saw Upper Deck grow up. Not only did the company successfully transform its flagship from a fun-loving, cartoony, young-person’s baseball card set to a mature, classy, young-adult’s baseball card set, but it birthed a brand that gave the company a strong foothold in the rapidly expanding ultra-premium market. If I thought I was intimidated by SP when I first saw it, what about Topps and the other Upper Deck competitors?

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #21. 1994 SP

Yes, I can feel your stares on the back of my neck. And I’m ready for the comments expressing your incredulity at my not including this set in the top 20 of the early decade. First ’93 Upper Deck and now this? This one even has an A-Rod rookie! What, exactly, are you smoking?

Yes, 1994 SP was one of a handful of sets to including an Alex Rodriguez rookie card. Actually, it had four of them, plus a special autographed version available through Upper Deck Authenticated. But this is not the A-Rod Countdown, so I’ve approached sets with Rodriguez rookies like I did a few years back with those sets with Canseco, Clemens, Bonds and other hobby titan rookies (nice company, eh Alex?). This hasn’t been done to spread my personal dislike of Rodriguez, but because sets have to be rated objectively. Maybe you don’t agree with my rankings (and wait till you see who made the top ten!). That’s fine; let’s open the debate. I’m not doing this countdown to make friends (or really enemies, for that matter).

1994 SP was a beauty of a set. The cards weren’t the first to be printed on metallic stock, but they were the first to silhouette the players in such a way that they appeared grounded in reality, not floating through some Lawnmower Man alternative dimension. They were little pieces of gold, and packs were insanely expensive for the time (and today. Have you tried buying a pack? Forget it. It will probably run you $20 or more, and I’m guessing that it will keep going up as Rodriguez races towards the career home run mark).

I only bought one pack of these when they came out, and even though I got mostly commons—though check out the Delgado die-cut; yeahhh boy-eee—I coveted them like they were the treasure of the Sierra Madre.

But so what? As Upper Deck’s answer to the Finest and Leaf brands, SP may have been the popular choice as 1994’s king of the premiums, but that wasn’t exactly a tall order: Topps Finest couldn’t rebottle the magic of its debut set in 1993 and Leaf/Limited wasn’t that great (though it too had a Rodriguez rookie on its checklist). And besides, SP was the hot shit second fiddle to Topps Finest in 1993. That Upper Deck’s competitive fire was enough to turn the tables on Topps in 1994 was almost to be expected. That’s the way things work.

I’m not trying to come across as downplaying a set of SP’s caliber, but I… ah forget it. Call this set #17. Dammitt… now I have to rethink my top twenty.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #23. 1992 Upper Deck

While other kids my age were busy doing whippets under the bleachers after school, I was at home, in my room, by myself, blowing my mind with the three-photo cards found in 1992 Upper Deck. Upper Deck debuted the gimmick in 1989, but it was hardly old hat three years later. I mean, did you hear me? Three photos on one card! And they all overlapped! The concept rocked then, and it still rocks today (I’ve stared at this card of Ken Griffey, Jr. now for at least five minutes straight and still can’t figure out if I’m looking at three or four overlapped photos).

With cards like these stealing the spotlight, you almost forget that 1992 Upper Deck had all the hallmarks of a great set: a fantastic design, memorable rookies, fun subsets and a checklist that didn’t turn anybody away at the door. Toss in a bizarre (yet timely) insert of Tom “Mr. Baseball” Selleck, an autographed Ted Williams Hero(es) Worship card and enough holograms to start your own hall of mirrors and you were looking at probably the best set Upper Deck had assembled up to that point. Taking nothing away from its landmark inaugural set from 1989, 1992 Upper Deck was great simply because it didn’t look cheap, with its bright colors, inviting graphics and thinly glossed stock, even though it was.

And that’s an important distinction to make. 1989 wasn’t a cheap set to buy into, even though it probably should have been: the cards, while totally revolutionary at the time, have not aged very well (outside of the Griffey rookie and two or three others). They feel flimsy, with dull, muted colors and photography that doesn’t jump as far off the page as it probably should, given the set’s stature in the hobby. But cards from 1992? Perhaps because it was never going to be (or intended to be) considered a Pillar of the Hobby-type set, it hasn’t had as far to fall. My argument’s coming out all convoluted, but the gist is that because 1990 Upper Deck missed out on one of the biggest rookies of the year (Frank Thomas) and 1991’s design can best be described as ‘eye-gougingly painful,’ the expectations for 1992’s set were very low. Obviously, Upper Deck learned from the previous two years’ mistakes and had a few tricks up their sleeves, but if anything the set’s goal seemed to have some fun out there. And it passed with flying colors (not to mention with a stash of three-photo motion cards).

I should probably also mention something about the ill-advised Comic Ball 3 set, as it featured much of the same design as 1992 Upper Deck. All I can say is that the Upper Deck writers must’ve been on something more potent than junior high-strength whippets in order to come up with coherent dialogue between Jim Abbott and the Tasmanian Devil. I mean, writing for Reggie Jackson and Daffy Duck is easy: they’re both obsessed with themselves. But Jim Abbott and Taz? First, I thought Taz could only shriek nonsense, and second, I didn’t realize Jim Abbott had enough personality to carry a conversation, much less one with a cartoon character.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #27. 1993 Upper Deck

I’ve always liked this set. Actually… how I feel towards this set goes a little deeper than just liking it. I like like this set (if you know what I mean). Is that embarrassing? Perhaps. But let’s just say that were I invited to Upper Deck’s house for a party in the basement and we just happened to play spin the bottle, and when I spun it just by chance pointed in 1993’s direction, well, let’s just say that I wouldn’t be against spending five minutes in the laundry room with the set. Alone.

Why? C’mon, do you even have to go there? Okay. Fine, I’ll tell you—but you have to promise me you won’t tell anyone. And don’t expect me to make eye contact with you while I tell you this.

It’s because I’ve never felt ashamed of the fact that I bought the factory set and paid full retail price (at least $40 at the time). It’s because it was probably the best-designed Upper Deck set from their first five years (1989 to 1994). And yes, that includes both 1993 and 1994 SP.

It’s because 1993 saw Upper Deck fall in love with gold metallic ink, resulting in the super-attractive Top Prospects design, as well as the script player name (first use of script since 1990 Donruss) on the base card front. That script on the front was classy, especially when combined with the thick white borders, the warm, vibrant photography and the sheen of the UV gloss. And because it was classy, I was classy for appreciating it, elevating me from pimply, 14-year-old introvert to discerning Man Of The World.

But beyond design, I love the little things: the Peter Gammons ‘Inside the Numbers’ subset, the obvious Score/Pinnacle rip-off inserts like ‘Then & Now’ and the Iooss Collection, not to mention the unparalleled ‘Teammates’ subset, like this one of the Texas Rangers’ ‘Latin Stars.’ (Quite a group, eh? Also, Juan Gonzalez’s hand on Palmeiro’s shoulder kind of creeps me out.) Topps has tried to bring back this kind of subset with their ‘Classic Combos’ incarnation, but no subset since 1993 has outdone ‘Teammates.’ It’s definitely one of Upper Deck’s greatest contributions to the hobby.

Finally, I love this set because it’s Upper Deck like we’ve never seen it before: quietly putting out a great, no-real-frills set, the bombast of previous years replaced by a quality checklist and a great design.

1990 - 1994 Countdown: #29. 1994 Upper Deck

There are a few things I’ve never been able to figure out: the inner workings of the female brain, the inherent difference between Go-Bots and Transformers and what the point was of the elongated black and white photo in the lower left of the 1994 Upper Deck design. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I’ll never understand women, and I’ve decided that even though I couldn’t tell them apart, I liked the Go-Bots almost as much as Transformers. But that little black and white photo? I think we should get to the bottom of this one together.

It’s a funhouse mirror? The misguided beginnings of a Fibonacci sequence? Oh wait, I’ve got it… It’s a waste of precious real estate! It’s as if Upper Deck’s design team, by 1994 in the middle of the pack in terms of overall design (1. Score/Pinnacle; 2. Topps; 3. Upper Deck; 4. Fleer; 5. Puke; 6. Donruss; that’s right, ‘Puke’ boasted a better overall design than Donruss prior to 1994), all ate brown acid in the photo lab and embarked on a bummer of catastrophic proportions, only to commemorate it with a bizarrely skewed Mini-Me photo in the lower left. Don’t worry, they told themselves. Ain’t nobody gonna care ’bout a little old photo.

Well, I care, and not only because I’ve been stumped by its significance for almost 14 years. I care because it ruined a pretty great design, and ruined a possible four-year run—from 1992 through 1995—of great design that rivals anything any of the other sets had put out since 1976. (But, ah, let’s put the little black and white photo to bed. It’s tired. And it’s gotten me all riled up…)

As for the rest of the design, it’s a winner. Full bleed photography on both front and back, silver foil logo and player name on front and copper metallic typography on the back. Not to mention ample statistics and no clutter. What can you say? Upper Deck rides again.

For your consideration: before Topps re-ignited its relationship with old flame Mickey Mantle, Upper Deck had him. And while they were not so bold as to ram him down collectors’ throats in the base set, Upper Deck gave him ample voice in the insert department, including a wet-your-pants-if-you-found-it dual autograph card with Ken Griffey Jr. And one last thing about this set before we move on: 1994 was the first year of base set parallels in packs of any Upper Deck product (in addition to flagship’s ‘Electric Diamond,’1994 also saw the ‘Silver Signature’ set in Collector’s Choice, the ‘125th Anniversary’ set in All-Time Heroes and the die-cuts in SP). It’s hard to believe that Topps had something two full years before their west coast rivals, but there you go.