In 1999 there was only one card that I wanted to add to my collection: A Skybox Premium Autographics Joe McEwing autograph. The Cardinals lost second baseman Delino DeShields to the Orioles in free agency after the 1998 season the team brought up Joe McEwing to fill the void. The first half of the year McEwing, or Super Joe, hit .305/.350/.418 with 4 home runs, 3 triples, and 19 doubles. Card companies were a little slow to add his cards into products, but eventually a few companies floated out a few cards.
The second half of the season McEwing hit the wall and was eventually traded to the Mets the following spring for Jesse Orosco. His career ended up lasting a total of 9 years with most of his time spent as a utility player for the Mets.
I still looked for this card after he was traded away from the Cardinals and landed a copy a few years back for a couple of bucks. At one point, during the summer of 1999, card shops in St. Louis were selling this card for as much as $25. It was pretty hard to spend that kind of money for a light hitting second baseman. The card is not necessarily the easiest to find, only one copy on Ebay in the last 90 days, but they sell for less than $3.
I started collecting baseball cards in the early 1980s as a kid. There were all sorts of cool things about collecting cards in that era. There were only a few sets out each year and I spent most of my energy trying to put together the 792 cards for the Topps set every summer. A few packs from the Dierbergs in Manchester and a few from the Ben Franklin and by the time school started up in September I had finished off my set.
The packs of cards had a completely different vibe back then. Wax paper wrappers and the gum were the two biggest differences. Of course those two items also meant lots of imperfections with the cards. There are still plenty of unopened wax from the 1980s floating around if you have never experienced the awesomeness of opening a pack of cards with a stale piece of gum in the pack, but you were often left with stains, discolorations, and sometimes even dings and dents in the cards.
Today there is no gum in the packs and everything has foil packs. There are still some dings and dents on cards, but the stains and discolorations are a thing of the past. Well, for the most part. In this year's Topps Heritage set Topps announced that they were inserting cards with bubble gum stains into the product.
It sounded like a cool idea and I was actually excited about landing a copy of one of these cards. They were even supposed to be scented like bubble gum. I guess you could say they were scratch and sniff. So after opening two boxes of Heritage, a few retail backs too, I had plenty of cards for my set along with some short prints, relic cards, and variations. No bubble gum stain cards. But wait....
While I was sorting out my Heritage doubles to help out another collector this afternoon I found this....
and then I found this.......
Very slight difference and there was no difference in code at the bottom of the card, which is probably why I missed the variation the first time around. I must admit that the manufactured imperfection of the bubble gum stain on the backs of the cards is pretty cool and a nice creative touch. I was thrilled to find this card too before I shipped it off to someone else. While I am not a huge fan of Andre Ethier I think I am going to file this one away in a box. Cool idea by Topps.
My blog turned 3 earlier in the week and I am now hitting post 1000 in the same week. It's crazy to think that I have written that many posts and even crazier to think that a couple of hundred people show up on this site on a daily basis and read my ramblings about baseball cards. I said it earlier this week, and I will say it again now, thank you for taking time out of your day to stop by blog.
I had thought long and hard about what to do to celebrate my 1000th post. I first noticed I was getting close sometime in December. I considered a few different paths for this post, but I am going to make this post simple and focus on one baseball card which fits nicely into my collection. I could have gone out and picked up something big, but instead decided to go for something more in the unique category.
Here's my card for post 1000:
First, I wish the scan were a little bit better. I picked up the card from a collector in Puerto Rico and it is still en route. I am actually using his scan of the card.
There have been 37 different posts about Ray Lankford on my blog before today, this makes 38. I am guessing someone has a better Ray Lankford card then me, but I am extremely proud of my collection of cards of the 1990s Cardinals outfielder. I have collected Lankford cards for more than 15 years, so I am basically at a point where there are very few cards left I need to add. The list can be summarized as mainly printing plates and a few low serial numbered cards that are either nearly impossible to find, or too expensive.
Which brings me to my new Ray Lankford card. I noticed this card floating around Ebay a few weeks back. I had to do a little bit of research, but basically it's a legit card that was put out in 1990 after he spent the off season playing for the Indios de Mayaguez in the Puerto Rican Winter League. Lankford actually had two cards in the set, the other will be here next week too. This card is a League Leaders card celebrating Lankford for leading the league in triples.
The card itself was really inexpensive costing me less than $5 shipped. It's also why it is probably crawling in between Puerto Rico and North Carolina. I was surprised to see how many 1980s and 1990s players have cards in these sets. If you have a player collection of someone from this era these cards and sets are definitely worth a look over.
A little later on Friday than I like to post these, but for your entertainment....The Friday Five.
Sets are in numerical order by year. I did not give a runners up, or honorable mention, on these posts. However, I will give a nod to the 1981 Donruss set. It's not one of my five for a few reason, but it's still a really good set if you are looking for something beyond this list. Like the good Donruss sets the cards had some good rookies and had a good 1980s card set feel, but the set was riddled with errors and almost all of the pictures in the set and taken in Wrigley Field or Comisky. It's overly noticeable the first time through the set, but it makes it hard to flip through the set too many times. Still I love some of the cards in the product, most notably is the Tim Raines rookie card.
1982 Donruss
I did not actually collect cards in 1982, but found this set sometime after college and slowly put together the complete product with a few boxes. The 1982 Donruss set was an improvement over the 1981 set in almost every facet. I always really liked this design with the baseball and baseball bat at the bottom, not sure why. There is something really early 1980s about it all, that's probably not a good thing, but I still love looking at these cards. The most important card in the set is the Cal Ripken rookie card....
In my opinion the 1982 Topps Traded Ripken is his best 1982 issue, but this has always been second on my list. It's better than the 1982 Fleer, which is a distant action shot, and the regular Topps card which features Ripken on a prospects card with two other players. If you did not want to shell out the money for the Topps Traded Ripken rookie card this a great alternative.
1983 Donruss
I think I would like this set a little bit better if Donruss had varied the design a little bit more. The 82 set had a baseball bat with a baseball, the 1983 set had a baseball bat with a baseball glove. Not sure the design team spent too much time here, but the 1983 Donruss set still has some really good qualities. This was, again, the first year I collected baseball cards. Interestingly I did not get any Donruss cards when I started collecting. In fact, I did not really get into Donruss cards until the late 80s. I did spend a little bit of time during the summer of 2003 putting this set together out of boxes. I figured it would be a fun project to undertake twenty years after starting my collection.
I feel like I have said this in about 20 different posts on this blog, but the 1983 products are always all about the big three rookie cards of Boggs, Sandberg, and Gwynn. The Sandberg, wearing the blue pinstriped Cubs uni, and the Gwynn in the brown Padres uni are my two favorites. There is a Wade Boggs, but meh.
1984 Donruss
I like the design of the 1984 Donruss set. This was the last of the 1980s Donruss sets that I assembled. I think I have only had it in my collection for about five or six years. Honestly, I collected the Topps set almost exclusively that year as a kid and when I went back later on I focused on the Fleer set. There are a lot of collectors who love the Mattingly rookie card in this set and often put it first on their list of Donnie Ballgame rookies. I am not much of a Mattingly person so I am going to take their word on that. My favorite card in the set is the Joe Carter rookie.
Wasn't this card worth something like $30 at one point? I remember it was surprisingly expensive for Joe Carter. So, here what is cool about this card:
1. Ivy
2. Pinstripes
3. 1980s Mustache
4. A Rated Rookie Logo
5. Joe Carter
(Look away Phillies fans...you know what it is....)
1985 Donruss
The 1985 Donruss set had a cool design like the 1984 Donruss set, but the rookie cards (Clemens and Puckett) are much better. I discovered this set at some point during the summer of 1985 while chasing McGwire cards. There was a card shop in Creve Couer, outside of St. Louis, and the owner made me a sweet deal on this set. It does not have a McGwire rookie card in it, like the 1985 Topps set, but I really like the Puckett rookie and love the Clemens rookie. There are some other cards in the set too, including a nice Eric Davis rookie, but these are the two most important cards in the set by a wide margin.
1987 Donruss
This was the first year I picked up any Donruss cards as a kid. The design leaves a little bit to be desired, but there are all kinds of cool rookies in this set including one of Barry Bonds. There is also a Will Clark, Barry Larkin, Greg Maddux, and Rafael Palmeiro. While I am not a huge fan of the design, it was pretty consistent with the style Donruss used throughout the mid 80s. Some collectors will not touch Donruss cards past 1987 because the card company went off the deep end with the design in the years following 1987 and eventually ended up being pretty blah by the time the 90s rolled around.
I picked up a new bubblehead for my baseball card room about a week and half ago. Since the best card shop in the area closed down recently a group of collectors from around the Raleigh-Durham area have banded together in a Facebook group to talk, trade, and sell cards. It's a good group of people who all used to hang out at Big D's Card Shop.
One of the group members ventured down to Spring Training in Florida to check out several different team camps and also made a stop by Rays Fan Fest. I had asked him to keep an eye out for a certain lost bobblehead at Rays Fest, but they sold out rather quickly.
The Rays had several other bobble heads that they were selling at their Fan Fest, so I still ended up with a really cool item for my collection. This is my second Will Myers bobblehead and was a giveaway last April 15th at The Trop. The bobblehead commemorates Myers winning the American League Rookie of the Year in 2013.
I like the look of the front of the bobblehead. It's a really accurate representation of what Myers looks like after he swings and hits the ball. His front arm might be a little bit low, but overall it's excellent. The bat is always behind his head with one hand low on the bat. MLB has posted dozens of Myers Home Runs on YouTube. They all look like this.......
and the actual video.......
The uniform and details with Myers appearance are pretty well done too. Here's a quick glance at the side and back views of the Will Myers Bubblehead.......
Myers is wearing the Sunday blue alternate uniform, the long pants with the shin guard are a staple of Myers gamely appearance. Overall an excellent addition to the collection. I am going to have to clear off some space next to my Durham Bulls bobblehead of Myers and get a picture of the two together. A big thank you to Jon for taking time to pick this up for me on your trip.
It's a dreary Monday and I am not feeling too terrific today, so I am going to give you a short, simple, and sweet post for your reading enjoyment. This offseason I added several players to "People Whom I Collect List" and now that the season has started I cannot let you, my loyal readers down, with a poor effort on players I might have introduced you too during the long off season.
Here's a player I hope to see in Durham towards the end of the summer. Last year Johnny Field took home the Rays Minor League Player of the Year and managed to hit an even .300 with a .376 OBP, and .488 slugging at two stops in Low A and High A. I am guessing he's going to spend the whole season with Double A Montgomery, but I can be optimistic right? On to the baseball cards....
I have already picked up a bunch of the Johnny Field cards out of last year's Bowman Draft product and some of his USA Baseball autographs from Panini, so my card today is going to have to tide you over until Topps, Leaf, or Panini decides to make a 2015 Johnny Field card.....
This Field card comes from the unlicensed 2013 Donruss Elite product and features him wearing his college uniform with the Arizona Wildcats logos airbrushed off. Not the most attractive card, and at 725 copies not the hardest to find, but if you're going to collect a player even these types of cards are nice to add to the collection. This would actually be a cool card if Donruss had left the college logos on the uniforms, like they did in the Donruss Elite sets from 2007-2010. I guess after 2010 they became more unlicensed than they previously were......
When I was a kid I always seemed to end up at baseball card day. I do not think it was anything intentional, but I have a Cardinals team issued set from a stadium giveaway from almost every year between 1988 and 1995. The Cardinals team sets were pretty typical of baseball cards that were given away by teams. They had a sponsor stamp somewhere on the front and a big advertisement on the back. One year the set was issued by Kansas City Life Insurance, another year it was sponsored by the St. Louis Police Department, and the card I am sharing the week for #MyCardMonday features an ad from the U.S. Forest Service.
The cards have been hanging out in a big Rubbermaid container I have filled with ticket stubs, scorecards, and different programs that I have picked up over the years attending baseball games. I had a great time looking through the cards a few days back and decided to pick one to share this week.
This Ozzie Smith was my favorite in all of the sets. This card was from the 1988 Cardinals Team Issue set, that's a cool Smokey the Bear in the corner, and features a cool picture of the Hall of Fame shortstop hopping over Gary Gaetti in the 1987 World Series. There is no better name on the 1980s Cardinals than Ozzie Smith, throw in a really sweet picture, and this is a cool card. Here's a look at the back......
Love the cool cartoon PSA with Smokey the Bear. The cards in almost all of the team issued stadium giveaway Cardinals sets are oversized including the 1988 set. The card is 4 inches by 2.5 inches which made storage an issue. My Ozzie card is not in the best shape and I honestly thought about possibly just replacing my set. Storing these team sets in a Rubbermaid container was probably not the best idea, but they are really cheap on Ebay.
