The Baseball Card Blog

Cerone Alone

2013-05-15T22:00:00.000-04:00

Rick Cerone, 1989 Topps

PUTTING PINE TAR ON MY BAT SO MY HANDS WILL STICK TO IT.

LA DI DA DI DA ... THERE'S TWO HITS IN THIS BAT I CAN FEEL IT.

WHY YOU LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT?

WHAT'S YOUR PROBLEM BRO I'LL BE FINISHED WITH THE PINE TAR TOWEL IN A MINUTE DAMN.

PEOPLE BE LOOKING AT ME WEIRD ALL THE TIME HERE.

WHAT YOU'VE NEVER SEEN A HANDSOME VETERAN BACKSTOP BEFORE?

TAKE A PICTURE IT'LL LAST LONGER ACTUALLY DON'T OR I'LL BREAK YOUR CAMERA SONNY CORLEONE-STYLE.

THAT'S A COINCIDENTAL REFERENCE NOT A STEREOTYPE, OKAY?

JUST TRYING TO BE A LEADER MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS JERK.

FEELS LIKE THERE ARE ENEMIES ALL AROUND ME.

CLOWNS TO THE LEFT OF ME JOKERS TO THE RIGHT LIKE FROM THAT STEVIE WONDER SONG.

NEVER SHOULDA LEFT NEW YORK.

YO YOU GOT SOMETHING TO SAY TOUGH GUY?

DOES THIS LOOK LIKE THE FACE OF A GUY WHO TAKES ANY GRUFF?

I'LL BE FINISHED WHEN I'M FINISHED - THERE'S MORE PINE TAR TOWELS IN THE CLUBHOUSE DAMN.

HAD A DREAM LAST NIGHT GUYS WERE TRYING TO GET ME.

KEEP YOUR FRIENDS CLOSE AND YOUR ENEMIES CLOSER.

JESUS SAID THAT, PRETTY SURE.

WISE MAN.

I'M NOT EVEN SURE WHO MY FRIENDS ARE ANYMORE YOU KNOW?

NEVER SHOULDA LEFT NEW YORK.

WHAT WAS THAT?

DID YOU HEAR THAT?

SOUNDED LIKE SOMEONE WAS CALLING MY NAME, TRYING TO LURE ME INTO A CAVE OR SOMETHIN'.

AIN'T GONNA FALL FOR IT WHOEVER YOU ARE!

CAN'T SCARE ME, THESE PUNKS.

I SWEAR IT'S LIKE THEY CAN SMELL THE YANKEE ON ME.

I DON'T EVEN TRUST MY OWN TEAMMATES.

IS SOMEONE BEHIND ME?

Don't stop, belieeeevin' ... hold on to that feeeeeeeling
/fade to black/

Why You Should Care About Bubblegum Art

2013-05-14T12:58:00.000-04:00

Have you ever heard of Pat Riot? If you're a voracious reader of The Baseball Card Blog and have devoured all of its pages, then I'll assume you know who he is. But if you're new to the blog (welcome!), you have to check his work out. His re-faced cards are little masterpieces of pop-culture art.

It's been a while since we heard from him, but Riot's got a new show coming up in Los Angeles. Opening May 25th at the Known Gallery and titled "Out of Left Field," it promises a full gallery of baseball-card and bubblegum art.

What is bubblegum art? Well, it's kind of exactly what it sounds like: art made out of chewed bubblegum. I'll admit it, that sounds gross. I mean, I've been to the gum wall in Seattle, and while impressive, that much chewed gum is disgusting. And yet... check out these photos that Pat forwarded us...

But back to the main question: Why should you care? Besides Riot's work being classic pointillism, and besides it being created using an unexpected material, it's actually great.

I've been thinking a lot about sports art lately. Maybe it's because creating custom cards is fast becoming my favorite hobby, or maybe because The Baseball Card Blog's own Travis Peterson is featured in Beckett Sports Card Monthly in their June "Art" issue. But sports art walks a fine line between legitimate and that horrible, dreadful catch-all word so beloved by critics: irreverent.

If anything, creating sports artwork out of gum is definitely reverential. And if I were Riot, I wouldn't be surprised if the Baseball Reliquary came knocking when all is said and done. Actually, the more I think about it the more this pairing makes sense: they're both based in the Los Angeles metropolitan area; one creates reverential baseball art and the other collects and curates it; and they're both out of the mainstream.

Riot's show will also feature a lot of his re-faced baseball card work. You can read all about the show here.

The Inspiration

2013-05-08T22:00:00.000-04:00

Wayne Tolleson, 1989 Topps

Guys, Wayne Tolleson stole my heart and will steal yours, too.

Where do I begin? How about here:

Love and first sight. Let's go to Wikipedia:

Jimmy Wayne Tolleson

That's his full name, for reals. It's so dang AMERICAN I want to hop on a bald eagle and sail above Mount Rushmore. His Wiki bio photo is him at pregame with two boys, prolly his baseball-loving, well-behaved sons. I already feel like a terrible person being around Wayne Tolleson on the Internet.

A switch hitter who threw right-handed, Tolleson was listed at 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) tall and 160 pounds during his playing career.

Five-feet, nine inches tall is, depending on your Eckstein source, just one-to-two inches taller than David Eckstein. Wayne Tolleson was, however, not Albino. But David Eckstein weighed (weighs; still alive, but unsure of post-retirement weight fluctuation) 170 pounds. David Eckstein would not have been allowed to box Wayne Tolleson on account of being too large. Speaking of other sports: did Wayne Tolleson play any other sports?

At Spartanburg

Spartanburg. That is awesome. I feel like the essence of Sparta is truly enhanced when you put a "burg" at the end.

(S.C.) High School, Wayne was a football teammate of former NFL Quarterback Steve Fuller.

I don't even know who Steve Fuller is; am I supposed to be impressed? From what I know already of Wayne Tolleson, I think the back of Steve Fuller's football card should read, "Was high school teammate of major league baller and generally amazing person and true American hero, Jimmy Wayne Tolleson. Go get his card and throw this one in the garbage can." (No offense there to Steve Fuller, who is maybe a nice person.)

You know, Darin Erstad played football. He was a punter for Nebraska, and he really took the grittiness of being of a punter to the major leagues, with the way he punted proverbially and willed his team to win like in football with good punts. I wonder what type of gritty punter Wayne Tolleson was ...

Tolleson was also a star football player at WCU, hauling in 105 passes for 1,747 yards and 14 touchdowns over two seasons. Tolleson was named All-Southern Conference as a wide receiver after leading both the conference and the NCAA Division I in receiving in 1977 with 73 catches for 1,101 yards and seven touchdowns.

Oh he was a diva wide receiver? That's not as a gritty as I thought. Too bad he didn't kick anything.

In 1977, he was WCU's emergency placekicker and was a perfect 6-of-6 on field goals, and connected on 22 of 24 extra point kicks.

Okay that's pretty cool. But let's everybody relax. It's not like the guy played special teams or anything.

At the first-ever Canadian-American Bowl in Tampa, Florida, Tolleson returned the opening kickoff.

I am sitting next to my Grit Meter 3000 right now, and I am not kidding when I say that it just exploded. There are pieces of it everywhere. Wayne Tolleson did this, and I'm not even mad. I'm not even going to bother buying a new Grit Meter until the grit scientists go back to the drawing board and make a much more powerful model on this information I have just provided re: Jimmy Wayne Tolleson.

Guys, Jimmy Wayne Tolleson > Darin Erstad AND David Eckstein (!!!). Had his playing career fell into that niche of time after the Internet got big but before FJM, he likely would have caused several sports writers to have orgasmic heart attacks.

To recap, his name was Jimmy Wayne Tolleson, and he was 5'9", 160 pounds, and was possibly vision-impaired. He overcame all these obstacles to kick and catch footballs, and then hit baseballs professionally from either side of the plate, didn't matter to him. He was a Spartanburger through and through, and more importantly, a Yankee. Less importantly, he was a husband and father, but that's cool, too. In 1987, the "New York Press Association" - which I think is just Mike Lupica yelling in a large empty room - awarded him the "Good Guy Award." He donated the award to Haitian refugees. Maybe. I didn't look that up, but we can assume, safely.

Now let us all go forth and be better men. I mean you guys. I have cards to post.

A few of my favorite screw-ups: 1951 Bowman Overprints edition

2013-05-03T21:51:00.000-04:00

Did you see this great write-up about the blog? Check it out when you get a chance. All right, let's talk about screwed-up baseball cards.

I've written lots in the past about my love for screwed-up baseball cards. Severe, horrendous miscuts, wrong fronts, wrong backs!, diamond-cut cards, cards missing foil, cards with typos, cards at the edge of a sheet, cards missing a color, cards with the wrong photo—or the wrong facsimile signature. And what about cards that have problems with color registration? Those are great. But the best? The best are overprints.

What's an overprint, you say? Well, it's simple really: instead of a card having one image on its front and one image on its back, an overprint has multiple images. Sometimes printers do this to test the ink or the alignment of their presses. Other times they feed the wrong sheet by accident.

Whatever the reason, the result is one awesomely weird baseball card. Overprints are more commonly seen with stamps or paper currency, but with baseball cards, they aren't that easy to come by. They're by-products of the printing process, to be used as test prints or samples during production by the people on press during the run. With stamps or paper currency, it's easier to understand that overprints would be released, to extend the usage and life of regular stamps or notes. But if you opened your penny pack or pack of five cards in 1951 and got a card that looked like this, you'd notice. And you'd probably feel pretty angry.

So how did I get these? I got these six on eBay. They were cheap, too, which initially lead me to believe that they were fakes, but after handling them and handling other 1951 Bowman cards from my collection, the overprints feel about the same weight, and the cardboard feels right. (Granted, they could still be fakes, but I'm not too worried about it.) In terms of them having a value, I don't know how to assess that. I like them, but there weren't too many bids on the cards I won, and my winning bids were low, less than $10 each. So value? I'm not sure.

They've got blank backs, and each card has at least three images printed over each other on their fronts. There isn't too much written about them on the Web, but here's what I've found:

T206 "Ghost" overprints (From the T206 Museum, 2004)
1951 Bowman overprinted uncut sheet auction results (From a Robert Edward Auction, 2009)

And file under "Overprint (disambiguation)":
What is an overprint? (From a Net54 thread, 2008)

Leave a comment on this post if you know anything else about overprints!

Frank

2013-05-01T22:00:00.000-04:00

Frank Viola, 1989 Sports Illustrated for Kids

Picture me, 1989, delicately tearing out the perforated card of a curly-haired, mustachioed pitcher and adding it to my collection. Who's living better than this? Got my own magazine subscription, practice is in 45 minutes, 'bout to get on the phone with this girl who I might like but only if she likes me, got my dope new 3-D-ish Frank Viola card ... can't tell me NOTHIN'. Wait 'till I get my money right.

Frank won the American League Cy Young Award in 1988,

Please use his last name, Sports Illustrated for Kids, and stay true to AP Style. Frank. That's so stupid. Frank won the Cy Young. That doesn't even sound real. It sounds like what Jeremy Viola told Mrs. Viola when his brother Frank won the Cy Young. "Ma, Frank won the Cy Young." Frank won the Nobel Peace Prize. Frank discovered penicillin. I don't believe a person named Frank did those things. I'm going to need a last name.

This is what always bothered me about Sports Illustrated for Kids - they were so patronizing. It's fine if you want to cater to kids or whatever and throw in some cartoons or perforated sports cards or what have you. But don't call him Frank. I wasn't trading cards as a kid like, I'LL TRADE YOU THIS TODD FOR THAT DON SORRY CAN'T PROCESS SURNAMES JUST A KID MY NAME IS MIKE.

I mean, yeah, maybe I AM a dumb, illiterate kid who smells, but I'm not an idiot, you know? I do subscribe to your magazine that my mommy got me for Christmas. I don't know, maybe I'm getting all bent out of shape about this pointless card from a kid's magazine from 1989. Maybe they weren't as patronizing as I remember.

Fans call Frank "Sweet Music" because of his last name. What is a viola?

A BIRD! AN INVESTMENT STRATEGY! NO, A BOOK! NO, A SKATEBOARD! A VEGETABLE! ANOTHER NAME FOR A HOT DOG! GERMANY! A VIDEO GAME! WAX! NO, SOMETHING SWEET! MY AUNT!

THE ANSWER IS UPSIDE DOWN WTF I'LL NEVER KNOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Did you know?
FRANK'S FAVORITE COLOR JELLYBEAN IS WATERMELON.

Besties

2013-04-24T22:00:00.000-04:00

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.

The Three Amigos

2013-04-17T22:00:00.000-04:00

GEORGE BRETT MINI CARD HATERS.

George Brett, 1988 Topps Superstars mini

DON'T BE FRONTIN'.

HE'S A SUPERSTAR, YO. RED BACKGROUND A METAPHOR, BLOOD OF HIS ENEMIES (PITCHERS).

HE BATS LEFT BUT HE THROWS RIGHT.

THAT IS CRAZY.

MINI CARD CAN FIT IN YOUR WALLET.

OTHER CARDS AIN'T BE DOIN' THAT.

I CARRY MY GEORGE BRETT MINI IN MY WALLET JUST IN CASE.

DO YOU ACCEPT GEORGE BRETT MINI CARDS AS A FORM OF PAYMENT? PROLLY NOT BUT YOUR LOSS YOU STUPID RESTAURANT.

I LEFT MY INSURANCE CARD AT HOME OFFICER BUT HERE IS A GEORGE BRETT MINI.

I TRUST THAT WILL SUFFICE.

I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE ASKING, WHERE'S ED WHITSON AND MEL HALL?

OH SNAP THERE THEY IS.

THIS IS THE SAME CARD.

NICE JOB CROPPING ED WHITSON, TOPPS.

MEL HALL BE LIKE,

"PFFT. WHEN IMMA GET MY OWN SUPERSTAR MINI WITH RANDOM DUDES ON THE BACK? BEEN PUTTIN' IN WORK, SON!"

ED WHITSON BE LIKE,

"WHATEVER YO I DON'T EVEN CARE."

MEL HALL BE LIKE,

"KEEP WALKING, ED, YOU OL' LOOKING GRAMPA. AIN'T YOUR GRANDKIDS NEED YOU TO TAKE THEM TO CHUCKY CHEESE OR WHATEVER? PLEASE."

ED WHITSON BE LIKE,

"WHY DON'T YOU COME TO THE N.L. AND I'LL SHOVE THAT BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP."

JUST GOT REAL UP IN HERE.

GEORGE BRETT BE LIKE,

"SETTLE DOWN, NON-SUPERSTARS. TRYING TO CONCENTRATE HERE ON MY FOLLOW THROUGH."

MEL HALL AND ED WHITSON BE LIKE,

"PFFT."

MITCH WEBSTER BE LIKE,

"WELL HOWDY DOODY FELLAS! BEAUTIFUL DAY FOR SOME BASEBALL!"

GEORGE, ED AND MEL BE LIKE,

"SHUTUP MITCH! YOU NO WALLET-FITTIN' FOOL."

THREE AMIGOS.

The Rick Rhoden Rap

2013-04-10T15:15:00.000-04:00

Rick Rhoden, 1988 Fleer Superstars

Rhoden comma Rick, ain't slick or dick
In name that is, I'm slick and got a big one
S to the P for the effin' Yankees
You don't know my steez? Please suck on these
Sunflower seeds, yo, get that cheese
Played for mad teams, can't nobody lock me DOWN
Down, keep the ball down
It's what I do, tell your girl my balls drop
Off the plane, yo, insane how I pull that string
Bling underneath this fly windbreaker
That's your girl o'er there? Pfft, think I'm gonna take her
Back to the dugout teach her how I swing
That bat that club, either one that's the thing
Mad versatile, be golfin' on the weekends
Weekdays too, work every five days
Got more cash than a pimp gets paid
Be pimpin too in this pimped out cart
Sitting on chrome 'till my next scheduled start
Unless I get the call to pick up the good wood
First pitcher DH in the AL hood
Run and go tell that playa, it's all good
On the dugout steps getting on my Gatorade
Other SPs drinking mad hateorade
Mad cause I got mad skills to compete
On the links, on the hill, at the club, on the street
Dope mustache just icing on the cake
Your wispy-ass upper lip ain't taking my cake
I rhyme cake with cake, yo, don't give a what
Got better things to do like see what's up
With this nervous ass dude standing in the batter's box
Allergic to my stuff like he's got the chicken pox
Sit your ass down, son, called strike three
At the knees, it's a breeze like a short par-3
Gotta bounce, gotta pounce on this helpless a$$ rook
Rihanna where you at? Bring it in with the hook ...

Where's Waldos?

2013-04-03T22:00:00.000-04:00

Ryne Sandberg, Waldo Candies

I recently discovered that I have TWO of the four Waldo Candies baseball cards. This has been an unbelievable revelation that has changed my life forever.

We are going to piece this puzzle together DaVinci Code style. I have neither read that book nor seen that movie, but assume it's about putting together a set of weird baseball cards. Anyway, here is what we know:

Kevin Maas is one.

Ryne Sandeberg is another.

Kevin Mass and Ryne Sandberg are both white.

Unsurprising considering the Old English prose on these cards.

Waldo Candies is racist.

There are four cards in the set.

If one of the other two cards is Oscar Gamble, I will issue a formal apology.

I will not do that.

Here is an obstacle to our endeavor. If you Google "Waldo Candy Cards" my stupid blog is the first thing to come up. That means Waldo Candy Cards are not a very popular topic of conversation around the Interwebs, meaning it's unlikely we'll ever be able to discover who was featured on the other two cards.

HOWEVER, there's a glimmer of hope. And it comes from an unlikely source: a commenter named 69robster.

I'm sorry, 69robster, you've had "FIVE" of these cards? But the back of the two cards I own explicitly states there are only four cards in the set. Is it possible 69robster has the rare FIFTH ~~Gospel~~ Waldo Candies baseball card in his possession? Or should we be skeptical of 69robster? Something inside of my heart wants to believe 69robster and get to the bottom of this mystery, 69robster-style.

Does anyone know where 69robster is? We should probably find him first, and then take it from there. Does he even still have the cards he claims to have owned for "several years?" Or did he discover their value and find his buyers? And if so, did those men pose as buyers only to harm 69robster in an attempt to keep him quiet and the mystery of the Waldo Candies cards just that -- a mystery?

If you're out there 69robster, let us know you're alright, and that the establishment hasn't gotten to you. We love you, and we miss you.

Baseball's Best

2013-03-27T22:00:00.000-04:00

It's 1988, but who are baseball's best players? Baseball is separated into two categories: pitchers and sluggers. Which pitchers are the best? Which sluggers are the best?

Great questions. There are two pitchers who are the best. Here is a cool graphic re: pitchers.

Here is a pitcher.

Dwight Gooden is the best. His ERA is 2.46, which is the best. I look forward to seeing how much bester he can become by steering clear of trouble and really working on his pitching techniques and mental fortitude. Here is the other pitcher who is the best.

Teddy Higuera is the best. His ERA is 3.50, which is the best. One time Teddy Higuera went to the All-Star Game, not as a guest but as a pitcher. According to Wikipedia, In the game, Fernando Valenzuela struck Higuera out in the fifth inning to tie Carl Hubbell's record with five consecutive strikeouts. I would have titled that story, "Chunky Mexican pitcher strikes out chunky Mexican pitcher." What I want to know is: why was Teddy Higuera batting in the All-Star Game? I feel like if a chunkster lefty pitcher is at bat in the All-Star Game, the manager has made a mistake. Anyway, Teddy Higuera is the best regardless of striking out one time in the All-Star Game. He probably did it on purpose because he hates Carl Hubbell.

All the other pitchers are just okay.

But what about sluggers?

Which sluggers are the best?

The answer to that is: one slugger.

Tom Brunansky is the best. His average is .250, which is the best. Average is stupid. Sometimes you have to look further than outdated stats, like how a man stands around and the aura he exudes.

DER.

Tom Brunansky's nickname was "Bruno," which is short for Tom Brunansky. That story about his nickname origins is the best.

Lots of players are the best when you really think about it. Because baseball is the best. But not all the players are the best, only some. Only three. Maybe there were other players in this set? These are the only cards I could find.

Confarnit

2013-03-20T22:00:00.000-04:00

Zane Smith, 1990 Topps

SMELLIN' LIKE SOME SULFER JUST HAD SOME DIARRHEA OUT HERE. WHAT THE HAY? PEOPLE BE FARTIN' LIKE IT'S NOTHING THINKIN' THE SWEET SMELLS OF SPRING'LL COVER IT UP. AIN'T THE CASE. THEMS OPEN-AIR FARTS ARE BAD CAUSE PEOPLE BE THINKIN' THEY GOT CARTE BLANCHE TO DO 'EM. FART BLANCH. THAT'S MY JOKE I SAY TO PEOPLE. RECKON' MY WHO FARTED FACE BE RIVALIN' THAT OF M'GOOD BUD JOE JOHNSON. SOLID FELLA BUT MOODIER THAN A SONOFABITCH. AIN'T SEEN M'HAT IN SIX DAYS BUT WHOSE A' COUNTIN? SOME ROOK'S PLAYING A PRANK, BUT I'LL GIT 'EM WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT. PROLLY THE SAME PRANKSTER WHO CROP DUSTED O'ER HERE. I'LL DROP A TURD IN HIS LOCKER COME AUGUST. THAT'LL LEARN 'EM. WHATCHA'LL LILLY-LICKERS BE THINKING 'BOUT OUR NORTH AMERICAN NEIGHBORS UP YONDER? AIN'T NEVER LIVED IN NO PLACE OTHER THAN THE GOOD OL' U S OF A, AND DON'T WANT NOBODY QUESTIONIN' MY ALLEGIANCES! JUST TRYING TO FIND A GOOD PLACE TO REST M'HEAD AND A SPOT WITH SOME HOMEMADE PULLED PORK SANGWICHES. WHAT'S THE NATIONAL BIRD? I SHOULD FIND OUT PRONTO TO BLEND IN. WHO'S STARTIN' TODAY, MCDOOGLE? IS THERE A MCDOOGLE ON THIS TEAM? NO? COMMON NAME WHERE I COME FROM. FRANCIS MCDOOGLE USED TO FIX HVACS IN M'HOMETOWN. BEFORE THE PLAGUE HIT THAT IS. NOW HE SPEAKS WITH A STUTTER AND FIXES NOTHIN' BUT SANGWICHES. CAN'T SEE BUT TWENTY YARDS OUT HERE WITHOUT M'SUNGLASSES. BRIGHTER THAN M'GIRL'S SMILE TODAY. WHAT ARE THEM FELLAS DOING OVER THERE? PROLLY LAYING SOME FARTS AND HOOTIN' AND HOLLERIN' 'BOUT IT LIKE SOME DUMB KIDS. RECKON I BETTER GO FIND OUT. CONFARNIT ONE OF THEM'S GOT M'HAT. YEP THEY FARTED IN IT. I'LL BE A MONKEY'S UNCLE.

The Candy Trade

2013-03-13T22:00:00.000-04:00

In 1989 John Candelaria began the year as a Yankee but then got traded to the Expos. Then sometime in the offseason, I guess, he signed with the Twins? If you happened to have a 1989 John Candelaria baseball card, you were probably like, "What the hell, bro? I can't keep up with all this." (You were probably not like though that because: who cares.)

In stepped Topps Traded. Say something happened like Scooter McSo-and-so got called up to the bigs, or some second baseman had a sex change operation and switched to third, or whatever with John Candelaria. Topps Traded would document those things in card form so that future scientists would know they really happened. Then, if you were a kid with like no money, you could buy this extra set and have all your wildest dreams come true.

Besides the up-to-the~~-nanosecond~~-three month accuracy, Topps Traded was also brighter than the regular year's stupid set. Because they only had to produce cards that reflected changes, Topps could afford to splurge on quality as it related to brightness. "You need to wear sunglasses when you look at these cards because the past is looking bright," is what a lot of people would say at the time. And was that brightness ever so beautiful! For example, check this out yourself before you wreck yourself:

John Candelaria, 1990 Topps Traded

The brightness of the back of this card is exceeded only by the brightness of John Candelaria's smile on the front. I remember having this card and condescendingly asking my friends to see their John Candelaria '89 cards where he's on the Yankees. I'd be like, "Pfft. You know he switched teams, right? TWICE. Nice outdated card, brah. Look at outdated cards much? Also, this card is so dark. Did you pay for this?"

So yeah, not bragging or anything, but by 1990, thanks to my Topps Traded set, I had all my John Candelaria ducks in a row. Then he got traded to the Blue Jays and by '91 he was on the Dodgers? What the hell, bro? I can't keep up with all this.

The Sluggo of Berry Hill

2013-03-06T21:00:00.000-05:00

Damon Berryhill, 1991 Score

A funny thing happened on the way to the back of this card ...

A funny thing happened to Damon on his way to recovery from surgery on his right shoulder in '90.

That is a succinct, engaging lede. I can't wait to discover the funny thing that happened! Here are my guesses:

He fell down the stairs carrying a bag of rooster meat and broke his LEFT shoulder.

He decided he hated baseball and wanted to be a bicycle repairman.

He recovered fully and returned to playing baseball. (The funny thing was how seamless it all went.)

He had a fart attack.

Those are excellent guesses. Let's see which one is right.

While he was away, Joe Girardi stepped up and became a good No. 1 receiver for the Cubs.

UNBELIEVABLE. Guy gets injured and the team uses a different guy in his place? I have never heard of such a thing ever happening before. Why couldn't the Cubs just not have used a catcher for a little while? This truly is a very funny thing to have happened to Damon Berryhill. Hey, Berryhill, you're out of a job, ha ha! Nice shoulder problems, dude.

That means Damon will have to show he still has the right stuff

NKOTB reference, I like it.

Cubs Manager Don Zimmer: Hey Berryhill, still think you still got the right stuff?

Berryhill: I think so, Skip. Just gonna take it step by step.

Zimmer: Good call. Happy to see you're hangin' tough after that shoulder injury.

Berryhill: Yeah, no doubt. Please don't go girl.

Zimmer: You talking to me?

Before his debilitating injury, Damon was cited as the best defensive catcher in the NL. Known as "Sluggo," he had one of the strongest throwing arms in the game.

Back in my playing days (Little League), whenever I noticed a guy (kid) had a strong arm, I liked to nickname him, "Sluggo." Because of his arm.

Hey, way to gun that runner down at home from center field ... "Sluggo!"

Shut up, KENNY.

Unrelated: In 1989, Berryhill sluggo'd .341.

The Mega Master Set

2013-03-03T20:46:00.001-05:00

I've documented my collecting habits over the last seven years on this blog, following an arc from the scattered, massive accumulation of decades-worth of baseball cards to new-card musings to a realization that in terms of collecting, less is more: that it's better to collect with a purpose and a goal rather than to simply collect because it fills the time.

As it turns out, like many collectors, I have a lot of different focuses. One goal is to get a card of every player that has ever played on the Boston Red Sox (my Soxlopedia). Another is a small player collection of Fred McGriff. And collecting printing screw-ups, like miscuts, blank fronts, blank backs, doubleprints, and those cards missing gold foil or some other mistake. And cards from the 1967 Topps Who Am I? with their disguises still on (unscratched). Another is completing sets.

And it's here — completing sets — that I want to highlight today. The other day I was at my local shop (Kenmore Collectibles in Kenmore Square, Boston) and mentioned to its owner (Peter) that I was thinking of going for the mega master set of 1965 Topps. He didn't know what I meant, which I thought was weird, since I assumed that this was something that other collectors did. The mega master set would be collecting every card made in a particular design. So for 1965 Topps — the one with the pennants — that would mean not just finishing the regular set, but then pairing it with 2003 Upper Deck Vintage, which co-opted the design. And then adding 2014 Topps Heritage. And 2014 Topps Heritage Chrome, Refractors, High Numbers, and whatever else Topps creates next year for this design.

But wait, there's more! There's the 2001 Gallery Heritage insert set. And whatever cards were included in the multiple Topps Archives and All-Time Fan Favorites sets. And various cards in the Shoebox, the 50 years, 60 years, and Cards Your Mother Threw Out insert sets, the Vintage Legends Collection, the Bill Russell Missing Years card from Topps basketball... And I'm sure there are others that I haven't listed here.

I've put together traditional sets before, but the idea of the "mega master set" appeals to me. I've decided to do this for Topps sets from 1965 (with Embossed, but maybe not Transfers), 1976, 1984, 1986, and 1987 for starters (but not including the Tiffany sets from 1984, 1986, or 1987).

So...is this a thing that other collectors do, or have I stumbled onto something new?

LaCoss, Part Two

2013-02-27T21:00:00.000-05:00

Mike LaCoss, 1991 Score

We've all met Mike LaCoss before, right? Good. (When you search Mike LaCoss these days, that post is No. 3 on Google's Mike LaCoss radar. It appears above his Baseball Almanac page. We are mainstream here now, folks. In specific regards to Mike LaCoss, but still.)

I would like to talk about Mike LaCoss a little more because I found something that is baffling to me.

Mike was one of the handful of Giants starters who went on the disabled list in '90, and weakened the team's chances of repeating in the NL West.

"LaCoss to DL - Giants chances of repeating further weakened" is a headline I have just thought up that I think would have been appropriate for that occasion. Sometimes I like to think of headlines that would have been awesome 20 years ago based on information I have read on the back of a baseball card. This particular headline would have been perfect to include in a high school time capsule circa 1990, because that year is best remembered for the various injuries sustained by the starting pitchers of the San Fransisco Giants.

He missed over three months after arthroscopic surgery to repair torn cartilage in his left knee.

I can never remember if it was his left knee or his right knee. It was his left knee.

Before being injured, Mike pitched a strong four-hit 3-1 victory over the Dodgers for his second straight win.

You guys are probably waiting for the baffling part. Sorry - I'm not sure why I copied down all the other crap. My bad. Here is the baffling part:

An All-Star pitcher in '79, his out pitch is -- you guessed it -- a split-fingered fastball.

I'm sorry, I just, WHY WOULD I HAVE GUESSED THAT?

Seriously, why would I have guessed that? No disrespect to Mike LaCoss, but was the average person so acutely aware of his split-fingered fastball? I feel like maybe not everybody knew about Mike LaCoss' out pitch.

Could it be that Mike LaCoss is tossing a split-fingered fastball on the front of the card, and the back of the card assumes that the 10-year-old kid viewing the card has excellent still-shot pitch recognition? Did some part of this text get accidentally deleted? I am at a complete loss here.

Ironically, I feel as though we here at The BBC Blog, in some small way, might have brought just a modicum of fame to Mike LaCoss' split-fingered fastball (by calling it a forkball, btw). But this card predates that post by two decades. Is it possible I am in some sort of time warp where blogs exist but Mike LaCoss is still playing? That seems more feasible to me than the idea that the effectiveness of Mike LaCoss' split-fingered fastball is common knowledge.

I don't know, maybe I am underestimating America's familiarity with Mike LaCoss' pitch repertoire. He did, after all, give Topps that famous split-fingered pose in '89 ... maybe he was just giving an insatiable nation what it so desperately wanted. If so, therein lies yet another irony -- that I once so callously attempted to sarcastically highlight his split-fingered fastball when that pitch needed no highlighting and was, in fact, already more famous than I could ever hope to be. Is the joke on me? I fear it very well might be.

Maybe I would have guessed it. Maybe I should have guessed it. This is bothering me very much, you guys. I have a full-time job, btw.

2013 Arrested Development Set - Pack Break

2013-02-23T19:05:00.000-05:00

Much like the rest of the known universe, I'm a huge fan of Arrested Development, the TV show that ran for three seasons on Fox. When I heard that Netflix would be airing a new, fourth season starting in May, I was giddy. So it's only natural that when I heard rumors about this set back at the National last August, I was hopeful that it wouldn't get mired in production hell and find a way to get released before the new season.

Well, my local dealer finally got a case of these in. He had boxes priced at $65, which leads me to believe that there must be autographs and relics and other hits in the mix. He couldn't find me a sell sheet, but I'm sure I could if I do enough digging on the old Interwebs. In the meantime, I bought a few packs.

Here's what I do know. The base set is 75 cards of characters from the show. The pack mentions the odds of getting a variation, so I'm going to assume that there are also SSPs lurking. I know there are lenticular inserts and at least two auto/relic inserts (Star Signs and autographed Teamocil letter patches), and I heard something about Bluth Banana wrappers, though I don't remember those from the show. Maybe it's a throwback item? That could be cool.

Here is my first pack. (8 cards per pack; $3/pack)

Pack 1

#9 - T-Bone

#47 - The Stair Car

#1 - Michael Bluth

#31 - Mr. Bananagrabber

#45 - Phillip Litt (Never-Nude variation)

#57 - The Aztec Tomb

#46 - Phylidia Featherbottom

#29 - Roger Danish

These cards are neat. I'll try to post the other pack in the next few days, along with a quick review of the set.

57*

2013-02-20T21:00:00.000-05:00

Cecil Fielder, 1990 Upper Deck

The thing I remember most about Cecil Fielder's 1990 season is this card. Not that I think about Cecil Fielder's 1990 season a lot, or at all, but sometimes, when I do - like when I'm posting this card to this blog and need an introductory paragraph - I immediately think of this card.

The main reason I think of this card is because the 1 in 51 looks SO MUCH like a 7 to me. Every time I look at this card, which is almost never, but DOES include now, I think, "Wait, did he hit 51 home runs or 57? I feel like it would have been a huge deal if it were 57 because that is very close to 61. But I don't remember it being such a huge deal. I know I could go online right now or just flip this card over, but it bothers me that I have already spent so much time wondering about this. I was supposed to be at work an hour ago. Wait, was I? What day is it?"

Obviously, artist V. Wells did a fantastic job here - the action and posed montage is splendid and an obvious nod to some of Monet's* finest work. I do, however, feel as though the number is the centerpiece, and in that regard at least some level of failure is at play here. The major point this card is trying make - Cecil Fielder hit THIS MANY home runs - is not clear to me. Maybe if the racing stripes were going the other way?

Honestly though, is it me? Am I only the only one who thinks this looks much more like 57 than 51? It's possible I'm over-thinking this.

In my quest to obtain multiple sources citing 51, I did venture on to Fielder's baseball-reference page. I noticed he is listed there at 230 lbs. That literally seems 100 pounds less than I remember him being. Every recollection I have of Cecil Fielder seems conflicted and warped. All I know for sure these days is that his son Prince Amukamara also plays sports and doesn't eat vegetables.

Pretty neat that Fielder's 50th and 51st home runs came on the season's final day. Also he hit six more home runs, giving him eight, which is a record.

The last three games for the Tigers were in New York. Fielder went 0-for-8 in the first two games of the series and it looked as if the 49 jinx might stop him.

I recall nothing about a 49 jinx, but the 49 jinx seems comical in retrospect. Forty-nine was the average number of home runs hit by each player in the years 1998 - 2003. Hey, remember when Richie Sexson hit 45 home runs TWICE? What the farts happened there? Richie Sexon's middle name is Lockwood, by the way. I am learning a lot today, on the Internet.

Finally, Fielder hit a Steve Adkins fastball that reached the "Upper Deck" and made history.

I like what Upper Deck did there. Brought it back to them because they are the focus here. I wonder if they would have paid the $6 million to commission this artist's rendering if Fielder's 50th home run had barely cleared the outfield wall, hitting the Topps of it.

*Monet is the only famous artist that came to mind. I assume he also did baseball player montages.

Old Hoss 100..

2013-02-18T20:34:00.000-05:00

Once again, I need to apologize for being away so long. This time I have a better excuse. Well, maybe not better, but at least it is baseball card related. I have spent the last couple months finishing my first baseball card set. The amount of work was a little overwhelming. I only made 84 sets, but designing, printing, cutting, boxing, and shipping took most of my free time over the course of two months. After printing and shipping costs, I made a tidy profit. I calculated my hourly wage at 55 cents an hour. While that is less than most prisoners earn making liscense plates, I earned mine doing something I love.

I really enjoy making fake baseball cards, so I took the (not so big) leap to making "real" cards. The inspiration for the set was the amazing writings of America's foremost, undead, Base Ball Hall-of-Famer, Chas. "Old Hoss" Radbourn. If there are any of you that are not familiar with the twitter legend @oldhossradbourn, you really are missing the boat. Consistently hilarious and insightful, Old Hoss tweets like he lived (lives?). He is able to squeeze social commentary, profanity, and insights about the modern version of America's pastime into 140 characters. Simply amazing.

A couple of months ago, ESPN released a list of their top 100 baseball players. Never one to miss an opportunity to tell it like it is (was?), Old Hoss provided his unique perspective for each choice. Over the course of 48 hours, he had burned through the "top 100" like Sherman's march to the sea.

A few of my favorite tweets:

#88: "Pop" Anson. __________________ The space above that line is white, just like the game that filthy racist insisted we play.

#83: M. McGwire. Would be ranked higher but angered all the scribes when the fellatio they gave him in 1998 gave them oral cancer in 2005.

#68: J. Bagwell. It is nigh time to acknowledge the unspoken truth: while batting he looked like a defecating monkey.

#32: B. Gibson. A man of epic stature, endurance, and mean-ness who failed to fire one right through T. McCarver's face.

#31: C. Ripken. Shockingly rude of him not to catch Cal Ripken's Disease and pass away before breaking L. Gehrig's streak.

#11: H. Gehrig. True story: pummeled W. Pipp half to death with a shovel then stoically submitted his application for the open job at 1B.

Reading the backs of baseball cards has always been one of my favorite things. Turning these priceless gems into baseball cards had to be done. I decided to let the quotes speak for themselves. The only "stats" on the backs of the cards are his tweets.

I wanted to give my customers a little something extra, so I made some special short printed cards. Several people have asked for a complete checklist, so I figured there is no better place to post it than here at the World (Wide Web) Famous Baseball Card Blog.

There are twenty five "Not Quite" Top 100 player cards (each hand-numbered to 10 copies), but those are listed on the checklists included with the set. The unlisted short printed cards are as follows:

Old Hoss Quotables - (Hand-numbered to 5)
1. The Scribes
2. J. Morris
3. M. Miller
4. M. Trout
5. M. Cabrera
6. MVP
7. E. Tate
8. Balls
9. Champagne
10. Hitters
11. A. Chapman
12. L.W. Jones
13. J. Kruk
14. Trades
15. The Enemy
16. The Law
17. J. Profar
18. Fan Fest
19. M. Kelly
20. The DL
21. Injury
22. C. Arthur

Short Print Checklist - Alternate photos or card backs (Hand-numbered to 5)
2. W. Mays
35. Secretariat
41. P. Martinez
55. R. Jackson
60B. O. Smith
60C. O. Smith
60D. O. Smith
65. E. Murray
72. B. Blyleven
73. R. Alomar
74. B. Larkin

The only really tedious aspect of the sets was the boxing process. Sorting and boxing up the cards wasn't much fun. (That might explain the disarray of my own collection of cards.) I designed, cut, and assembled my own boxes. Here are a couple of pictures of my "assembly line."

The cards facing up were miscut at the printer. I had to have quite a few reprinted.

I had a blast making these cards. I wish I would have saved one for myself.

If you missed out on getting a set of these, I'll make sure to post about the next set HERE first. It worked so well last time, I am proud to say that I'll be working with @oldhossradbourn again. We have started working on the set, and plan to formally announce the set around opening day of the Base Ball season. I promise it will be spectacular.

Will Clark, Starbrite Superstar

2013-02-13T21:00:00.000-05:00

Will Clark, Starbrite Superstars, Year unknown

I'm very much a less is more type of person. I guess it's just that I have what some people might call "taste." I don't need any bells and whistles or distractions in life or on my baseball cards. When I actively collected, I was always drawn to cards where the picture of the player was the focus. The less stupid crap that was on the card, the better, which is why -- like many -- I was mildly obsessed with Upper Deck and Stadium Club ... before, ya' know, discovering boobs. But at card shows I would find these strange cards that were the most no-frills cards I had ever seen, and I loved them with all my heart. It was as if the makers of these cards refused to insult my intelligence. Here is Will Clark. His name is Will Clark. You know the rest. Enjoy.

Now, as few frills as I desired on the front, I did have a great appreciation for the statistical information on the back. Aside from newspaper box scores and watching the actual games, the backs of baseball cards were how I learned about players back in the diz-ay. Unfortunately, in that regard, these splendid picture cards had little to offer.

Person 1: What should we call our company?

Person2: "Company," ha!

Person1: Lol!

Person2: Wipes tear.

Person1: Seriously though.

Person2: I've always liked stars, and the sun. I enjoy their brightness. The sun is a star, technically.

Person1: Sometimes in baseball they call the better players "superstars." I feel like we could mesh these two concepts. How about: "Bright Stars of Ball Stars Super Company, LTD?"

Person2: Eh. I think we should shorten it. I'm envisioning it wrapping around the semi-circle of a rising sun, which is technically a sta-

Person1: I know dude. I went to school, too. How about "Starbrite Superstars?"

Person2: Passes out.

Person2: Wakes up. I almost just died that name is so perfect. Do we know any graphic artists?

Person1: My nephew once drew a picture.

Person2: Let's brainstorm.

Person1: We know what stars and the sun look like. The sun's rays can easily be represented with simple lines.

Person2: You know a lot about art.

Person1: Thanks. But what objects represent baseball?

Person2: How about baseballs? And a bat maybe. A baseball bat.

Person1: What about gloves?

Person2: I don't think they use gloves anymore.

Person1: Should we put a bird on it?

Person2: No.

Person1: How many "superstars" are there in baseball?

Person2: I don't watch much baseball, but: 21.

Person1: We have a lot of work to do.

Super Star Crotch Powder

2013-02-06T21:00:00.000-05:00

Benny Santiago, 1989 O-Pee-Chee mini

O-Pee-Chee was a Canadian card company -- already hilarious -- that specialized in candy, hockey cards, and then ventured into other sports. It seems, through my extensive research in which I skimmed words on Wikipedia, that they were maybe owned by/affiliated with Topps? Also, maybe not? I'm not sure, but if I had to guess I would say they were owned by Topps because Topps owns everything. You and I are owned by Topps. Sorry.

Anyhoo, O-Pee-Chee was sort of an outside-the-box entity. Everything you thought you knew about sports cards would be shattered into a cloud of dust when you saw an O-Pee-Chee card. For example, did you ever think you wanted a MINI Benito Santiago card in which he is sort of scratching his crotch? Me neither, but then I saw it.

I want to reiterate that this is a MINI card. It fits easily into the palm of your hand for optimal viewing!

Another thing is: did you know Benny Santiago is a SUPER STAR?

Super Star. Benito Santiago. What kid growing up DIDN'T have a huge Benito Santiago poster in his/her bedroom, with dreams of playing catcher in the manner that Benito Santiago played catcher, which is to say crouching down while also hitting .236. (While looking up Benito Santiago's statistics, which for some reason I didn't know off the top of my head, I discovered he was arrested last February in Florida for smoking weed in his car. Also he was a prominent figure in the Mitchell Report. Not judging, just feel like I should mention it since I am a very important reporter of facts.) In fact, Benito Santiago remains a SUPER STAR to this very day. I just went online to purchase a Benito Santiago fathead for our living room and they were sold out/are not manufactured.

This card reminds me of one of those Japanese commercials that features borderline American stars endorsing weird things. In this version, Benny Santiago is very happy with the SUPER STAR brand of crotch powder he uses. Well, maybe not that happy, but pretty happy.

It's cool that Benito Santiago's 1988 hitting stats are listed on the front here, but maybe we can get a better feel for how superstarry Benny is if we examine the stats on the back.

Oh. Here are two baseball players. Neither of them appears to be Benito Santiago, but this certainly maintains the theme of "baseball" this card was aiming for. Hey, do either of you guys know where I can find some Benito Santiago stats?

: ...

: B*tch please, what do I look like, the Internet?

'Smooth as Malt'

2013-01-30T21:00:00.000-05:00

The year was 1991, and the Topps baseball card company was 40 years old. Topps celebrated this milestone by putting out an awful set of baseball cards. For example, this. The one thing that always frustrated me about this set and many other Topps sets from that time frame -- besides the ugzz factor -- was the extreme curlability. If you left a 1991 Topps baseball card out on a table, it would magically curl up like a slug trying to protect itself from a predator. (Slugs do that, right? If not, my bad, but you get the point.) You could leave it on the table, go to the fridge and get a drink, and when you turned around the card would appear as though you had it wrapped tightly in a rubber band for three decades. I never understood why or how this could happen, but my guess is that it had something to do with the cut-rate cardboard Topps was buying from Columbia. Anyway, neither here nor there.

Out of the ashes of the set's general terribleness arose this card:

Walt Weiss, 1991 Topps

Granted, the thing that makes this card neat is the picture itself -- the rest of it falls victim to the Topps aesthetic. If Upper Deck made this card it would almost certainly have a legacy of being the greatest Walt Weiss card ever produced, and that's saying a lot because there is a card of him not-so-subtly threatening to bash you in the head with his bat. But let's check to see if there's anything cool on the back:

One of Walt's favorite activities is listening to the music of Bruce Springsteen. Walt has served as a guest disc jockey on an Oakland-area rock station.

So here you are, Walt Weiss, and you've got a card featuring an awesome shot of you leaping high in the air over a trying-to-take-you-out Joel Skinner whilst making a double play, and the back talks about how much you love Bruce Springsteen and also that sometimes you DJ. I would argue a baseball card never made a white person appear cooler.

Hey, hey, hey, how y'all doing out there in Oak-town? It's your boy W.W. on the one and twos over here, that's Weiss comma Walt for the uniformed, acrobatic shortstop for YOUR Oakland A's. Matter of fact, call me W.W.W. - the extra "W" stands for World, as in Series. Got my ring on now. Gonna patent that triple dub thing when I get around to it. Anyway, hope you're all feelin' good out there tonight, feelin' sexy, feelin' like you're in the mood for some love-making perhaps. We'll get to that later, with an assist from some Bad Company. For now it's time for a double play -- get it? -- with back-to-back tracks from the Jersey man himself. Let's start you off with a little "Born to Run." Number two is a surprise. Hope you like it. I know I will. This is Walt "Smooth as Malt" Wizz-eiss getting you through the night, and I'll catch ya' on the flip side. Oh yeaaaaaaahhhhh ....

Anyway, the point is not that Walt Weiss is dope to the max. The point is that it was Topps' 40th birthday. The burning question back then was: what do you get for the baseball card company that has everything? I was 13 years old at the time, and almost all of the money I had somehow earned at that point had already been funneled into Topps' employees' pensions, so I was at a loss. I eventually sent them a card about being over-the-hill and also being an old-fart who farts a lot. It was pretty hilarious. Hope they got it and weren't offended. It was all in good fun.

It's impossible to say how old Topps is now, but they're still around ... right? I think so. I haven't purchased a Topps card in more than 20 years, but here's to hoping they're using better cardboard. Catch y'all on the flip side.

How To Save The Base Set

2013-01-30T14:22:00.000-05:00

How long has the flagship Topps base set been dead? Since 1996? Maybe not that long, but it sure has felt like that. Instead of a checklist interspersed with All-Stars, team cards, and subsets, almost a generation of flagship base set checklists have been divided as follows: one or two series, each made up of 300 to 400 base cards of individual players, followed by a string of team cards, then designated rookie cards, then perhaps, if you're good, between five and ten "fun cards," that aren't all that fun, just action shots with different headlines. Fun subsets like Turn Back The Clock, All Stars, Record Breakers, Season Highlights, World Series, and even Father/Son are long gone.

Instead, the base set checklist is overrun with short (or single) prints, and recently, super-short prints. Sure, finding an SP or SSP in a pack is fun, I'm not going to deny that. But when companies don't want to expand the base set checklist (thus SPs, variations, and SSPs hiding behind regular base card checklist numbers), the idea of adding a subset or two (or three or four) would mean removing a handful of rookie-card slots or end-of-the-bench players who might turn out to be diamonds in the rough.

Here's a solution. First off, don't touch the SSP idea; it's a draw for too many collectors. But instead of hidden base-checklist SPs, add subset cards as base-checklist variations. And don't short-print them, either—seed them 1:1 or 1:2, in a different pack position than inserts or SPs are traditionally placed. Packs will become livelier thanks to these accessible SPs. Although SPs in name only, the subsets would still be hidden off the regular base-set checklist. This way, the checklist holds steady at 600 or 700 cards, with a "master" base set checklist of 650 to 800 cards completely accessible to collectors not interested in spending lots of cash for expensive short prints.

Of course, this idea may not work for all sets. A set I'm looking forward to is Heritage '65, due Spring 2014. Unless an asteroid hits Topps HQ in Lower Manhattan in the next few months, my educated guess is that the checklist will have at least 75 on-checklist SPs, with chrome and refractor parallel sets, plus the tired Heritage stable of inserts News Highlights, Highlights, Then & Now, and New Age Performers. It's incredible to me that these insert sets keep chugging along, despite wearing out their welcome years ago, but that's a topic for another day. Let's just focus on the base checklist.

What if Topps shook things up? Like by removing most if not all of the base-checklist SPs. For clarification, I'm not talking about hidden variations. If anything, by unlocking these 75 or so numbers from short-print status, it opens the possibility of adding meaningful shadow SPs.

Take the original checklist from 1965 Topps, for example. It's chock full of retiring legends, Hall of Fame rookie cards, and exciting stars. To revitalize the Heritage checklist, take a page from the All-Time Fan Favorites sets and create shadow SPs of players like Yogi Berra, Warren Spahn, Sandy Koufax, Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Hank Aaron, Bob Gibson, Steve Carlton, and others on their original checklist numbers but using different photos than their original cards.

This will allow collectors to be able to complete the regular set without breaking the bank, but also add a twist for master set collectors. And this is just the thing a set like Heritage needs—heck, like any set these days needs: a revitalization of the base-set checklist from the inside out.

Coca-Cola Commemorates Cal, Coca-Cola

2013-01-23T21:00:00.000-05:00

Cal Ripken, Upper Deck "Coca-Cola" commemorative set

I went through a brief phase in the early 2000s where I stopped opening stuff. Like, I would buy a piece of memorabilia and not open it, thinking it would retain additional value. I've since developed the more mature understanding that memorabilia is supposed to be enjoyed on some level other than as an investment awaiting resale, especially considering I have never sold anything in my life because I don't know how to sell stuff. My point is that: here is an unopened Cal Ripken, Jr. commemorative set of Upper Deck baseball cards sponsored by Coca-Cola. You know what they say -- it's not really commemorative if it's not from Coca-Cola, the soda company.

I think this was a promotional item at a late September Yankees-Orioles game at Camden Yards. Even back in 2001, I knew that Cal Ripken, Jr. was going to be something special, evidenced by the fact I never opened this set. In a way I wish I had opened it and was able to discover more about him. For example, what position did he play? Did he have a family? What was he even famous for? Anyway, the important thing is that I should go to Giant Food and buy a commemorative Cal Ripken, Jr. Coca-Cola 8 oz. bottle.

The purity of baseball cards is most adequately manifested through the suggestion/demand that you get your ass down to a store called Giant Food to make another consumer purchase. Unfortunately, I never did that, and was unable to maximize the commemorativeness of this experience. Had I ventured to Giant Food, however, I feel certain I never would have opened the 8 oz. Coca-Cola bottle, and I'd be sitting here today not only with an unopened pack of worthless promo cards, but also with a dusty bottle of extremely flat soda. So many regrets.

I had even debated opening the set for this very blog post, but couldn't bring myself to do it. I have been sitting on this investment for a dozen years; it wouldn't make sense for me to give up now just for a few yucks on a free Internet blog. It's not what Cal would have wanted. It would have been quite the reveal though! Maybe another time, but also maybe not. Does anybody want to buy this?

It's important to note that, while this commemorative set claims to honor Cal Ripken, Jr., there is a lot more about Coca-Cola on here than Cal Ripken, Jr. For example, Coca-Cola's motto in 2001 was "Life tastes good." Indeed that motto is as relevant today as it was then, and we should all figuratively drink life up as we would literally drink Coca-Cola. But we shouldn't drink too much Coca-Cola because then our life will be cut short because really, it's just sugar water that makes people fat and gives them heart disease and stuff. I hope that Cal Ripken, Jr. drank life to the fullest, because I think maybe he died?

That is sad, but I feel comforted by the commemoration.

The Practically Perfect Practical Joker

2013-01-16T21:00:00.000-05:00

Ryne Sandberg, 1991 Score All-Star

It's difficult to be serious when you're looking at a big-head cartoon baseball card. But let's get serious here for a second. Because guys -- Ryne Sandberg will beat you.

Ryne can beat you so many ways --

Like, beat ME? But I am just sitting here writing about Ryne Sandberg! I didn't ask for any trouble. I have always humbly acknowledged that Ryne Sandberg can beat me in a myriad of ways, including:

with a home run, a clutch base hit, a steal, by scoring from first on a double

By understanding the signs given to him by the third base coach, by telling the outfielders how many outs there are, with his fists, with his MIND,

making a tremendous fielding play.

And with that we have listed all the conceivable ways a baseball player can single-handedly beat a baseball team. WE THOUGHT WE WUZ GONNA WIN BUT WHEN RYNO SCORED FROM FIRST ON DAT DOUBLE WE WUZ LIKE, LIGHTS OUT.

Ryne has such natural instincts and intangibles

Full disclosure: I was never aware a middle infielder possessed intangibles pre-Jeter. I had thought that Derek Jeter literally invented intangibles, an act in itself that IS intangible because no one knows how he did it. So this is all very surprising to me, although not really because I have natural instincts for noticing intangibles.

that he rarely, if ever, makes the wrong play, either on the field or on the bases.

That he rarely, IF EVER, makes the wrong play. IF EVER. IF EVER. IF EVER.

"There is an excellent chance that Ryne Sandberg has never made a mistake." -- this baseball card.

Not that I am a skeptic, but I did take the initiative to check and: Ryne Sandberg has 109 career errors. That is just in the field. I tried to look up how many times he made the wrong decision while running the bases (j/k I didn't do that), but I couldn't because that is an intangible.

Okay so obviously Ryne Sandberg was a tremendous defensive player by any metric. But I was thinking that maybe we can chill out a little bit with the praise. I think we can all agree that Ryne Sandberg has intangibles, but that doesn't mean he's infallible. I mean, this isn't Don Mattingly we're talking about here.

A gamer who likes to play practical jokes, he set records for

Practical jokes?

errorless games and total chances in '90.

I would like to learn more about the practical jokes. I don't appreciate how this card mentions practical jokes in passing and then doesn't expand. What are the hot foot stats? How did he marry being a gamer AND a practical joker, as it is obviously something not many players can do. Who got the ol' clubhouse whoopie cushion? Who fell victim to a double-decker poop job? Who let the dogs out?

"Day in and day out, there's nothing he can't do," said Cub manager Don Zimmer.

I'm sure there's something he can't do. It may take a hundred years and 12,000 scientists to reveal, but I am confident there is something Ryne Sandberg cannot do. In the meantime, we must all take the word of the man who once fell down while trying to fight Pedro Martinez, which was a hilarious practical joke.

Grinded by the Light

2013-01-09T21:00:00.000-05:00

David Eckstein, 2002 Fleer "Triple Crown" series

David Eckstein is the forefather of grinders. His story is a remarkable and popular one -- born nine months premature, he grinded his way to five feet seven inches in height, tall enough to attend college. From there he walked on to the baseball team -- not by walking but by grinding -- and then led them to 16 consecutive semester championships. Eventually he grinded to the bigs, where every team he ever played for won the World Series. He only retired when he could no longer throw the ball from second to first -- he grinded it there, which worked for a while, but then modern runners became faster thanks to steroids, and the curtain was drawn.

The above story has been told so many times it seems impossible to find anything David Eckstein-related that does not indulge in the urge to mention it. I did, however, locate a baseball card that seems to have gotten its story from an unreliable source.

The quirky Eckstein

David Eckstein has been described as a lot of things -- grinder, scrappy, grinder, scrappy, scrapper, grindy, "Scraps," Grindy McGrinderson, etc. -- but never quirky. Quirky is how we describe people like Carl Everett, who doesn't believe in dinosaurs. David Eckstein believes in dinosaurs. David Eckstein IS a dinosaur, in that he is a throwback named Grindosaurus Ecks.

was a standout personality and athlete for the Florida Gators

I am unsure if David Eckstein was/is a standout personality. I have never heard him speak, probably because so many people have decided to speak for him. Telling inappropriate albeit hilarious jokes at parties and doing keg stands (the only known ways to define "standout personality") is not, however, the typical life of a grinder. Grinders remain quiet, because grinding requires so much focus and hard work. "Let him get the glory," is the motto of the grinder. "I'll be here doing the little things to help us win, like being mad short and choking up 12 feet on my bat so I don't strikeout."

team that finished third in the 1996 College World Series.

Also incorrect. First of all, you can't finish third in a World Series. You either win it or you don't. Pretty sure the Atlanta Braves aren't all like, "Hooray, we finished tenth in the 2012 World Series WHERE'S OUR TROPHY?" Also, the Florida Gators won the 1996 College World Series because David Eckstein was on the team.

So this card has it all wrong, but that's okay because nobody -- not even Fleer's 2002 "Triple Crown" series -- is perfect. And actually, the inaccuracy of this card does well to highlight the grindiness of Eckstein himself, since grinders are often misunderstood. Sometimes the grinding is mistaken for "showing up" the athletes with more talent but less desire. Sometimes genuine grinding is mistaken for ironic grinding -- "Yo, check it out, dude is hustling down the line when he's obviously out. HA! Hilarious! We should invite him to the party later." But true grinders always shine through, and the way you can tell is how their light reflects on to others.