Night Owl Cards

"Of course," the many collectors who aren't Dodgers fans are saying. "Blasphemy," my fellow Dodgers fans are saying. A few years ago, I would have been right there with the torches and pitchforks: of course the best cards in a trade package are Dodgers cards! But in the last couple of years of really focusing on diversifying my collection, I am naturally drawn to other cards that don't necessarily display Dodgers on the front. Such was the case from a recent envelope from Nick of Dime Boxes . As I always I do when I receive a package from a fellow collector, I -- after my traditional card mail dance around the room -- go through the cards and pull out the ones I need. Once I have that tidy stack, I review which cards stand out and how they might form a blog post. Those cards are placed in a new stack while the others stay where they are while I figure out whether I have anything at all to say about them. Here were the cards -- needed cards -- ...

I've made some sort of attempt to collect a current set ever since I returned to modern cards in 2006. Even during years when I didn't like the flagship Topps brand, I either focused on another current set or made a half-hearted attempt to collect flagship. But I feel myself doing none of that in 2016. Sets that I have collected enthusiastically in the recent past -- Allen & Ginter and Stadium Club -- will get no more than token treatment. Heritage, the only set with promise, sabotages itself with shortprints every year. (I will still buy periodic packs because pack opening is the essence of the hobby). As I take greater control of what I want to collect, I've already sensed that I am placing greater attention on vintage and the quirky corners of this hobby. And that's coming out in what I buy and apparently in what I write about -- because others seem to be noticing it, too. In the last week or two I've been hit with card packages with the overriding t...