Night Owl Cards

Ah, 1998, an epic year in the night owl timeline. But baseball cards didn't have anything to do with it. I was five years into my collecting hiatus. The year is legend because I became a dad. I am sure I watched some of the Mark McGwire-Sammy Sosa home run race with a baby in my arms.   Somewhere in the summer of 1998, my wife and I were wheeling that baby in her stroller while walking through a mall, I don't remember which one. We walked into a chain book store -- I don't remember which one -- and I spotted Topps cards on one of those islands near the front of the store. They were packs of 1998 Topps. OK, sure, I'll grab a couple of packs and see what cards look like in the year 1998.   I recall thinking they were OK, nothing special. They certainly didn't break my hiatus, which lasted for another eight years, give or take a pack or two. I had no idea how active the hobby was at that time -- the number of sets and companies and "innovation." It was a year...

I know it seems like I've settled on a schedule of posting every other day. But that's just March forcing me into that pattern. It's nothing planned. But you'll probably have to put up with it for at least a couple more weeks.   I'm finally getting to the other big send of cards I received over the last couple of months. This showed up from reader Bill K. about two weeks ago and I've been combing through it ever since. Here is an idea of what I pulled out of the box:   Those are four thousand-count boxes and they were all pretty much jammed full. The vast majority of it was Dodgers with a few "guys who used to be Dodgers" and an early '90s Buffalo Bills set added.   Bill said he's been cleaning out/pairing down his inventory, which if the boxes are indication was filled with cards from the early-to-mid 1980s to today. As you might have guessed, I had a lot of these cards already. I mean A LOT. Perhaps you've heard I collect Dodgers.   So mu...

(Damn, what a crazy night in sports. There's nothing like working in the sports department of a newspaper when they're updating the Penn State story 29 times. Throw in the NBA labor saga and the insanity of being rich and living in Venezuela, and it was a pretty invigorating night. What's the opposite of "slow news day"? I'm appreciating that. It's time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 124th in a series): I'm a Coca-Cola guy. I prefer the taste to other cola drinks. Actually, right now I'm on a cherry pop kick (and don't tell me how much that stuff ruins the insides, I already know). But when cola is the choice, I'll go with Coke. It's not that I don't like Pepsi. It's fine. Coke is just a little better. But when I was younger, I didn't even consider taste when I picked Coke over Pepsi. I favored Coke for the same reason I favored McDonald's over Burger King, Topps over Upper Deck. Coke was first. I don...