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...

  Here is the new product-release calendar for upcoming sets, posted on the main page of Trading Card Database: Please note the first item on that list.   2021 Topps Big League baseball.   To quote Andre Dawson, "what year is it?" I am not insinuating anything about TCDB's list. The site doesn't come up with the release dates (note there are several other 2021 sets in that list). Any collector that's a fan of Big League or up on new card sets knows that 2021 Big League's release has been postponed repeatedly. Why Topps even announces a new date anymore, I don't know. It's gotten pretty comical ever since the calendar turned from 2021 to 2022. Supply issues and backlogs is the reason for the massive delay. I think someone commented when I mentioned the delay earlier that figurines were part of 2021 Big League and the manufacturing/distribution of those was the reason for the delay. I don't care about figurines (see my shrug with today's Fanatics...

Some cards arrived at the house recently from blog reader and frequent commenter Stubby, who provides a needed and often insightful perspective on various card topics, but especially cards from the '60s, because I'm not Don Draper, man. The cards fell into two distinct categories and they're so different that I must break them up into separate posts. I will start with the totally unexpected cards first. Yes, the Dodgers cards were the unexpected ones. Stubby went traveling through my want lists, which is the only way to fly. And he found stuff that would've taken me years to reach on that perpetual priority list in my head. For example, Panini products, both up there, and down here. You all know my stance on Panini, but I'll suspend the criticism just this one time to mention that the Roy Campanella Elite Giants card is pretty awesome. A larger photo would have been nice (the design, Panini, the design), but I'm happy to have that card. Anothe...