Night Owl Cards

By 1993, even dumb ol' me was waking up to the idea that the old collecting model wasn't going to work anymore. I couldn't possibly collect everything that was on store shelves at this rate. The objective every year since I started in 1975 -- find wax packs at stores, buy them -- was a solid purchasing model for years and years. But by the late 1980s, I couldn't keep up with all the sets out there and a lot of times I didn't care, and even in the years when I did try to buy them all, say 1991 and 1992, I was reaching the realization that this was stupid. So, in '93, I went into the collecting season with my eyes wide open. I would collect only what I knew or what appealed to me. And this is how the year went: Find Topps, buy Topps. Find Fleer, buy a little bit but I didn't really like it. Find Donruss, buy a little bit but I didn't really like that either. Find Score -- but it wasn't easy -- and buy it. Find Upper Deck and ... Holy smoke...

This is my favorite card recognizing a Dodger no-hitter. Donruss also put one out of Kevin Gross in its 1993 set, but it scans like crap, and the Score one lays it all out for you. Who, what, when, where. It's there. With the first no-hitter of the season pitched last night (yes, I was working and thank goodness for earlier Saturday start times on the west coast), I looked back on which cards I have that recognize Dodgers no-hitters. There aren't a lot of them. If you pitched a no-hitter before the 1990s, good luck, unless you're Sandy Koufax. Really, the boom in no-hitter cards, recognizing personal achievement on the field, was in the '90s. Score, again, brought it to the forefront with its marvelous no-hitter subset , acknowledging the surge in no-hitters during the 1990 season. The Kevin Gross card followed two years later. The next Dodgers no-hitter happened in July of 1995 when Ramon Martinez pitched one against the Marlins. This is what I have t...

You should have known this was coming. There is no way I am ever going to get anything done on this blog if I don't get rid of this unbearable guilt. When my scanner stopped talking, the mailbox was still functioning and I literally ran out of room on my card desk as cardboard began overflowing onto the floor. I started getting dirty looks and only through begging, pleading and bargaining (that scanner is one shrewd negotiator) was I able to get the scanner conversing again and just in time. But the cards remain. Stacks upon stacks. Only through sheer night owl brain power am I able to not mix them up. But I'm pushing my luck. Two consecutive days without mail (I think the postman has gone AWOL) will not lead to a third. I must show you all of the accumulated cards RIGHT NOW. Yes, right now. Now I can't control what you're going to do after receiving this news. The cards are good, so if you choose to leave, you'll miss out on some fascination and some ...