Night Owl Cards

The world of the Night Card Binder is not above artificially created dramas. As an example, this is a 2002 Topps Heritage card of Preston Wilson, who as you may have heard is both the stepson and nephew of former Mets outfielder Mookie Wilson. (He's also George Foster's godson). It's a pretty cool card because it depicts a night ballpark scene in the background. The card and the scene actually pays tribute to a 1953 Topps card of Red Sox pitcher Dick Brodowski. You can see that the backgrounds are just about identical. Why Topps chose Wilson for a card that resembles the Brodowski card, I have no idea. They appear to have nothing in common. Didn't play for the same teams, didn't play the same positions, don't have similar names, and as far as I know, Brodowski isn't both the stepson and nephew of the same person. The card numbers on the back aren't even the same. Brodowski is card No. 69 in the 1953 set. Wilson is card No. 100 in the s...

A general perception exists that baseball has lost its ability to nickname its players. Once a colorful part of the sport's past, nicknames have either degenerated into Han-Ram, A-Rod, I-Pod style abbreviationisms, or come about because some people actually think Chris Berman is clever. Although I tend to think the nicknames were better back in the day, I'm not totally convinced that people are nickname illiterate today. I mean "Pokey" is a perfectly ideal baseball nickname, and Reese was around as recently as 2004. So this is what I'm going to do. Occasionally, I am going to post an all-decade baseball nickname team. I'll do one for the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s and '00s (I'll think about going back farther to the '20s, '30s and '40s). Then, once I'm done -- which will probably take about 7 years -- everyone can vote on which team is the best. Meanwhile, I am taking suggestions for your favorite baseball...

I've really tried to sing the praises of our hobby. I'm fiercely proud of it and firmly believe in announcing the fun factor in collecting every chance I get. I hope that when I'm oooohing and aaaahing in a trade post or cardboard appreciation or awesome night card that you understand what I'm really doing. I'm broadcasting how fun and, yes, exciting it is to collect rectangular pieces of cardboard. Sure, I criticize sets or cards, but that's only because I love the hobby so much that I want to see it stay great forever. As much as I love vintage, and threaten to go all vintage at times, I would be sad if I had to do that. Because that would mean that I believed my hobby was on the verge of death. Truthfully, I spend very little time thinking about the negative aspects of the hobby. About the only time I do that is when I'm reading the blogs. That's right. You're all to blame. The vast majority of the time I spend in the hobby is pouring my ...