Night Owl Cards

  My first sportlots order of the year has been sitting on my rolltop desk waiting for me to brag about it.   It's not bragging material, really. There were a lot of upgrades that I don't need to show, but I sure did enjoy getting that 1977 Topps Joel Youngblood to replace the creased one in the set binder that I didn't even know was creased until a rare day of sunshine came through the card room (who knows how many creased cards are hiding in the Northeastern darkness of my home).   Some stuff has been put away already and others have been sitting in a stack waiting until the one last pokey sportlots seller finally snapped out his stupor and shipped the last card (this always happens).    I've determined what my 10 favorite arrivals are -- but there are more than 10 cards. Per usual, these are interesting mostly to me and could very well bore you to tears.      10. Gavin Lux, 2020 Topps Chrome   The last card needed for the team set. Can you...

  I have a couple of 1975 Topps-centric posts to publish before the 50th anniversary year of my favorite set -- and my first year of buying cards -- is through.   This is the first of those posts. Ten years ago I wrote " A history of 1975 Topps tributes ," in which I documented all of the '75 Topps themed cards that I had known up to that point. It was pretty thorough, but it's 10 years old now and there have been so many more tributes since.   In that post I asked readers for other examples and said I'd add them to the post. But I didn't do that. I even forgot the post existed.   The only reason I'm updating it now is reader Dave kept commenting on it with other 1975 examples. He provided several in 2022. Perhaps I noticed that then, but I forgot about it again. Then, at the start of this month, he offered up another example. That got me to finally address this and provide an update.   So let's start with some of Dave's examples. One of them, the ...

  I'm guessing that most people who collected the 2024 Heritage set have moved on to other card ventures by now.   We're even past 2025 Heritage appearing on store shelves, at least where I live -- it sure could hang around a little longer, I don't think flippers are gobbling up Heritage. I'm still chasing short-prints in '25 Heritage though and I'm still keeping my eye on what's interesting to me in 2024 Heritage. Mostly I'm thinking about chasing the high numbers set and pondering what other Dodgers parallels I want.   So I was looking through my '24 Heritage in the Dodgers binder yesterday, getting an idea for what I could shop for, when I suddenly realized that there was no Max Muncy in the set.   "That's funny," I thought. "I'm pretty sure I've completed both the main set and the high numbers set." But just to be sure, I looked on TCDB and COMC. Sure enough, Muncy is nowhere to be found in 2024 Heritage.   Weird. ...

  I've been watching snippets of spring training the last couple of days. It's a busy time of the year for me, so I can manage only a couple of innings at a sitting usually. But that's enough to get that spring high that I'm so desperate for here in the later stages of winter.   I watch the the spring games and marvel what I see, like it's life on another planet. Spectators in the stands are actually fanning themselves! I take a quick look at the temperature bud on my laptop screen. 18 degrees. Nope, no urge to fan.   I can only imagine what it's like to live near spring. Going to ballgames sure is great. But I'd appreciate the simple, carefree feeling of hopping in the car (without clearing it off or stumbling on ice) and traveling a smooth street to the nearest big box or card shop. Sure, every life has problems, but in some places there is no snow on top of that.   One person who lives near spring is Jeremy of Topps Cards That Never Were . He was able to ...

  Whenever I finish off an old vintage set, it takes a little while to get serious about another one. I have to work up the energy to go through what it takes to tackle another one. It's a time-and-money investment. It's a project, really, not a work project, but a fun one. But, as always, projects take dedication, drive and stamina. It's not for the weak. Take that however you want.   Often it isn't until I purchase a certain card do I feel like I'm really in the right mind-set and I'm on my way to pursuing another set.   The 1969 Topps set, coming after I finished the 1970 Topps set, has been a goal for the last four or five years but casual-like as I focused on more pressing card needs. It's always been in the background even as I added '69 Topps cards to my collection.   But with 1970 and other stuff out of the way, it's not in the background. In fact it's staring me in the face, waiting for me to commit.   You may think that with 624 of the ...