Night Owl Cards

Sometimes I feel a little sorry for the players whose careers spanned the so-called Junk Wax Era. I don't hold any particular allegiance to that period. Unlike what seems like 75 percent of collectors writing blogs and on Twitter, I did not grow up with cards during this period. The late '80s/early '90s was actually my first return to the hobby. I had collected for 10 whole years before the JWE hit the big-time around '86, '87. But still, my heart goes out to those players whose cards are deemed a mere pittance because card companies couldn't control themselves and issued obscene quantities of cardboard. How would you like it if you put a decade of sweat and toil into a career and decades later your cards are still worth 10 cents apiece? That never happened to dudes from the '50s and '60s. Heck, not even the '70s! People still want their cards and they're willing to put down real live dollars! Simply through bad-timing, these Junk Wax Er...

I won myself an unopened wax pack and some Dodger cards just for answering a simple question over at Closet Full of Cardboard . I'll show the Dodgers some other time when the mood strikes, but I need to open the pack now, because it's something I've never done before. I know. This is a pack of 1988 Fleer. I can hear you groaning already. But you can't assume that everyone was 10 and opened garbage cans full of cards in '88. I was 22, on the verge of college graduation, and had met my future wife only five months earlier. I spent '88 mostly in the company of my girlfriend, and I promise you the topic of baseball cards never came up once during that year. Twenty-three years later, the secret is out. My wife is all too aware of my obsession with baseball players on cardboard. I open packs right in front of her without shame or remorse. She's even bought some cards for me when she's feeling brave and daring. Things are a lot more comfortable now...