Night Owl Cards

  I've done a fairly good job of avoiding the blaster purchase over the last four or five years.   Once a standard pick-up, I gradually pulled away due to  blaster-exclusive "manufactured relics," then general unavailability during the pandemic, then a hike in price and the repeated frustration of pulling Marlins and Diamondbacks.   There are really only 3 times out of the year that I respond to the blaster siren call: When the new Topps flagship comes out, when new Heritage comes out, and when I get a gift card for Christmas. (Keep in mind I was regularly buying multiple blasters a week a dozen years ago).   The Target Christmas gift card arrives when I'm at my weakest. Typically at the holiday I haven't received any separate cards as gifts and I've also avoided buying cards during the holiday season so I can purchase gifts for others. The gift card gives me permission because I haven't opened packs in soooooooo long.   So that lengthy intro was intended ...

 (I managed to find my way to a ballpark today. It's been awhile. I go so infrequently these days that when I do, I'm surprised by the prices on everything. I mean this is minor league baseball, should I be spending $150 to have a good time for a "minor" event? It's just the two of us! Anyway, time for Cardboard Appreciation with an appropriate card. This is the 341st in a series): When I wrote a post 10 days ago about the very nice cards I received from reader Jonathan, I didn't include a set of cards he sent me. It was the 1986 Memphis Chicks set from something called "Time Out Sports". Jonathan said he got it cheaply because the Bo Jackson card that's part of the 26-card set wasn't included. But he sent it along anyway because he thought it had that charm that 1980s minor league sets are known for ... and it does.     A blogger from 2008 could expend quite a few words on a card of someone named Jere Longenecker who the photographer didn...

  There is a full cart over at sportlots that is just waiting for me to have time and money. Veteran readers know that this is not a great period for spending cash on cards for me, but the wallet loosens by mid-March.   One of the first things I will do when that time comes is click that ship button. The majority of my sportlots order is set needs and in a couple cases will finish off sets I've been chasing the last few years. Happy, happy, joy, joy!   I've mentioned before that set collecting makes the most sense to me, even in this age of Topps playing head games with the few set collectors who remain. While other kinds of collecting feels a little disjointed or scattered, collecting a set comes with a goal: finish the set. There is a defined end. And I've gotta have goals.   This brings me the most peace in collecting and even if that sportlots order feels like it's stagnating, I'm still working on those sets. Not too long ago I finished a TCDB trade with Mokola...

  I mentioned when I completed the 1988 Donruss set that it marked the first time I had completed four major sets from a given year.   I don't see that happening for me ever again. After the '80s, it's difficult for me to find multiple sets I was interested in enough to try to complete them. For example, I've completed 1993 Upper Deck, I wouldn't bother throwing money at any other '93 set outside of a token Topps complete-set buy. (I'd take a gift of a complete '93 Stadium Club or Pinnacle set but I'm not buying them).   So '88 is a milestone, a one-of-a-kind collecting feat. I like that it's '88. That's the year the Dodgers won the World Series; it's the year I graduated from college; it's the first full year of my wife and I going out. It's basically the last great year before adulthood stomped everything to hell.   To mark the feat, I thought I'd take 10 notable players from this time and compare their cards from th...

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...