Night Owl Cards

  I'm a bit odd, I know that. But everyone is. I think collecting baseball cards is "leaning in" to your oddness. Might as well accept it and have fun.   My oddness exhibits itself in my collection in many ways, although all of these things make perfect sense to me.   One of the weird things I do has to do with the binders in my collection.   I will always be a binders guy. As a set-collector, it just makes sense. Boxes hide your collection. I like to see the cards displayed, as if in a book. You know how much I love periodicals anyway. Binders are an extension of that. To get a full idea of my binder oddness, I'm going to the one that houses my 1970 Topps cards. Weirdness is on glorious display for that year. Here's a page as evidence: Right away, I'm sure you've spotted my habit of double-bagging. I don't think I need to defend this anymore. I've mentioned my reasons for doing this multiple times (saves money and space). It makes sense to me, eve...

I am almost certain that the Yankees are going to win the World Series. I've been certain for quite awhile. During this postseason, I have always rooted for the other team, and felt real disgust when they didn't succeed, or -- like the Angels -- make dumb mistake after dumb mistake. But I always knew that the Yankees would prevail. I'm not the greatest evaluator of talent, but I can see what the Yankees have and how they are playing. I don't think the Phillies have a real shot of winning the Series. It could go six games. But I don't see a seven-game series or a Phillies win. Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE a Phillies win and I would love to be wrong, but my gut says it ain't gonna happen. Given that, what I'm saying here shouldn't annoy any Yankees fans, too much. Your team is going to win the World Series, so who cares about what some blogger thinks? It's well-established that I do not like the Yankees. I come from a family of Yankee...

This is the first week in six months that I have not received a single card package in the mail. There are a couple of reasons for this. One is I have been trying to catch up with the cards I have obtained recently -- organizing, filing, etc. -- so I have initiated very few trade talks. The second is I'm waiting on a handful of packages to arrive. Some are en route, another one is tied up in another trade, and three or four are out there in the stratosphere somewhere. With a couple of those, I have no idea if they will ever come home. But that's cool. Life plays some strange tricks and card collecting fades into the background like a child's stuffed toy. Plus, I'm sure there are a few people who are wondering the same thing about cards I agreed to send them. I'm assuming my scattered brain has lost track of a trade or two. I hope people will let me know if I have. But the trading hasn't totally come to a halt. I am working on four or five trades at the mom...

All right. I am absolutely certain that this card is a night card. There can be no dispute. We have the lights on. We have the dark sky. We have Jerald Clark bathed in illuminosity. We're batting 1.000. I bring this up for two reasons. First, two bloggers have sent me this particular card over the last few months. I do enjoy it when another blogger actually makes the effort to track down a night card, and there is no question that this is a beauty. The second reason I bring it up is because there seems to be some question as to whether the card below is a night card. Motherscratcher sent this card to me because he thought it was a night card. Two other people commented on the previous post that they thought it was a night card, too. I, on the other hand, am not so sure. I'm saying that it's not a night card, although there's not a lot of confidence behind that statement. The reason I say it's not is because the bank of lights is turned off. Also, the sky looks da...

(Usually the word "appreciate" appears in sentences with a happy ring to them. Except when it is preceded by the words "I would." As in, "I would appreciate it if you wouldn't leave your clothes lying on the floor," or "I would appreciate it if you wouldn't curse in front of my grandmother, or "I would appreciate it if you would put those cards away and have a conversation with me." ... Um, not that I've ever heard any of these sentences. Time for another edition of cardboard appreciation. This is the 15th in a series): I'm in a bit of a ornery mood for some unknown reason . So I might as well feature a card that brings all of my childhood hatred for a certain team to the surface. My brothers and I have despised the Yankees for a long time. I can't pinpoint the exact moment that this began, but I can relay my first recollection of disliking the Yankees. It came on May 2, 1976. That was the day that the Red Sox and Yankee...

I'm not on speaking terms with my mail carrier. Not that he knows this yet, but the next time we see each other face-to-face, which happens about, oh, every four months, I am going to give him the silent staredown. Until today, I had not receive mail in three days. Sunday and Monday, of course, there was no mail. On Saturday, we had a wicked snowstorm in which we received a foot-and-a-half of snow between 4-10 a.m. We received no mail that day, too. Whatever happened to that saying, "neither rain, nor sleet, nor dark of night ..."? I guess "wicked snowstorm" isn't on the list, huh? So, I was anxiously awaiting the mail today because I knew there were some cards on the way. I did receive three packages, which is fantastic. But I know my mail carrier is holding out on me. The mail load was probably quite heavy after no mail on Saturday (I received a number of other articles of mail today, as well -- bills, magazines, investment notices informing me that my r...

We here at Topps/Fleer/Donruss/Upper Deck/Score/etc./etc. have the best interests of you, the player, at heart. (Rusty Staub, swinging and looking absolutely goofy). Our mission is to serve you, the athlete. (Jerry Grote desperately attempting to run out a grounder). With our fine fleet of photographers, we will cast you only in the best light (Jim Fregosi watching as his foul pop up is about to be caught). You are the star of our show. We want to make you look as good as we possibly can. (Jim Wynn hitting one straight up in the air at Candlestick). The kids look at you as heroes, so what purpose would it serve to make you look bad? (Bobby Murcer fouling one off or possibly swinging and missing). You are the most talented players in the game. We want to showcase that talent (Len Randle yelling after taking a bad swing or maybe fouling one off his foot). Rest assured, you are in capable hands (Lou Piniella nearly spinning completely around and saying something like ...