Night Owl Cards

  During the 1960s, the Dodgers made the World Series three times, all within a four-year period. Throw in 1959 and they were in the World Series four times in seven years.   Currently, the Dodgers have been to the World Series four times in six years. It's a fairly similar run to the 1960s one, although this version of the Dodgers has been more successful winning Series. (Three compared to two).   I wonder if these Dodgers will be thought of in the way that the '60s Dodgers are, as a talent-laden team, filled with some of the best pitching talent ever, with some OK offensive talent -- though nothing like what L.A. currently has. They are respected. I don't think people got disgusted with the Dodgers showing up repeatedly in the Fall Classic -- something tells me that if fans then were disgusted by that kind of thing (I have my doubts), it would be toward the Yankees (five straight WS from 1960-64).   A lot of fans will jump in and say that the two scenarios are diff...

   I realized just the other day that I have been rooting for the Dodgers for 50 years. Today, the first Dodgers game of the year, marks exactly 50 years -- although according to the calendar I guess 50 years wouldn't arrive until April 9, which was the first Dodgers game of the 1976 season.   Anyway, for 50 seasons I've been a fan. Last year I celebrated 50 years as a collector and the year before that I celebrated 50 years of owning baseball cards. I'm still waiting for my awards.   I've mentioned before that although I started collecting in 1975, I wasn't watching any baseball games. My allegiance to the Dodgers was demonstrated almost entirely by wearing a Dodgers hat, which was really a Los Angeles Angels hat. I'm wearing it in the photo above on the occasion of my 10th birthday.   Outside of that, being a Dodgers fan in 1975 meant getting as many of the '75 Topps Dodgers as I could. I did not watch any regular season games on TV until 1976. That's...

 (Woof, blog views have taken another downturn, basically in the last two weeks. Maybe everyone was too busy watching the Olympics! Anyway, for those still reading, this is called Cardboard Appreciation and we're at the 365th in a series):   As far as I can tell, this is the first time Shoeless Joe Jackson has appeared on a Topps card.   I pulled it when I went back for a hanger box of 2026 Topps last week. I opened it at work. When I saw the card I didn't think anything of it other than "that's a weird-looking thing."   But later I remembered how MLB removed Shoeless Joe and other deceased ballplayers from its permanently ineligible list last spring, making them available to be voted into the Hall of Fame. Also, since Topps doesn't make a move without MLB approval, that means Jackson (and I assume Pete Rose) are eligible to appear in current baseball cards.   Up until now my Shoeless Joe cards have been created by Upper Deck, Donruss/Playoff/Panini/Leaf, vari...

  I finally received a sportlots order today. It's my second order of the year from the site and this time I went with the box shipment to save myself some money.   I was questioning myself for doing it while waiting because gosh does it take awhile. It was only a month, it turns out, but it certainly seemed longer. I know I've been through this before (and written about it) but the saving sometimes don't seem worth it during the wait.   I usually reserve sportlots orders for plugging a few team set needs or set needs in general, but not for super-vintage cards in most cases. Sportlots isn't great for knowing what the cards look like when you buy them (it seems to have cut back even more on the pictures in fact). So stuff like Kellogg's cards is out.   I don't know how much these arrivals will interest people but who cares? This blog thing is here for showing my cards, nobody else needs to like them but me.   Here we go, I mean, why all the 2021 Stadium Club Ch...

  I stopped at the monthly card show Saturday. It was the second straight weekend card show I had attended. This would have been crazy talk in the first 10 years of my blog, but it's something that could easily happen two or three times a year now -- and if I wanted to do a little more traveling around the state, I might be able to go to a show nearly every week over the next six months.   I'm not quite that obsessed. Two in two weeks is quite amazing enough for me.   So you may remember in the show write-up last week that I said I actually finished the show with cash left over. That means I carried that cash into Saturday's show. I padded it just a little, but I budgeted about half the amount for this show that I did for last week's.   It turned out to be plenty because I left this show with money left over, too!  I'd like to blame the expanding number of tables selling Pokemon and such -- it's getting so pervasive that I'm starting to see a world where the...

  I've mentioned before that work has been even more of a time-suck than previously. It's infringing on blog posting and I don't think I can go to my bosses and say this is the reason why something's got to change, but something's got to change!   The first three days this week I worked more than the usual eight hours (plus a couple hours on Sunday) and I was prepared to do the same Thursday. I had a story interview arranged before I started my shift and I thought, "welp, I just added more hours that I won't get paid for!"   But it didn't turn out that way. Thanks to some general panicking about the weather, every single sports event in our area was canceled last night. So I ended leaving work at 10:45 p.m! That never happens. Usually I'm there until 12-12:30 and on busier nights (like tonight), I'll close up shop around 1:30 a.m.   So I got to leave work early. That's a red-letter day around here! (I don't have much). But I should...

  Today is the fifth anniversary of the Dodgers' trade with the Red Sox in which the Dodgers gained Mookie Betts for a bag of beans.   It's not a coincidence that at around the same time, Betts has moved into the top 10 in terms of the number of cards in my collection. Two World Series wins with one of MLB's flagship teams and being a hell of a bowler will do that. He's now at No. 10, according to TCDB, with 373 cards, knocking Adrian Beltre to 11th.   It seems that Betts arrived in the top 10 extremely quick. Sure, it took five years, but there are plenty of other players in my collection who are favorites, who I've been collecting for a long time, and are nowhere near the top 10.   But if you are a star during this era of collecting baseball cards, you are going to make up ground fast. Companies now issue way too many cards of the top five percent of ball players. It makes it much easier to reach the top than it ever has been. Just for my own funzies, I thought I...

  On Saturday I got up knowing that the monthly card show was taking place on the other side of town. I looked out the window. It had snowed steadily the day before, very lightly but with the wind the inch or two stuck to everything and it had grown colder, too. It was maybe 10 degrees out and the cars were coated. It was my day off. Ugh, I don't know if I want to go across town. This is a terrible attitude for someone who was once willing to drive through less-than-ideal weather for more than an hour to get to one of two shows a year. So I showered, got dressed and had a bite to eat while the car warmed up. The plows had been through a few times, most of the roads should be fairly clear. I stopped at the ATM for some cash and wondered when all dealers would take nothing but cards or a cash app and then drove the rest of the way to the show. The parking lot was pretty full. I walked down the hallway and to the check-in table and paid my five bucks (still too much). I knew what I wa...