Night Owl Cards

The 10th anniversary giveaway has come to a close. But first I need to get rid of this 2010 Topps short-print of Cy Young. It's the last prize left and an interesting if I can say so myself. I mean look at those stats! And those teams ? The Spiders? The Perfectos? The AmeriCAINS?? (What the hell, Topps, it's supposed to be the Boston Americans ). This card is destined for Sport Card Collectors, if he wants it. He just has to let me know by 8 p.m. EST Monday. Otherwise it goes to Bru. Or Fuji after that. I will be sending out prize packages hopefully starting the end of this week. I can't send them all out at once. I don't have the time nor the money. Fortunately, Commish Bob of the Five-Tool Collector helped in the money department by donated nearly two-dozen stamps to the cause! Thank you very much! That is a big assist. Especially for someone who is paying for a kid in college. So I'll start sending out prize envelopes, starting with the first p...

The late '70s sure was an odd time to issue a card set called "Rock Stars," but that's what Donruss did in 1979. By '79, punk and disco had risen and fallen, given birth to new wave in the middle there, and was sharing the radio airwaves with what was left of arena rock. You can see what a confusing world it was by the four groups that pre-baseball Donruss included here. Queen was still rock, but branching out into a little bit of everything. The Babys, considered the next wave of rock at the time, was actually pop rock. The Village People was a dance club novelty act. And by '79 your parents had stopped hating Kiss because the band was so mainstream it was on the verge of selling cereal on TV. In fact, Kiss put out a disco record that year. I know all this because I was 13 in 1979. This is what I grew up with. If Donruss wanted to be more accurate and relevant to the time period, it could have chosen a quartet of Led Zeppelin, Van Halen, Dire Straits ...

This is one of the greatest cards ever. I received it quite awhile ago, from Dave of Tribe Cards , in its current encased state. On the back, Professional Sports Authenticator tells me it is graded "Good," and that it is a "2." Whatever. I never think about grading cards. The only time I think about grading is when I come across a blog post that rips someone for having a card graded, or recommends someone have a card graded. Either way, it makes me sleepy. I don't sell cards. I don't plan to sell cards. Grading doesn't have a place in my life. And thank goodness. My life is packed full. Sealing up cards in plastic strikes me as weird, even though when I think about it really really hard, I can come up with a reason for doing so. But that doesn't mean I like owning graded cards. Whenever I happen to obtain a card enclosed in a case meant to protect me from myself, I do one thing: I find the closest hammer (we have a few scattered all ov...