New Blog and a Contest

The infamous Matt that has been trading with a few of us bloggers has started his own blog.  Not only does that give us another blog to read he is having a contest.  So head on over to The Diamond King and check him out. 

Dan, What A Mailday!! Post 6 (The Pinnacle of Junk Wax)

I have seen it argued before but ti me 1990 is the absolute pinnacle of the Junk Wax era.  Every time I have ever bought a big lot of cards when I sort them the 1990 stack is always the largest.  I always find something I need too.  The box Dan sent was the same way in that the stack of 1990 cards was the biggest.  Unlike any other lot I also needed every 1990 card he sent.

I remember going to Hills as a kid.  I went before the junk wax era though so I didn't have any cards.

Thanks to a Google search and then a Wiki page I found out that Hills was bought out by Ames in 1999.  But it didn't last and folded in 2002.  We will always have their cards though.

This is one of those oddball Score cards.  The Writers Journey left a comment saying they were part of a boxed set in 89.  Figure that 90 was the same way.

Dear Post - I would buy a lot more of your products if you put baseball cards in them again.

It's Wade and Wade and Wade and Wade and Wade and Wade...

So many Fleer mini sets.  And I will never own them all.

I randomly get one of these Red Sox minor league cards every now and then.  I think I am actually getting close to the set finally.

Now that is a group of Swell cards. 

KayBee put out a good set of cards in 1990.  I mean just look at the quality of stars in the Red Sox team set alone.  A quick internet search says that Toys R Us bought out KayBee 2 years ago.   

I scanned these a week ago when I got the package.  Now that I am posting them I realize that I must now pull that Nick Esasky card and find out just what he was the League Leader in.

I was told that card companies designated guys as All Stars even when they were not All Stars.  These two however look like All Stars to me.

I still have a decade of cards to post and the well is running dry.  OR maybe it is just that 1990 Pacific cards are not exactly great fort the creative juices.

A few ears ago I had a friend that bought an early 90 Honda bike to turn around for a buck.  It was dark blue with Neon pink decals all over it.  It took us hours to peel all the pink off of it.

Somehow I didn't have many 1990 Leaf Red Sox.  Dan helped out though I still need Clemens and Brunansky.

These are not 1990 Fleer I finished that set off years ago.  These are Fleer Update.  The whole team set to be exact.  Aren't Greg Harris' glasses horrific?

This was one complete post.  With these cards Dan finished off my Classic Update, Fleer All Stars, Fleer League Leaders, Fleer League Standouts, Fleer MVPs, Fleer Update, KayBee, Pacific Legends, Post, Ames, and Hills team sets.

This isn't the last of what Dan sent either.  There is still over a decade to go.

Dan, What A Mailday!! Post 5 (Late 89s)

I didn't exactly like admitting that I still need some early 80s Red Sox but I am almost embarrassed that I still need late 80s Red Sox.  Not just one or two, I could use hundreds of late 80s Sox.

So here is a sampling of some late 80s stuff I was looking for before Dan helped me out.

I know I did a sticker post already but these are more card than sticker.  They even have a reagular back with stats and all on them.  Plus they feel like a regular.  Actually I can't say that they really are stickers because I never have tried to peel one.  Nope they go straight into the binder.

 I busted an entire box of 87 O-Pee-Chee and I didn't get the team set.  Dan had to bail me out by

 sending the last 4 that I needed.  That is what trade partners are for.  (by the way does anyone need any 87 P-Pee-Chee or Leaf Pirates, Atros, Expos, or Rangers??

 I have been seeing quite a few cards of Mr Boyd ever since my begging post a month ago.  Sadly I don't remember him being an All Star.  Evidently he was though or at least Fleer says so.

 Does anyone know if there are still any Kaybee Toy Stores?  I know I haven't seen one in years. 

 I don't know how I still need so many Sportflics?  It was one of my very favorite sets as a kid but I still need a whole slew of them from every year.  I don't think I have completed one team set of Sportflics yet.

A Canadian card of The Rocket.  Back in 88 I would never of imagined him playing for a Canadian team at some point.  Then again he went on to play for a whole lot worse teams than the Jays.

 

I will never complete all the little Fleer sets.  There seem to be an endless amount of them.  I don't even know which were extras in packs and which were their own set.  

I'll probably finish both 2008 Documentary and 20th Anniversary sets before I finish off all the little Fleer sets. 






 .

I don't think anyone wants to look at 89 Fleer.  Instead here is the back of the one that Dan sent me.  It is not ordinary 89 Fleer it is part of the update set.  The 80s were riddled with update sets.

 Is this Pacific an early version of the Pacific that showed up in the 90s?  

 Why can't bread come with cards anymore.  Seriously.  My family goes through 2 loafs of bread a week.  That is potentially 104 cards a year I'm missing out on.  Actually I'm probably missing out on more than that.  I'm sure that if bread had cards in it I could come up with excuses to eat more bread.  That or I might find a pond with some ducks that need feeding.

 Swell, was this issued in some product like the JJ Nessen card?  Or was it just a Swell set.  So many cards came out in the late 80s and if they were not in the Beckett I didn't know anything about them.  In fact at one time if it wasn't in Beckett I didn't consider it collectible.  My how things have changed.

I didn't know what Ames was.  I had to Google it.  How did we live before Google.  Hard to imagine my kids will probably never use a dictionary or a set of encyclopedia. 

Oh yeah, Ames was a department store.  Now it is produces lawn and garden products.  The two are in no way related and the history of the garden products is way more interesting than the department store.  Seriously Ames shovels played a big part in American history.  Check it out for yourself. 

I learned to scan two cards above each other instead of next to each other so that they post better.  I still don't know whey some images are larger than others though. 















I know I had these two cards as a kid.  I know were they went too.  I had a friend who's house burnt down and I gave him all my baseball cards collected strictly football.  I wonder what ever happened to that guy?

More of the many many Fleer small sets.  If I ever collect them all it will be such a big accomplishment that I may have it engraved in my tombstone. 

Here Lies Adam

Collecting all these cards killed him.

This is the least embarrasing scan of the whole post.  These are a Red Sox minor league set from 1989.  Of  all the guys pictured Plantier, Irvine, and Zambrano made it to the next level.  At least those are the ones I have major league cards of.  Plantier played 7or 8 seasons.

How can a self respecting card collector say he needs 89 Donruss?  Because it is Donruss Traded.  See the card in the middle of the scan?  T-7?  That means rare.   Ok maybe not rare to you but rare to me.

You are thinking "Really 89 Fleer?  You are bragging about getting 89 Fleer?"  I know your dog has 89 Fleer lining the bottom of his pen but does he have Fleer Update?  I didn't think so.

This is not your ordinaly 89 Score.  It isn't update either.  It is Score Superstars.  That makes it special somehow.  I'm not sure how because I never saw one of these back in 89.  Actually I don't even know haw they were sold.  As a small set maybe?

Here Lies Adam

One of Adam's biggest goals in life...

Dan, What A Mailday!! Post 4 (early 80s)

Surly I'm not the only one that needs early 80s cards.  It is kind of embarrassing in a way but I actually need quite a bit of them.

  Dan helped me out by sending a whole bunch of them my way.  Feast your eyes on the early 80s awesomeness that he sent.

I never really bought any Fleer cards.  Not when I was a little kid, not even when I was a teenage collector. Fleer was just outside of my card realm.  Yaz either hit pop fly or a towering home run.  I'm going to imagine it is a home run.

It turns out I already had this card.  It was on my checklist that I needed it but somehow it was in with my 82 Donruss instead of 83.  It is probably because the copyright date in the tiny print at the bottom say it is an 82.

You would think they could have painted Teds hat on straight. He was the greatest hitter of all time for crying out loud. 












When I wear a belt I put the belt buckle in the middle.  Just saying...

84 Donruss is another much over looked set, by me at least.  It actually isn't so bad.  Some nice action shots along with a few posed shots.  What is not to like.  If Night Owl tries to name this one it should be the music set because the lines at the bottom remind me on the lines in sheet music and the Donruss sign looks like a note.

This is a 1984 Glossy Insert.  Otherwise known as one of those send in sets I was never allowed to purchase.  It is funny what was considered glossy back then compared to now.

I have been slowly tracking down all the 84 Fleer.  It is about the ugliest set ever though.  Wade didn't get cut off by my scanner the card is really that far off center.  We forget how good we have it now-a-days.

Yep, more 80 Fleer, it is kind of the standard for this post.  Although the stands look empty that is in game action on the Buckner card.  There is no way he practiced that before every game. 

The other day I mentioned how my brain doesn't remember Jim Rice as being a happy guy.  But once again here he is with a smile on his face.  If I wasn't bussy scanning hundreds of cards I would break out the 70s binder and see how many more smiling Rice cards I find.

 

The Canadians called, they want their cards back.  Too bad though because I call no take backs.  They have hoarded their Leaf and O-Pee-Chee long enough. 

Tony kind of looks like George Jefferson on this card.





















Mark looks like Jeremy Davies playing Dickie Bennet in Justified.  You know, inbred and strung out.

Just so you know 86 counts as early 80s.  Late 80s starts in 87 at least it does for me.  Probably because I started collecting cards in 87 and everything pre 87 seems like an old card to me.






There is Buckner in that pose again.  It's an 86 card to boot.


To Boot...  get it...










Mmmmm... Chicken

This card was Fleer's attempt to make a Sportflic.  Close your eyes and think smile, when you open them Wade is happy.  Close your eyes and think mad, when you open them Wade is mad.
















Not all Fleer cards are created equal.  Some are much harder to come by like this from the 87 Update set. 

 Last of the early 80 cards.  This is a 1985 Quaker Jim Rice.  Once again he is happy on his card.  I think it must be because that Amish guy had to have built a time machine to make Jim look that young in 85.

  I wonder how many times they had to whip that horse to get it up to 88 miles per hour.

Dan, What A Mailday!! Post 3 (Stickers)

When I was a kid I had a few football sticker books.  I never got one filled though and I have no idea what happened to them.  Time to relive that youth without actually sticking the cards.  These are going in sheets instead.

I started out with just one 1981 Topps sticker and now I have all but one.  (Fred Lynn)  

 

Thanks to Dan I now have a complete team set of 1982 Topps Stickers.  Unfortunately the only way i remember Yaz is the old guy Yaz like on the stickers above.  Doesn't Perez look funny?  He has to be stealing signs in that photo, don't know what else he could be doing.

 

Here is my dollar, May I please have #8 Tony Perez and any 9 random players?  Tony will finish my team set for me.

 

I have about 5 versions of each of these cards, all with a different back.  I wonder if there is someone out there that is putting together a master set of these one with every single sticker back configuration. 

Next up Early 80s cards.