Night Owl Cards

A few weeks ago, Topps announced the release of a product that kind of set me off. The $100, online-only, limited-edition, god-help-us-if-this-is-the-wave-of-the-future Heritage High Numbers set threw me into full rant rage , and I basically swore off collecting current Topps product for 2013. Then I turned around and obtained the Dodgers from that dirty set. Rod from Padrographs grabbed a box of Heritage High Numbers and sold off cards from it in a team break. It cost me under 5 dollars to get the Dodgers, plus a few other cards that are already coming in handy. You may wonder why I'd buy cards from a set that annoys me so. Well, that's easy. First, I'm a Dodger collector. I see a Dodger card, I want it. It's kind of like when a dog hears bacon sizzling. There's no thinking involved. Get bacon. What's to explain? Second, the set was already purchased by someone else. In my ideal world, no one would buy any of the sets, and Topps would head crawling ...

("Don't bother me. It's Thursday." I think I'll make that my outgoing message on my voice mail. So. Much. Crap. But I figured out a way to squeeze in a Cardboard Appreciation! This is the 166th in a series): I have heard some collectors complain about Topps' Cyberstats series from 1995. One even said it was "awful." That threw me because I always thought they were cool. Sure, all the stats are fake. Not real at all. And I'm someone that likes reality. But mathematically projecting someone's stats is good, clean fun. We all like to see what "might have happened." I think it was particularly important during this time. A lot of people were mad at baseball in 1995. The strike had just wiped out the last third of the season and the World Series. Frank Thomas, Matt Williams and the Montreal Expos got screwed. (Often forgotten is that the Dodgers could've made the playoffs for the first time in six seasons that year). Ever...

In my line of work, "context" is important. I'm not merely referring to sports figures who try to pass blame by claiming "I was taken out of context." I'm referring to "news value." Whether something is "news" or not has a lot to do with "context." When, what, where, why, who, etc., etc. You know the drill. But a lot of people do not. I don't know how many times I've had to explain to someone why we did a certain story or why we didn't do a certain story. It all has to do with "context," and often the response I get back is a blank look or silence on the other end of the line. This countdown has a lot to do with context as far as the cards I've picked. It's not merely the way the card looks. Although that does have a lot to do with it, if I was doing this countdown based solely on "look," there would be much different cards. It'd either be a countdown of all MOJO MAD HITZZZZZZZ ...

It's no secret that my ultimate goal in collecting -- as of 7:52 p.m., Nov. 27, 2012 -- is to complete the 1975 Topps mini set, the set that reminds me of the pinnacle of my childhood more than any other set in existence. There is no doubt in my mind that I will eventually complete that goal. And when it happens, it will be a true miracle in a cardboard sense, just because I'm the type of collector who prefers less challenging tasks. In the meantime, I am content with mini miracles such as this one: on Saturday I completed the 2011 Topps Lineage '75 minis tribute parallel set. Yup. I did something I never thought I'd ever do. I polished off a 200-card parallel/insert set. I realize that the Lineage minis are not 1975 Topps. You don't have to tell a guy who bought '75 minis at the corner grocery store in 1975 that. Lineage minis have those horrible card backs. The team font is all wrong. The "Topps Lineage" watermark is annoying. And they spe...