Welcome to Night Owl Cards, where a card from the '70s can whoop a card from the '50s any day of the week and six times on Cardboard Appreciation, the Review 3.
For the sixth straight week, a 1970s card has been voted the winner of the opening round on this latest vote-off show. And for the second straight week, it's been a card from the often-overlooked 1974 Topps set.
Here are the voting totals:
1. Dave Kingman, 1974 Topps, 23 votes
2. Chris VanCuyk, 1952 Topps, 14 votes
3. Erin Andrews, 2012 Allen & Ginter, 5 votes
4. Dave Lopes, 1977 Hostess, 3 votes
5. Sparky Lyle, 1979 Topps, 1 vote
6. Miguel Cabrera, 2011 Heritage All-Star, 1 vote
7. Joe Girardi/Mariano Rivera, Veteran Masters, 2012 Heritage, 1 vote
8. Andre Ethier, 2011 Bowman Platinum green parallel, 0 votes
(48 total votes)
I think I can safely give an opinion of Kingman's performance (but don't ask Tom Lasorda) and say that he definitely did not strike out. King Kong joins his fellow '70s compatriots in the next round.
So let's see if there is a '70s card in the next group of eight and whether it's powerful enough to continue the streak.
Here are this week's candidates:
1. 1976 Topps Fred Lynn: Hey! We've got a '70s candidate right away. And it sure is powerful enough. Lynn is a player I "subconsciously collect." Subconscious collecting was the topic for this post. We all collect, whether we know it or not. And even when we're conscious of our collecting, we're not always conscious that we collect certain players. Call it "hoarding" if you wish. I prefer "subconscious collecting."
2. 1978 Topps St. Louis Cardinals checklist: Once, baseball was played on a rug, not grass. It is my hope we'll be able to say, "once baseball cards were printed on slick indexy card stuff, not cardboard."
3. 2006 Topps Walmart Stan Musial: This is one of like five cards I have from the fairly large '06 Walmart set. I'm supposed to be collecting everything 2006 Topps, yet I'm so very far away from completing it and barely even interested in doing so. But vote for Stan the Man if you like.
4. 1978 Topps Graig Nettles: More '70s! This card was the subject of a front-of-the-class talk I gave on baseball cards when I was in eighth grade. That was the topic of that Cardboard Appreciation post. But the comments went off on a tangent about projectors. Like we were in the AV club. Nerrrrrrrdddddddssssssssss!!!!!!
5. 2000 Pacific Invincible Eric Karros: Pacific put out some pretty wild sets back in the day. There was nothing wilder than 2000 Invincible though. This card is merely example A.
6. 2009 Upper Deck SPx Matt Kemp: If you're a team-completist like me, the worst thing you can do is go through the last few years of your want list and see how many team sets you have failed to complete. But it's absolutely the best thing you can do if you want to beat yourself up.
7. 1991 Score Randy Ready: If you sort '91 Score by team, it's a painter's-canvas mish-mash of turquoise, blue, black and white. If you sort it by number, all the colors stick to their own kind. I didn't know this. Now I do, and I'm a lot happier. ... Oh, and Randy Ready is probably the best name ever.
8. 2013 Topps Austin Kearns: The topic of this Cardboard Appreciation was cards issued of players immediately after they had died. Ken Hubbs, Don Wilson, Danny Frisella, etc. Why was the very alive-and-well Kearns included in this post? Because Night Owl is an idiot sometimes.
OK, so there are the voting possibilities this week. I daresay we may have a Red Sox vs. Yankees showdown on our hands. And like most Red Sox-Yankees games, it's going to last a week.
But don't let that dissuade you. Place your x in the poll on the suddenly blood-red sidebar!
Thanks, as always.
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