Archival footage

Let me tell you, the Walmart closest to me is STOCKED UP this year in the card department.

I don't know what came over it. For years -- as long as this blog has been around -- Target has beaten Walmart senseless when it comes to card stocking. It's been no contest. But this year is different.

Out of habit, I go to Target first, because it's the big box with the latest cards. But more often than not this year, I leave with nothing, which used to be the pattern at Walmart. Now, I'm going to Walmart, and finding what I need!

Around 6:30 p.m. Friday (a terrific time to be at Walmart when you want to avoid crowds, by the way), I found a card shelf filled with 2018 product. Boxes and boxes of Allen and Ginter and Series 2 everywhere. To a lesser degree, Stadium Club and Big League and Opening Day. Some monster boxes of Chrome for $39.99.

I almost missed the Archives rack packs stashed over to the side on the middle shelf. I grabbed four of them and headed for the checkout.

Now, you know me and Archives. I look at the product like I would some 20-year-old trying to remake a Police song. It doesn't match, it's not good enough and it's giving me a headache. Last year I bought almost nothing of the product, annoyed that we were getting the 1982 Topps design, again.

But this year somebody answered my plea to tackle some of the much-avoided designs of my childhood and so we have the 1977 and 1981 designs in this year's Archives, both from my formative collecting years. The other design is 1959 Topps, which I respect quite a bit (the 2008 Heritage set is the only one I've seriously attempted to complete).

So, although I had no plans to collect it, this year's Archives sounded a little fun. I took a look at the wrapper, hoped I didn't pull any of the Sandlot cards advertised on the front (unless it's "Bad News Bears," be gone with the baseball movie cards), and noted the image on the front is also from 1977:

Let's hope the cards inside match as well as the wrapper.


RACK PACK 1

#34 - Anthony Rendon, Nationals
#62 - Addison Russell, Cubs
#36 - Adam Jones, Orioles
#74 - Anthony Banda, Rays
#49 - Bobby Doerr, Red Sox
#47 - Carlton Fisk, White Sox

Like the last few years, each of the three designs are clumped together in rack packs and this year the '59 design comes out first.

Bobby Doerr has been an Archives representative before, but mostly what I want to mention is the replication of the design.

As usual, Archives insists on spelling out "third baseman" and "outfielder," etc. Even Heritage (the Eric Chavez card) knew you didn't do that.

The most jarring element though is the name lettering, which is too small and squashed. Long names aren't extended across the width of the card as happened in 1959. They start at the center and head to the right. Same with shorter names. Unlike the Carl Furillo card, that spaces the letters in his name, the names on the Archives cards are floating off to the right.

Picky? Sure. But wait til we see the 1977 cards.

#169 - George Brett, Royals
#194 - Jack Morris, Tigers
#140 - Pedro Martinez, Expos
#175 - Ryan McMahon, Rockies
#157 - Alcides Escobar, Royals

All right.

The '77 design releases all kinds of memories and feelings inside. This is the first set where I was really aware of what I was doing -- collecting baseball cards. I really began to focus on appearance and design. And this is not the greatest representation.

So much to address. I didn't expect the All-Star bar, but man that Brett card looks naked without it. The cumbersome "third baseman" is wedged into the flag when the perfectly adequate "third base" will do. And the team names ... oh, the team names.

They are much too tall, thin and spaced out. 1977 Topps was all about FAT team names. Look at the 1977 Reds cards.

But the downfall of the 1977 section of the set comes with the decision to put the position lettering in white type no matter what.

Those position names are unreadable on yellow flags. Trust me, it is even less readable in hand. I feel like I need a decoder ring.

The 1977 Topps cards used black or white type, depending on the flag background, for the position names. Kind of smart, huh?

FS-LAA - Angels Future Stars

Time for the insert portion of the package. I smiled when I saw this card. This is my first Shohei Ohtani pull and this was the way you would pull his card back when I was 15 years old -- as part of a three-player future stars card! The way rookies should be lumped together!!

CA-10 - Amed Rosario, Mets, Coming Attraction

Here is the more updated treatment of rookies. I believe this is from the 1993 Topps set (I get '93 and '94 mixed up a lot). I didn't care for these when I was pulling them back then. Lucky for me, there's a Coming Attraction card in every pack!

#263 - Fergie Jenkins, Cubs
#247 - Lucas Sims, Braves
#218 - Zack Greinke, Diamondbacks
#246 - Scott Schebler, Reds
#240 - Eric Thames, Brewers

And here are the 1981s. Out of the three designs, this is the one that works the best. Besides the position wording, I can't find much different from the original 1981s. But here is one to compare:

That's a pretty good match.

So let's go through the other packs a little more quickly.


RACK PACK 2

#63 - Blake Snell, Rays
#90 - Andrew Miller, Indians
#14 - Andrew Benintendi, Red Sox
#89 - Julio Teheran, Braves
#27 - Max Fried, Braves
#81 - Goose Gossage, Padres

Gossage, like Doerr, is an Archives regular.

I just want to do one comparison:

"Andrew Benintendi" should be filling the full width of the card. (Also check out the signature differences!)

#161 - Justin Smoak, Blue Jays
#164 - Gleyber Torres, Yankees
#150 - Clayton Kershaw, Dodgers (Yaayyy!)
#146 - Nick Williams, Phillies (good luck reading the position)
#108 - Amed Rosario, Mets

The placement of the rookie card logo on the '77s is odd. Why mess up the traditional 1977 header with something that almost always appeared within the photo in every other set ever made? I am disappointed in these '77s.

This is another rookie reprint insert card. It is glossy, unlike the Archives cards. And it's pointless. How many of these things do we need? Am I supposed to paper my walls in 1975 Robin Yount rookie card reproductions?

#CA-11 - Gleyber Torres, Yankees, Coming Attraction

#270 - Reggie Jackson, Yankees
#254 - Rod Carew, Angels
#297 - Willie Stargell, Pirates
#299 - Mike Trout, Angels
#222 - Jose Ramirez, Indians

That is some serious star power in those 1981s. The Jackson should have an All-Star banner, of course, but let's compare a couple of other things.

The orange for the Ramirez card is not quite right.

Archives, sadly, did not go with the famed Pirates pillbox caps in its design. I understand why that is, since modern players are in Archives and the current Pirates usually aren't wearing pillbox caps. But couldn't they make an exception for Stargell? (Love that Stargell Archives card, by the way).


RACK PACK 3

#52 - Avisail Garcia, White Sox
#5 - Andrew McCutchen, Giants
#98 - Ryan Zimmerman, Nationals
#85 - Bert Blyleven, Twins
#84 - Bernie Williams, Yankees

Hmmm. Just five 1959 cards this time out. Does that mean anything? (Hint: Yes it does).

#143 - Carson Fulmer, White Sox
#122 - Nick Markakis, Braves
#137 - Alex Verdugo, Dodgers
#107 - Richie Ashburn, Phillies
#119 - Jim Bunning, Tigers

#220 - Yoenis Cespedes, Mets, silver bordered parallel, 47/99

Ready and waiting for a Mets collector to send me something.

#CA-15 - Francisco Mejia, Indians, Coming Attraction

Card is dinged on the top, but it doesn't matter because ...

Yay! Redemption!!!

I haven't pulled a redemption card in like a decade (tells you how often I buy hobby, huh?)

This is what the 1971 Topps Jim Perry card looked like. He was the defending Cy Young Award winner.

The autograph card I pulled won't look like this, of course. Since "silver" is in the description, I'll assume the border is silver instead of black. I'd prefer a black border with a silver autograph, but I doubt that's the case.

Perry is bit before my time (he didn't last and last and last like his brother), but I'll sit patiently for his autograph!

#248 - Wade Boggs, Red Sox
#201 - Roberto Clemente, Pirates
#271 - Trey Mancini, Orioles
#244 - Rougned Odor, Rangers
#257 - Hunter Renfroe, Padres

Some major batsmen with the first two cards. Makes me kind of annoyed at the other guys that came out of the pack.


RACK PACK 4

#18 - Ozzie Albies, Braves
#78 - Red Schoendienst, Cardinals
#37 - Hoyt Wilhelm, White Sox
#3 - Tom Seaver, Mets
#1 - Hank Aaron, Braves
#67 - Charlie Blackmon, Rockies

Those Seaver and Aaron cards are beauties.

#112 - Early Wynn, Indians
#144 - Clint Frazier, Yankees
#127 - Yasmany Tomas, Diamondbacks
#152 - Billy Hamilton, Reds
#131 - Byron Buxton, Twins

Mike Trout rookie card reprint

My Mike Trout rookie card is lauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuughing at this thing

CA-2 - Walker Buehler, Dodgers, Coming Attraction

That's a Coming Attraction that I'll go to see!

#250 - Cody Bellinger, Dodgers
#252 - Ervin Santana, Twins
#208 - Starling Marte, Pirates
#234 - Yadier Molina, Cardinals
#233 - Trea Turner, Nationals

And that's all of the packs.

I didn't do so well speeding things up, did I?

Archives has improved some of the things it once did. There are no real base card short-prints (except for variations). The final 20 cards of the set are a little short-printed, but they come in the form of what used to be subsets (1959 rookie combos and 1977 Turn Back the Clock), so they're easy to ignore if you want.

I've heard complaints about regression in card stock from last year. I think maybe that's the case, but I didn't notice it as a bad thing.

Archives still isn't for me -- too disjointed, basically -- but I admit these were kind of fun to open, especially since I did so well with Dodgers and pulls in general.

Now, I need to set the timer and wait for my Jim Perry autograph.

I bet it shows up before 1975 Topps appears in Archives.