Minis with a purpose

 

I know a lot of collectors don't care for mini cards. I can see their point. Even myself, a known mini lover, comes across mini cards that simply puzzle me.

What am I supposed to do with these?

I own pages for mini cards, but those pages are reserved for the mini cards that I want in my collection. The others? Can't store 'em in a box, they'll likely get lost or dinged. So what happens to them? I stack them high on a shelf, lonely by themselves, in hopes that one of them will fit someone's collection ... someday.

When people send me mini cards, usually the A&G kind, targeted for my A&G frankenset binder, only a select few make the binder. And then the rest become instantly useless. To the stack on the shelf they go. Sorry, fellas, no one wants you.

Which is why the frankenset binder is such a great idea. Minis with a purpose! I haven't felt this way about minis since I was completing the 1975 Topps mini set (but I'm not putting A&G minis in the same category as '75 minis -- I haven't lost my head ).

I received another round of A&G minis the other day from Jeremy of Topps Cards That Never Were. After comparing them with those housed in the frankenset binder, three of those minis have a new home in the binder.

 

 

The Zimmerman card moved into a brand new empty slot furbished just for him. Those are the best kinds of mini cards.

My mission is to fill all those remaining empty slots because then my frankenset binder mission will be complete. I counted up all the remaining empty spaces and I'm down to needing just 12 more.

These are the card numbers:

18, 54, 135, 144, 151, 171, 181, 241, 245, 300, 310 and 325.

 

I expect I'll be taking care of those wants myself in most cases, so I thought I'd look up which subjects reside at each number and then list my favorites for each number, so I can zero in on someone not boring -- I don't need another Carlos Guillen card in my frankenset -- to fill those spots.

 

So:

 

18 - The best candidates are Mariano Rivera (2007), James Loney (2008), Clyde Parris (2009), the Diamondbacks bullpen car (2018) and Ryne Sandberg, twice (2014 and 2019). This made me look up whether Sandberg's uniform number was 18. But, no, it was 23. Odd. ... The key card to pick up for this slot is obviously the bullpen car.

54 - Takashi Saito (08), Tony Hawk (10), Al Kaline (12), Rickey Henderson (17), Juan Marichal (19). ... Henderson is already in the frankenset. I try to avoid duplication although I'm failing miserably at that. I'd probably pick Saito, which is already in my Dodgers collection (the Hawk mini is easily the most expensive).

 

135 - Kyle Petty (11), Chris Sale (18), Dale Murphy (19), Harmon Killebrew (20). ... Not a lot to choose from here (Mark Teixiera was at this number in 2015, barely retired and annoying to pull when he was active. Such a Yankee-lackey, Topps). I'd go with Killebrew.

144 - Manny Acta (07), Grand Canyon (08), Stuart Scott (10), Torii Hunter (13), Frank Thomas (17), Warren Spahn (20). ... I know some will be aghast but the Grand Canyon beats out Spahn and Thomas easily. I'd even put Acta in there before those other guys, I remember him when he was Class A manager.

 

151 - Cole Hamels (09), Don Mattingly (18), Kenley Jansen (20). ... Not Jansen, I need that still for the Dodgers set. I like the Hamels card from 2009 but I might go with someone semi-obscure just to have another person represented in the binder, Ryan Langerhans is a good choice.

171 - Chad Billingsley (13), Dusty Baker (14) Jose Canseco (17). ... Probably Baker. He's with the Braves but at least it's not the Giants.

181 - Mark Buehrle (11), Joe DiMaggio (12) Alex Wood (16), Mark McGwire (17), Emily Jaenson (19). ... Again, Wood would go to the Dodger binder, also it's one of those cases where the mini is oriented differently from the base card, which is always fun. I'd pick Emily Jaenson for this number. I try to get as much female representation as possible.

241 - Bob Wickman (06), Doug Mientkiewicz (07). ... The choices are not good here. I'd go with the Mientkiewicz just for the novelty of seeing him in a Yankees uniform.

245 - Brad Penny (07), Matt Harvey (14), Mookie Betts (18). ... I think Betts is already in the frankenset so Penny or Harvey.

300 - Frank Robinson (06), Ichiro (07), David Ortiz (09), Roberto Clemente (12), Bo Jackson (18). ... Ichiro and Ortiz are already in the binder. Clemente is a natural. Or Frank Robinson as a Nationals manager would be fun. Or I could just piss everyone off and go with Bud Selig.

310 - Greg Maddux (07), Old Faithful (09), Matt Kemp (11), Patrick Corbin (16), Sean Casey (20). ... I didn't know Sean Casey was in A&G this year. But it would be the geyser for the win!

325 - Grady Sizemore (07), Frank Robinson (12), Johan Santana (13). ... This time Robinson is a player with the Reds, I'd go with that. Also, who in the hell thought putting Mark Grace in a Diamondbacks uniform this year was a good idea?

I don't blame you if you didn't go through all of that. This is more of a reference for me as I close the deal on the project. You're going to see a big blow-by-blow, page-by-page display when I'm finished.

Jeremy sent a whole bunch of regular-sized cards with the minis and that included many Dodger parallels and inserts that I needed. I'll show the parallels first as they're not as fun:

 

Not a lot to say about those, but they sure are appreciated!

Now the inserts:

 

I want to hug everybody over that 1970s Decades' Best card. Imagine a scene from 1978, my formative baseball-following years, in a set from 2020. I was all about that 1978 World Series and there's Ron Cey!

I needed gcrl to pinpoint Lee Lacy and Bill North for me. I may have come around on them eventually.

 

 

This is a parallel that I didn't know existed (not a rare thing for me). I guess those iconic reprint insert cards from last year had chrome versions, too? Of course they did.

 

 

This is a fascinating '96 Pacific card showing Mike Piazza playing in the second annual Carlos Baerga celebrity softball game. I had no idea that was a thing. Apparently a forerunner to the current All-Star Game celebrity softball show? Why was it named after Baerga?

 

 

This is probably the most striking card Jeremy sent. It's another wide-vision card from this year's Stadium Club. Pretty cool image. It's a familiar one, shown on baseball cards before, although rarely the entire scene. It's Koufax celebrating the clinching sweep of the Yankees at the end of Game 4 of the 1963 World Series.

I don't know what pages I can use for these wide vision cards. I don't want to banish them to a shelf though, so I'll find something.

Thanks for the cards Jeremy, and the congratulations on the Dodgers series win! And also thanks for my first 2021 image of that World Series celebration!

 

Oh dear. Guess I'm going to have to rely on 2021 Heritage for a proper World Series design.