The Kershaw Kwestion

I picked up a cheap, three-card lot of 2021 Topps Clayton Kershaw cards a week or two ago. After a delivery scare, which seems like an everyday thing lately, they showed up.

 

 

The first is the boring, old foil parallel that Topps is still relying on. The second, I don't really know what it is. It's not numbered and I don't see anything about blue parallels on Beckett's Series 1 checklist. It looks like the blue Opening Day parallels but it's not an Opening Day card, just Kershaw's World Series card from the base set.

I'm sure this is a case of me not paying attention to something everybody knows but I like it anyway, that's what matters.

 

The third card is Kershaw's SP variation of his base card (or one of them anyway).

It's been a long time since I picked up a Kershaw variation. I can't even say that this one spoke to me and I made the extra effort. It was more the cheap price than anything.

The horizontal presentation actually doesn't look that natural to me. I think it would've worked better as a vertical.

This is also the orientation of the Gerrit Cole SP variation:

 

So, I don't know, maybe Topps didn't want to repeat (like it thinks about stuff like that)? But I think the two cards could have made neat West Coast-East Coast bookends.

 

The three new Kershaw additions got me to 841 total Kershaw cards in my collection although I haven't shown some of the other recent ones yet.

But now comes the reason for that terrible blog post title -- how long will I be accumulating new Kershaw Dodgers cards?

I have no idea what's going to happen with Kershaw this offseason. As a free agent and with recent arm issues, the Dodgers seem to be taking a wait-and-see approach. It's difficult for me to imagine him in any other uniform and since he's been my favorite player for more than 12 years now, I don't want to see him dressing in an inferior uniform.

But I'd like to continue to collect his cards, I'm getting closer to 1,000 you know. But the acquiring of new Kershaws will stop as soon as he appears with another team. The only option for me if that happens is adding all the Dodgers Kershaws I didn't get to -- and I don't know how enthusiastic I will be if he's wearing a Nationals or Rangers uniform.

 

I think most people who follow stuff like this closely believe the Dodgers will re-sign him for a year or two, saying he's too entrenched with the organization to go anywhere else. Hopefully he's got a couple decent years left, at least, because I'm starting to get too old to pick favorite players and I don't have the energy to find a new one.

But for now, everything's status quo! Send me your Dodgers Kershaw cards!