Night Owl Cards

   The postseason has already begun -- the Tigers and Guardians are on my TV as I write this. I do miss day time postseason baseball. Even though I'm a fan of night games and night cards, there's too much artificial light in the playoffs and I remember fondly the days of coming home from school to a game already in progress.   So there's one good reason for wedging 12 teams in the playoffs. There's not enough hours in the night!   I will get to my traditional playoff post once we're past the wild-card series, but for now I'm feeling pretty relaxed about this postseason (probably my team winning last year has something to do with that). So how about a breezy little post?   I wanted to find cards that summed up each wild-card playoff matchup. Were there cards that included both teams? The answer to that: Of course there is night owl!   So let's take a look at just a few for each series. I'll start with the American League first:   RED SOX-YANKEES  ...

So baseball's regular season has ended ... at lightning speed from my perspective. I don't remember a season moving so fast, but I'm sure it's just another example of time speeding up as you age.   A bunch of teams are going to the playoffs (I remember when it was just four) and I'll get to that eventually. But right now I want to address a team that didn't reach the playoffs. In fact, it finished as far away from the playoffs as possible.   The Rockies completed the season 43-119. That's a .265 winning percentage. That's pathetic. That's a pathetic team.   It may not seem that shocking though because there was a team just last year that was even worse. The 2024 White Sox finished 41-121 for a .253 percentage.   It looks like I wrote that post about the worst teams since I became a fan a little too early. Since I wrote that two years ago, two teams went and topped (bottomed?) any of the other lousy teams that I had previously experienced in the 50 y...

  I'm guessing that most people who collected the 2024 Heritage set have moved on to other card ventures by now.   We're even past 2025 Heritage appearing on store shelves, at least where I live -- it sure could hang around a little longer, I don't think flippers are gobbling up Heritage. I'm still chasing short-prints in '25 Heritage though and I'm still keeping my eye on what's interesting to me in 2024 Heritage. Mostly I'm thinking about chasing the high numbers set and pondering what other Dodgers parallels I want.   So I was looking through my '24 Heritage in the Dodgers binder yesterday, getting an idea for what I could shop for, when I suddenly realized that there was no Max Muncy in the set.   "That's funny," I thought. "I'm pretty sure I've completed both the main set and the high numbers set." But just to be sure, I looked on TCDB and COMC. Sure enough, Muncy is nowhere to be found in 2024 Heritage.   Weird. ...

    I don't think I need to tell you that I love lists. Half of my blog, probably, is some sort of list. I love making lists. I like compiling those lists into a series (a list of a list). I like organizing my cards according to lists.   I've been doing that since I was a relative tyke, sitting on the bedroom floor, laying out 10 cards (five on each row) in order of career batting order on the back, selecting the next card off the stack to my left, and then shifting the lined-up cards over one according to the new arrival's stats.   Lists are an easy way to make information digestible and entertaining. Creating lists enjoyed a big boost in popularity in the early 1980s, as there seemed to be new books every week about this list or that. Lists fell into overkill, especially since the advent of the internet and a whole bunch of fly-by-night websites that want clicks. But a well-maintained, thoughtful list is always interesting to me. I gravitate toward lists: Top sitco...

  I wrapped up the Dodgers team set for 1961 Nu-Card Baseball Scoops with the arrival last week of the Johnny Podres card.   There are 11 Dodgers-themed cards in the set, which is a lot for an 80-card set but not as much as the Yankees, who are featured 16 times. I acquired most of the cards from card shows, oddly enough -- they just don't seem appealing enough for collectors to have them on hand like some other sets from around the same time.   But I love them, for obvious reasons, and I made a renewed effort to finish off the set over the last month or so. Fortunately, the cards aren't particularly expensive. I guess you'll pay a bit for the big-time stars, but I was lucky enough to get the Jackie Robinson early (and if I had to guess I'm thinking someone sent it to me -- sorry no time to look through every blog post). The most I can recall paying recently is $12 for the Roy Campanella at the latest card show.   The '61 Baseball Scoops set is the second one from N...

    Although I recently lamented the former card bloggers who have disappeared from the virtual card world -- couldn't tell you what they're doing or even if they're alive -- there are still plenty of former bloggers that I see on other social media sites. That's one of the reasons I have not been solely a blogger since the rise of other social media forms.   While blogging is easily my preferred platform for cards, communicating with old blogging friends in more informal ways, whether Twitter or Blue Sky or wherever, is a bit easier, casual-like and a little more fun (sometimes). It's random card thoughts and and conversations in easy bites. Another plus -- trades spring out of nowhere. You start the day with no intention of exchanging cards and 20 minutes later I'm swapping cards.   Recently I sent a few current Tigers cards to ex-blogger/ex-twitterer Boobie Maine , who now is in the card (and music) conversation on Blue Sky. I know too many Tigers fans lately...