C.A.: 1992 Topps Pre-Production Gold Tom Lasorda

 (Hey, fellow Northeasterners, are you enjoying the special edition two-month long March this year? I hear things are going to turn around in a matter of days. I'll believe it when I feel it, but right now there's a freeze warning. Time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 369th in a series):

 

There is no end to the cards that I've read about and promptly forgotten due to my brain's attempt to keep the real important stuff in -- and there's only so much room!

 

Topps Cards That Never Were mentioned this particular card a couple of weeks ago and I was immediately intrigued. It is one of nine 1992 Topps Pre-Production gold cards, cut off a sample sheet that Topps issued ahead of the 1992 set.

 

Jeremy wrote that this card leaves out the word "manager" on the front of the card and that was enough for me to think: "I need that card."

 

 

Here is the regular 1992 Topps gold Lasorda (such a great card) with "manager" mentioned.

 

 

It's great fun to put these two cards together to display the difference. I love stuff like this.

 

I can contrast-and-compare because after I mentioned in a comment on Jeremy's blog that I had never heard of the pre-production gold samples, he promptly sent it to me.

 

Another great part of the pre-production card is the back, which is totally different from the regular back.

 

As Jeremy notes in his post, the pre-production back contains a write-up about Lasorda, plus a gold diamond plastered onto part of the write-up signifying that it is a pre-production sample. Also the image of Dodger Stadium below is displayed much larger than on the regular card back.

 

 

Obvious differences. But the card number is the same!

 

While looking up information on these '92 pre-production cards, I came across a 2011 post from Lifetime Topps.

 

This told me that I was probably aware of these cards once upon a time -- I was an even more religious reader of card blogs back then than I am now. I likely dismissed them because it's taken me a long time to be intrigued by sample cards and also I likely figured they'd be impossible to find.

 

What Lifetime Topps also mentioned is that there is another 1992 Topps Pre-Production sheet of nine cards of the non-gold examples. Some of the subjects on this sheet are different, but the two Dodgers -- Tom Lasorda and Brett Butler -- are the same (so is Dennis Martinez, Bip Roberts, Shawon Dunston, Mike Heath and Rob Dibble). But the card numbers on this sheet do not correspond to the regular set's card numbers.

 

On that post he said he had a more difficult time finding the regular page compared to the gold page.

 

The cards on the sheets are regularly available as individual cards, which works for my collection just fine. And I appreciate Topps Cards That Never Were bringing it up 15 years after I probably first learned about it.

 

The information stuck this time.