Spectro-vision

I don't know why I do the things I do. I know full well that I don't like Upper Deck Spectrum as a product. I think it should be eliminated. In fact I'm on record as saying the color/design irks me, reminds me of unpleasant-tasting cold medicine, and other wacky things that only someone with my confused brain could think up.

And I'll blame my confused brain for buying a couple of packs of Spectrum, just to see what it would be like to pull some out of a pack. Maybe they wouldn't be so bad, I thought. Maybe I could find a Dodger or two.

Well, right out of the chute I knew it was a waste of five bucks plus tax.

Dan Haren last played for Oakland on Sept. 28, 2007. Yet, here he is, in an Oakland uniform on a 2009 card. But I'm not surprised by this. I've seen it several times already with Spectrum. I've even mentioned it before.

Spectrum and I don't see eye-to-eye already because I've never been a fan of cards in which the players are taken out of their natural background (unless you can come up with a killer design). Plus, the cards don't even look as good as they do here. The blue tint that shows up on the scan is only reproduced in hand if you tilt it under the light a certain way. Otherwise, the edges are kind of a dull purple color.

The set is just a colossal waste of time. The only thing that it has going for it is that it's not A Piece of History, which could be my least favorite set of the decade.

Upper Deck has just plain dropped the ball on its sets this year. I was no fan of Masterpieces and I know this isn't realistic with the way the card market works these days, but I think UD could have pleased more collectors by keeping Masterpieces and scrapping all the crap sets that it issues.

Because shiny purple cards of players wearing old uniforms just isn't cutting it. Not cutting it at ...

... Well, except for this card here. Now THAT is a nice card. Wow. I like that a lot.

Parallels like this don't save the set. But they do bring up an idea that's probably impossible: why not use each team's primary color as the background color? Blue for Dodgers, Cubs, Royals; red for Reds, Cardinals; green for A's, etc.

If Spectrum did that, I might actually like it.