Cameo overkill

If you collected cards in the 1970s, you know this card. It is an example of a cameo -- gone wrong. It is a hyper-cameo, if you will. Wes Parker is hogging all the screen time, obscuring the subject of the card. This is almost more Parker's card than Steve Garvey's card.

But it's a popular and often-cited card because of how it's presented and how different it is. And people can interpret it as a "passing of the torch" kind of card as Garvey eventually succeeded Parker as the Dodgers' first baseman.

This card is also a precursor to what we're experiencing today.

I'll get to that.

The Garvey card, obviously, wasn't the only example of a cameo on a 1970s baseball card. There are several others, including several in the same 1973 Topps set, perhaps one of the most cameo-heavy sets of all-time. Here is another often-cited one:

But cameo pictures have appeared on baseball cards probably since the beginning of cards. Here is one from 1956 Topps:

The second baseman is Jim Gilliam of the Dodgers.

Cameos were sporadic "accidents" on cards for decades. They were interesting because they happened so infrequently. And the cards on which they were featured lived on for years afterward because they were unusual occurrences.

And, if the stars aligned just right, you would get a cameo that included an up-and-coming superstar, which is what happened in the 1983 Topps set:

This card is now famous because of the cameo Ryne Sandberg made on Reggie Smith's card.

As the years went on, cameos sort of came out of the closet. They were no longer accidents or happy secrets, but intentional quirks that spiced up a card.

Upper Deck was very purposeful in its cameos throughout the 1990s, leading to cards like this:

And unfortunate items like this:

There are just too many Upper Deck cameos to count.

But what UD underlined was how fun these cards could be and how collectible they could be. Cameos are fun. They're interesting. Long-live the cameo!

In the last five years ago, Topps also has embraced the fun of cameos and you can find them frequently in the base set and even more often in the Update set. And some of those cameos are taking a different form, that resemble what happened on the 1973 Steve Garvey card.

OK, sure, this is A.J. Ellis' card. But you could argue that it's Dee Gordon's card, too. And it's Andre Ethier's card and Justin Sellers' card.

Topps had started blurring the lines of how to depict the subject of the card. It's now a game of "Who's Card Is It Anyway?"

Nowhere is this more apparent than in this year's Update set.

I'm fairly certain that 2015 Update has set a record for cameos. There are many, many cards that look like this. And the overriding reason for this is, as usual, there are so many extra, unnecessary cards in Update.

But before I get too negative on you, let's get back to the cameos.

It's kind of a fun aspect of the set, and as long as you can tell who the featured player is, it's harmless. But there are some cards where I feel like I'm being asked to figure it out for myself. "Who's Card Is It Anyway?" Is there a prize if I get it right?

I've already mentioned these two cards. There is no identifying caption. So it's like Topps is saying, "you should know this stuff. You're a baseball fan, aren't you?" And while I like that attitude -- I can use a little push once in a while -- I still don't know which one is Darren O'Day (probably the guy on the right, I think).

I just got done spending a week-plus familiarizing myself with the Blue Jays during the ALCS. But Devon Travis didn't come up. I need arrows or something here. Let's hope he's the guy on the right.

These are cards featuring cameos that make you work. This is the new world of cameos.

Today's cameos require process of elimination. OK, I know the Trout guy, I know the Pujols guy, so Hector Santiago's the guy on the right! Yay, me!

By the way, if I may go off on a tangent, someone has a semi-unhealthy obsession with Albert Pujols in this year's Update. So far I've pulled the above Pujols cameo card ...

As well as this Pujols cameo card ...

As well as this Pujols cameo card ...

As well as this Pujols cameo card ...

Plus a few more where Pujols is by himself (same image on two of them).

Did we go back to 2003 and nobody told me?

And then there's this card.

I wonder what Mamma Guerrero thinks of this card? Again, this is more Yasiel Puig's card than Alex Guerrero's card. And unlike the Garvey card -- where you can at least see Garvey's face -- all you get of Guerrero is a jersey number, the start of his last name, a bit of helmet and an arm.

That is a hyper-cameo if I've ever seen one.

The sheer number of cameos in Update, while fun, is a bit overwhelming. And it makes me wonder if this is another aspect of collecting that will fall victim to Topps overkill. You know the deal: if everyone gets a trophy, is it special anymore?

This was special.

I'm not really sure where we're at now.