Putting buybacks in their place

I came across an interesting question yesterday on Robert's $30 a Week Habit blog. He was wondering how to file these buyback cards. For instance, is the card here a 1978 card or a 2015 card, like the stamp says?

I had always considered it a 1978 card. It was made in 1978. It gets recorded and filed with 1978 cards. There was never a thought it could be anything else. But I was easily outnumbered in the comments. They filed their buybacks with the year it was stamped, considering it an insert from that particular year.

I'm trying not to get riled up about this, but --- aaaarrrrrrrghhhhh, you're playing right into Topps hands!!!!

This is not an insert -- and definitely not a hit -- no matter how Topps packages it! It is a regurgitated card ruined by a stamp! It is not a 2015 card, no matter what it says on the stupid stamp or how it was presented! It is a 1978 card, and nothing that a stamp says is going to change that for me!

OK, really, you can file your cards how you want. I'll try to calm down.

But just look at the back of the card, please.

There in tiny type, just below the Play Ball game, there is the copyright, which says --- 1978! (Uh-oh, here I go). Be your own collector! Don't let Topps tell you when a card was issued with a magic wave of a foil stamper thingy!!! Do you open a box of 2004 Topps Heritage in 2016 and then write them all down as 2016 cards???

Yeah, I know it's not the same thing, but it is to me.

All my buybacks go with the years in which the card -- you know, the thing that I collect -- was made. And the stupid buyback should be grateful that's what I do with it, because what I really want to do is throw it in the giant dupes box.

OK, that's enough ranting for today, let's see what cards Robert sent me recently.

It's actually two separate envelopes sent a couple of weeks apart. I don't know how people do stuff like that, but I'm grateful.

That card is pretty. It may be dismissed as some card designer's nostalgia trip back to inserts from 1999, but we all know that no one has nostalgia for 1999. Or shouldn't.

Robert is helping me with my 2016 Topps Dodgers since I refuse to buy them for myself. This one is fare enough, although I don't understand the "energized by battery power" line. Kershaw's face is kinda goofy, too.

Here is Yasmani Grandal again, who is a "future star" even while entering his fifth year in the majors.

This also is a night card. It's exceedingly difficult to pick out night cards in the 2016 set (yet another strike against this thing). With tight cropping, blurred out background and smoke covering the rest, I have to look for either a glistening helmet or a yellowish tint in the background.

I consider the Perspectives cards an apology from Topps for making my night-card identifying so difficult this year. This is an obvious night card. And awesome.

Robert sent three Bills cards (the scanner cropped the other card in half and I don't feel like recropping it). This is my first Doug Flutie card. Until this moment I had more cereal boxes of Doug Flutie than cards. I'm glad Robert fixed that.

Here is a trio of Buffalo Sabres stars. I really get a kick out of the Guevremont card. Every '70s card ruled, no matter what the subject.

Fantastic. This is the card that will spur me to put up a 1976 Hostess want list. I have enough now for it to be an actual compulsion. Look at that thing. I am in complete shock that the Star-Spangled Banner is not on the reverse.

A couple of '56 wants for what will be the longest set-build of my life. I love that Ellis Kinder card. It's also cool to get cards of people who played in the 1940s.

Thanks, Robert for the cards -- and the post idea.

I'm perfectly calm now.