When your subscription was extended one more issue

 

More than eight years ago (lordy, 2013 is eight years ago???), I wrapped up a series where I looked through the Baseball Card Magazines from when I subscribed to it between 1982-85.

 

I loved doing that series and was sad when I ran out of issues. But just yesterday I realized I hadn't explored all of the issues that I owned.

 

The April 1984 issue that you see here I used to kick off the series in 2011. But all I did in that post was make fun of people wrote to the letters section hoping the supposed errors on their cards (some weren't even errors) were going to make them rich.

 

I didn't bother scanning the rest of the issue like I did with all the other ones to follow. So I'm going to go through that now! It's like when you subscribed to a magazine for a year and they gave you a bonus issue before your subscription ran out!

 

OK, you saw the cover and what was in store as far as teased articles. Here is another peak with the index at the front of the magazine. I'm not going to cover all of these articles so you get a glimpse of everything Bob Lemke and crew offered. It really was a great magazine.

 

 

Here is a glorious advertisement from TCMA, plugging all of those wonderful TCMA issues from the 1970s and early '80s. This is fitting because there is a significant TCMA presence in this issue. I wonder if the magazine got TCMA to advertise in their issue because of the article?

 

 

This is the Reggie Jackson rarities article that was teased on the cover. Most of the cards mentioned are still rare, I believe. I haven't seen any of them in the wild and I don't think I've ever seen that Pepsi card shown outside of this magazine.

 

 

 One of the two Q&A articles in this issue, featuring Pee Wee Reese. This is an interesting article to this day and I'm going to re-read it (probably for the first time since 1984) after I'm done writing this post. It's pretty extensive.

 

I'm one card away from owning all four on this page! Only the 1950 Bowman card (doesn't really fit Pee Wee's image) is missing. I never would've thought back in '84 that I would've made that kind of progress.

 

This is the cover story on TCMA minor league issues. Minor league cards were all the rage at this time (I earlier pointed out another BCM article about minor league cards in another issue). As rookie cards started to boom in the early 1980s, people began to look for the next great thing, which is why the type on the front cover calls them "PRE-ROOKIES".

I've mentioned before that I prefer these kind of cards to Bowman's airbrushed, ugly-designed weirdness with their "pre-rookies." I probably have articles like this to thank for my preference.

 

The article also published a list of TCMA minor league issues with key MLB players in the set pointed out for each. This is just a portion of the list.

 

 

The "Collect Your Favorite Team" was a regular series with a different team featured. If you're going to collect the Yankees, prepare to spend lots of money.

 

I haven't heard about Hartland baseball figures for ages, I'm guessing the enthusiasm has died off for them over the years (Starting Lineup figures became the rage in the late 1980s).

 

The issue also has an article on how to go about seeking autographs, proper autograph-requesting etiquette, etc. Since I don't collect autographs, I was mostly interested in the pictures. This photo is older than '84 because Steve Garvey was a member of the Padres by this point and Don Stanhouse was long gone from the Dodgers. Notice how all the fans are ignoring Stanhouse. That's because it's 1980 and his season with L.A. was terrible.

I believe Pete Rose has been signing at tables for longer than his playing career lasted. Also, are we just going to ignore Bob Uecker standing there?

 

A shirtless Schmidt tells this autograph-seeker, "hey, my eyes are up here."

 

 

The "star interview" for this issue. It's cool looking back on these interviews. This one begins with Irwin Cohen asking Brett on rumors about a couple of acting gigs, which Brett shoots down as false.

Brett also didn't care much about memorabilia or cards at the time and wasn't a big collector as a kid. He said he probably had a few of his rookie card "stashed away."

That gives me the chance to show off my '75 Brett rookies again. I love these. The regular-sized Brett is probably the first "high-ticket card" I ever bought, ordering it through a mail-order catalog. I don't remember what I paid for it but it couldn't have been more than $15. You can see the corners are worn now, that's how young I was when I got it.

Brett was asked about the 1980 World Series, which produced my favorite quote from him in this article, which is:

"I think if I didn't have hemorrhoids, I would've enjoyed the World Series a bit more."

Shout out to Brett for teaching me what hemorrhoids were all those years ago.

 

 

It's April 1984, so about 80 percent of the many ads in this issue are selling the 1984 baseball sets. Also, everyone is the most trusted, been at it the longest, blah, blah. And, don't delay! (This was actually good advice for '84 Donruss).

 

I found this ad amusing. Just about every baseball fan knew that the Ancient Mariner, Gaylord Perry, was also a farmer. You could order $3 peanut bags from his farm ... and also old shoes.

OK, that's about it for this issue.

I think I'm really done now. Although if I ever pick up the debut issue from the spring of 1981 I'm going to subject you to another one of these.