Best set of the year: 1996

 

Here we are: One of the years of my past that is lost in the black hole of time and continuing memory loss.

1996 will be known to me for two things: the year I bought a house and the year the most hated boss of my life left town. Aside from a few assorted song favorites (Oasis, Garbage, Smashing Pumpkins, you know the ones), that's all I can recall.

But what about the baseball cards? Yeah, about that. 1996 was also the first year I did not buy a single card since the time I knew what a baseball card was more than 20 years prior.

So, how am I supposed to evaluate the cards from this year?

I sure don't feel qualified. I've said this for the last couple of editions for this series. The enthusiasm is low. And in typical '90s fashion, the cards make it difficult. How do I trim it down into something manageable and coherent?

For 1995, I limited the sets I was reviewing to only those that could muster 500 cards in their set. But in 1996, Topps pulled a fast one and issued a lame flagship set with just 440 cards. The absolute nadir for Topps.

I can't eliminate Topps from a yearly evaluation without making the whole thing more illegitimate than it is. So, with much anticipated pain ahead, I am including all of the '96 sets with 440 cards or greater. Ugh.

Let's get on with it.

 

1996 Collector's Choice -- the front

 

Plusses: In typical Collector's Choice tradition, the photo is well-presented, for the most part. ... CC put the team logo out front for the first time.

Minuses: A comedown from the previous year. ... I do not like sideways writing on card fronts. ... The side-design, as it often does, feels constricting. Although I haven't reviewed the cards enough, it feels like photo choices were limited because of it. 

1996 Collector's Choice -- the back

Plusses: You feel like you get a lot for your money with these card backs -- large photo as has been ritual for CC, complete yearly stats, a little write-up when there's room, plus a baseball quiz!

Minuses: A little busy compared with past CC issues.

1996 Collector's Choice -- overall

Plusses: Still working as an affordable alternative to Upper Deck. ... The set is 790 cards! Holy smokes! That is a jump of 260 cards over the previous year and 120 cards over CC's debut. ... The photos are still interesting, although it feels like there are more "hitters hitting" and "pitchers pitching" pix than in the first two years. ... The amount of subsets are insane: Stat Leaders, Rookie Class, Traditional Threads, Fantasy Team, International Flavor, Checklists, Postseason Cards, Team Checklists, First Class, Arizona Fall League and Award Winners. Then you have all-stars, all-rookies and tributes sprinkled throughout the set. ... "You Crash the Game" and gold and silver signatures return.

Minuses: So many bells-and-whistles that I don't need. ... The variety of subsets, particularly the different looks of all the cards makes it difficult for someone like me who wasn't collecting to determine which set they belong to, they look like they could go with any CC set from that time. ... There's a lot of pink-and-purple in this set, which is fine for My Little Pony but I don't get it here.

 

 

1996 Donruss -- the front

 

Plusses: Clean presentation with only the name at the top. That's where the positives end.

 

Minuses: My god, I feel sorry for collectors who bought Donruss this year. ... The worse placement of a brand logo on a baseball card. Not only is the foil square, which includes the player's team and uniform number, difficult to read, but it's placed over the top of the player! ... In unfortunate situations like the Greenwell card, it looks like Donruss is censoring the player's nether regions. ... One of the absolute worst looks of the '90s.

Donruss -- the back

Plusses: A fairly clean presentation of the player's stats, bio and a nice photo that often leads into the facts and figures. ... Big card numbers are cool. Be cool, card companies.

Minuses: Everything is just a bit too light for me. The muted blue and orange, the silver, the thin fonts everywhere. But the gray team logo doesn't obscure the stats, so that's good.

1996 Donruss -- overall

Plusses: Uh .... Donruss is still going? They wouldn't be around for that many more years. ... A solid-sized 550-card set with almost no filler. ... Decent inserts, which I gather were rather coveted as I still don't own several of the Dodgers inserts.

Minuses: I would've taken away Donruss' card license, if I had that kind of power, after seeing what '96 looked like. 

1996 Fleer -- the front

Plusses: It's not 1995 Fleer. ... Very clean design, a return to the '94 set, with one giant difference. ... You can't complain about not being able to read the player's name.

Minuses: The matted finish certainly was an interesting choice, but I don't really like it. ... Shuffling through the cards feels weird.

1996 Fleer -- the back

Plusses: Fleer is usually about making sure the backs are readable and this fits right in. ... The photo on the bottom is different but doesn't weird me out much. ... I sort of like the faded team logo at the top.

Minuses: I don't like card numbers at the bottom. I thought this didn't bother me, but I've realized it does. ... The bio write-up looks squeezed.

1996 Fleer -- overall

Plusses: Another no-nonsense base set. 600 cards and it's virtually all player cards with limited extras. ... This is what a card set looks like after it's been to rehab. It's sticking with the program, maybe being a little too good, but the wild '95 days are gone. ... The inserts are great, don't look or feel anything like the base set (which is weird), and are among the best from this time period.

Minuses: I don't know why Fleer thought matte-finished cards would be a good idea. ... I'm kind of bored by them. ... There are glossy variations of the cards, which just makes me think that Fleer knew this was a bad idea. ... There are also team-set cards that are also not matte, which confused the heck out of me.

 

1996 Pacific Crown Collection -- the front

Plusses: Like several sets of this time, the design gets out of the way of the picture. It's a nice view in a lot of cases. ... Nice action shots. Nothing that out-of-the-ordinary though. ... Team logos on the front!

Minuses: All of these full-bleed sets blend together to me. There is not much here that is different from an Ultra set, even from four years earlier. ... Just a personal preference, but I am not a fan of the bling-theme of Pacific sets, the gold and the crowns and such.

1996 Pacific -- the back

Plusses: As always, the Pacific card back is there for you, Spanish-speaking friends. ... I like the portrait shot on the back, if you're not going to devote a lot of space to the picture on the back, a portrait photo works better than an action shot. ... Card back works hard to make sure it's readable. ... I like the background color switches depending on the team. ... That is definitely a Latin card back.

Minuses: One year of stats is not enough.

1996 Pacific -- overall

Plusses: At 450 cards, Pacific just sneaks into this review. ... Pacific's set is also mostly just dedicated to individual player cards, which I can appreciate it. ... Pacific added a little notation for players who won awards the previous year. Nice. ... There are a limited number of inserts. By far, the most popular one are the Cramer's Choice cards, which are weirdly named after the president of Pacific Trading Cards. The cards are triangular, which is the main selling point. I don't get it.

Minuses: The set is not for me, just a little boring and the design I don't appreciate. It's a personal preference though. ... I promise you I'll get to a '96 set that I like.

1996 Score -- the front

Plusses: Another simple-but-clean set from Score. ... The torn picture look makes the set distinctive. ... I like the gradient color background for the player name. ... Lots and lots and lots of interesting photos in this set.

Minuses: The name spacing and the difference in fonts between the first name and last name bug me ... Team name is a little small.

 

1996 Score -- the back

Plusses: Like most Score backs, you know you're going to get some information and maybe even some interesting text ("he came on like a house on fire ..."). ... I like the continuation of the torn photo on the back. ... Nicely-sized card number.

1996 Score -- overall

Plusses: Finally a card set from 1996 that I enjoy. If I was collecting that year, this would probably be the set for me, once I finally decided to stop collecting that weird Topps set. In fact I feel like collecting this right now. ... The famed Bip Roberts sombrero hat card is in this set. ... Score refuses to be limited by the vertical photos, there are plenty of good ones, but this is another set that underlines how there should be another all-horizontal set already.

Minuses: I am not very impressed by the inserts. ... Not impressed by the "dugout collection" parallels either. ... 517 cards is on the small side for a flagship set.

 

1996 Stadium Club -- the front

Plusses: Per usual, Stadium Club gives you a high-quality photograph ... An improvement over the '95 design, I don't feel that the bottom player name design intrudes.

Minuses: The team reference has disappeared off the front of the card again. ... There is not enough different about this set to prevent me from confusing it with 1995 or 1997 SC.

1996 Stadium Club -- the back

Plusses: Yeah, we're still living in the mid-1990s. Gotta love it. ... The information provided is interesting.

Minuses: LOL, "The Skills Matrix" ... I can't bleeping read half of the card.

1996 Stadium Club -- overall

Plusses: You're going to get nice-looking cards because it's Stadium Club ... There are lots and lots of inserts and I still find many of them appealing. I like the Power-Packed inserts a lot. I like "The Metalists," too. And the TSC Awards insert is fun.

Minuses: Stadium Club shrunk to 450 cards this year, which seems counter to the whole Stadium Club motto, based on what it was doing when it debuted. ... All those Members Only and Extreme stamped parallels are very '90s and don't appeal to me at all. They get flipped over in my binders without a glance every time.

 

 

1996 Topps -- the front

Plusses: There aren't any. ... OK, to be nice, there's a team logo on the front of a Topps card for the first time since like the '50s.

Minuses: What on earth is going on with the squished-head secondary image? I've ragged on this before. Topps copied what 1994 Upper Deck did except made it worse. That single aspect ruins the whole card set for me and I know if I bought a single pack of this stuff in 1996, it would prevent me from buying another one. 

1996 Topps -- the back

Plusses: The floating nature of the stats box, the player image and the wild, red home plate image is quirky and creates one of the strangest card backs in Topps history. ... As much is going on these backs, everything is readable. ... Many of the write-ups are interesting.

Minuses: I don't like hospital-blue backdrops. I like pinstriped hospital-blue backdrops even less.

1996 Topps -- overall

Plusses: For those who find 660- or 792-card sets daunting, well does Topps have a flagship set for you!

Minuses: Topps was clearly affected by the aftermath of the 1994 strike with this set. A 440-card flagship set is weak, especially for Topps. ... There are so many elements to this set that I don't like that when I did the Topps Set Countdown seven years ago, this set was at the bottom. I think it still would be at the bottom. and that's saying something because I can't stand 2016 Topps.

1996 Ultra -- the front

Plusses: It's late-1990s Ultra, so you're going to get big photos and a number of them are going to be interesting. ... A classy presentation of the player name and team name. It looks like a little award for the player.

Minuses: Not much, the set is just a little samey-same to me because of the limited design and not mixing it up much from year-to-year.

1996 Ultra -- the back

Plusses: Uh, if you wanted four pictures of a player on a card, this is the set for you. ... I suppose the three different looks is a nice touch.

Minuses: What. The. Heck. One of the weirdest set backs ever and keep in mind all those Stadium Club card backs. ... Why bother adding stats, they're not that readable. 

1996 Ultra -- overall

Plusses: At 600 cards, it's one of the larger sets from 1996, and it's almost all player cards except for the Ultra Stars and Raw Power subsets at the end. ... I haven't mentioned this yet but a lot of sets at this time were grouping teams together by card number, this is appreciated. ... The traditional gold medallion parallels are pretty cool this year, sometimes they don't impress but these ones do. ... Lots of fun inserts (Hitting Machines, Rawhide, etc.)

Minuses: I get the feeling from this set, more than maybe any other, that the base set has become an after-thought and it's now all about inserts, and the dawn of the relic and autograph.

1996 Upper Deck -- the front

Plusses: The gold/bronze mantel is wild, distinctive and doesn't interfere with the photo as much as it could. ... This look definitely signaled the Gold Rush period of the late 1990s. ... So stately, seems a little classy for a card set. ... Photos are still interesting.

Minuses: The design does interfere with the photos a little. 

1996 Upper Deck -- the back

Plusses: Look at that photo and tell me that's not the greatest thing ever on a card back. ... Obviously Upper Deck didn't treat the stats as it does for McGriff for every player, McGriff had a special year in 1995. But it's cool. ... Gold wraps all around the card.

Minuses: That bio is brief.

1996 Upper Deck -- overall

Plusses: Upper Deck, which began the gold theme in 1994, really went over-the-top with the look in '96 but I kind of like it. ... You know you're going to get some interesting cards. ... An entire Hideo Nomo-themed insert set!

Minuses: The set is just 510 cards but there still plenty of subsets, which makes me think a number of players were left out of this set. The star saturation that began in the '80s and ramped up in the '90s continues to be a curse. 

OK, so that's way too many words about 1996 (Can you tell I started to run out of stuff to say?). I know I skipped some sets. Bowman, Pinnacle, Flair. But those sets should've included a few more cards and not been so obsessed with inserts.

Not much to like for me in '96, so the Set of the Year is an easy one.

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 IT'S SCORE!

(Of course).

Total "Best Set of the Year" ranking: Topps - 6, Upper Deck - 4, Stadium Club -3, Collector's Choice - 1, Donruss - 1, Fleer - 1, Score - 1