I recently completed the 1986 Fleer baseball set.
I've said in past blog posts that this was "the forgotten set" in my brain when thinking back on 1980s Fleer sets. Back when I had not completed a single '80s Fleer set, I would always confuse 1985 and 1986 Fleer. This was a time when I was not collecting baseball cards, especially ones that weren't Topps. Sometimes my brain would skip right over '86 Fleer and I'd think the icy blues of '87 Fleer came after the '85 gray flannel suit set.
That's part of the reason I set out to complete all the main Fleer sets from the '80s. These sets contained players that I followed from childhood forward, I wanted all those guys in my collection. So I got 1984 Fleer done, then 1981, 1982, 1983 and 1988. I recently finished 1985 and now '86 is in its own binder.
These are the last four that I needed. If you listen closely you can here Luis from Sesame Street singing "One of These Things ..." But for a younger night owl, Charles Hudson's card would be the coolest of the bunch.
These cards arrived from reader Paul, who you know as 1984 Tigers in the comments. He gifted me with a big box of goodies that's taken some time to go through. It's worth two posts, which is why this is the '80s part of the post.
I'd like to spend some time going through the '86 Fleer set here now that it's complete, but I just don't have that kind of freedom today. Maybe in a couple of days you'll see something.
For now, I'll show some of the other '80s stuff that came with the '86 Fleers.
1980s rack-pack glossies. Very awesome. My goal is to have all of these. I don't remember buying a lot of rack packs in the '80s but I've sure come across these cards in repack boxes over the years. In general, I'll take any glossy card from the '80s because glossy was the height of cool back then.
This is how we got our glossy cards before they showed up in rack packs. Topps would throw this in with every pack and you scratched and scratched and sent in your "walk" cards for a Supersize Glossy. These are from 1981 and I recall scratching and mailing off a load of these (I never won any of the WIN things, or maybe I ignored winning because I was all about the cards).
I'm not sure why Paul had so many of these. You got to send these in!
More Scratching with the 1981 Topps Scratch-Offs, Topps was all about getting kids honing their scratching skills in '81. There are a bazillion variations of these and I have a lot in my '81 binder already, we'll see where they go ('81 or Dodgers binder).
We've got all of your 1980s card brands covered here with the 1983 Donruss Action All-Stars! I recently posted about these and now there are some more to add to what I hope is an eventual completed collection. Already have my first dupe in Rickey.
Paul did not confine his sends to baseball (no he did not!). Here are three key Steelers cards from the 1980 Topps set. If I look at this set for long enough I will be tempted to collect it as it's just on the edge of my childhood fascination with the NFL. But I need to focus on getting 1979 done first before I consider stuff like this set or 1976 or something.
A 1983 Topps Joe Cribbs sticker. Cribbs slots into that forgotten Bills era of running backs between O.J. Simpson and Thurman Thomas. But Cribbs was the first Bills running back I ever knew (Simpson was just kind of a name floating out there, kind of like Richard Nixon).
Paul sent me these two items to illustrate the reuse of a photo, I believe these two sets are four years apart! Topps did this a lot, especially with stickers sets, I think they thought stickers collectors and card collectors were two different groups of people.
There were some '80s hockey Sabres, too, including more Scratch-Off material. The 1980-81 Topps NHL set is so wild to me, that they'd actually have collectors scratch-off for the player name. And check out that leaders cards, half of it is blacked out!
I didn't collect hockey cards back then but I would have thought it very strange then, too.
Paul also sent a 1979-80 NHL card, which I think might be the first time anyone has sent one to me. You just don't see the Gretzky rookie set cards floating around much.
Getting back to 1980s Fleer baseball, all that's left for me is the 1987 set. I'm not really feeling eager to collect that one right now, but I suppose I should get on it at some point ... or just buy the whole thing.
I think that'll about do it for my trip through the '80s portion of the box. The other portion of the box is coming up and you'll have to hold on to your hats and butts for that one.
We'll be going back earlier than the '80s for that one, in some cases a lot earlier.
Comments
Was a pleasure putting together that goodie box for you. It got me going through my tons of boxes of stuff in the basement. I would add stuff every day, as I'd see something and say "night owl would like this"
Some interesting notes on the selection. The dale mccourt card is actually airbrushed to show him as a King. You can see his red undershirt barely. He was awarded as compensation for the Wings ill-fated free agent signing of future HOF Rogie Vachon (who had a couple of dreadful years on very bad wings teams). Mccourt had a fan following in Detroit and refused to report so he stayed on the Wings in the end and the Kings got something else. This was the draconian era of free agency in every sport but baseball. The owners made you pay huge in compensation.
You inspired me on the Donruss 83 bigs to see what I had actually bought that summer and was happy that I did buy some cards but wished I had filled that beautiful set. I made enough summer dough in college driving an ice cream truck to afford that set.
As for the wesley walker 1000 yard card (1986 or 87) and 1983 sticker, the ONLY time the liedowns (our nickname for them during some dreadful years) played at Shea in walkers career was Sept 1979. I watched that game (as a Jr in HS) and remembered how badly he toasted what would be a 2 and 14 liedowns team. So that photo was used many years later. And yes, that's about how badly he outrank our D that afternoon.
I believe the Hudson card was a night game for 86F set, meaning it was from the 85 season. One of my favorite years. Even though tigers won it the year before and slipped behind Toronto in 85, I went to so many games in Detroit and then about a dozen games in Houston that summer on an engineering internship. Got to see Nolan Ryan fan Danny Heep for his 4000th K. Never thought he'd be fanning Rickey himself 4 years later for 5K.
Ps love the story in the Rickey vintage beckett on the 1973 topps baseball. What a fantastic set that was!
Around 2006 or 7, I would buy wax boxes on ebay. I got a full 36 pack box of 81s for about 40 bucks. Today that same box runs for 600 bucks! I would open one pack a week, usually Friday night just for fun. Those are scratch offs from the ebay buy. Enjoy trying to get a "hit" and wonder what it would've been like back in 81 to actually win that item. I kept 8 unopened packs from the box and can probably sell those on ebay for more than what I paid for the box. Yes I chewed the gum too! It dissolved.
The 1981 scratchoff game with the players. Those seem to come out just as the strike was ending in August so I was excited for them. However, I noticed pretty quickly that the same player could be on multiple panels and with different players. That turned me off from trying to get the set since I would have been obsessed with getting every panel possible and would have never separated them.
I luckily kept buying hockey and nba until I graduated from HS in 81. The blue border set from 79 80 I was lucky to get three Gretzky rookies. Used two of them for nice trades in the early 90s (got a very nice sharp cornered Carew 67T rookie as part of one trade). The 80 81 scratch off hockey set was really cool. By then I knew to never scratch off nor mark the backs. Each pack came with a team photo folded insert. Last chance for Gordie Howe as he had retired but was in the Hartford insert. Basketball did the same for its 80 81 hoops set. The Celtics team has Bird and Lakers Magic. Great inserts!
If you decide to collect the 1980 Topps football set let me know, I've got about 50 singles I could spare.
That Dale McCourt is more fascinating than it appears at first glance. According to Puck Junk (primary assist to Billy from Cardboard History) that card should not exist: https://cardboardhistory.blogspot.com/2023/10/puck-junks-bad-hockey-card-hall-of-fame.html
You bring up WaWas. That brings back some great memories. I'm retired now but worked for 35 years for Dow Chemical. I traveled a lot around 2009-10 and lived for about 6 months in Newark, DE. I remember asking some coworkers "where can I get great coffee but not at Starbucks prices?" Everyone said Wawas. Loved that place both before work for coffee and afterwards for snacks.
In 1986, topps was still the big guy but fleer was still available in stores. Donruss had decided in 1984 to lower production and only sell through hobby dealers. Nice set. 2nd year of dual rookie cards. Topps was still behind the times for rookies, except for a few sets like Olympics
When you are ready to "tackle" 1980 Topps, let me know: I have almost 300 different cards from that set that I can send you.
I think the cards work better as individual pieces as compared to a whole set. The Clemens, Sandberg and Mattingly ones are very nice cards with interesting action poses.