Always there

 

It's getting more and more difficult to fill the newshole -- industry term -- in a newspaper sports section these days.

I won't get too much into the reasons why because: 1) it's still my job; 2) the rant will amount to the longest post ever; 3) you don't care, just look how many people have newspaper subscriptions. But just to transition to the cards more easily, I will say that NFL copy is always there for me.

I've written about his before. The NFL never stops. There's no offseason anymore. It's June -- where once football would go silent for like four months until late July camps, now I can depend on a roundup of NFL news every single day. Granted, a lot of it is the stupid he said-he said, he said-she said, she said-she said stories that now pass for "news" in sports journalism (the latest example: the Caitlin Clark foul heard round the world). But empty space doesn't sell, so NFL it is!

 

The NFL is filling space on this blog today, too. I don't have a lot of time (again) and football cards are the most available and quick thing for me to write about today. See? The NFL is always there for me -- and for you, if you care about football cards.

 

I received a surprise send of three 1979 Topps football needs from The Chronicles of Fuji recently. He must have been spurred on by my card show post last month. Feels good to add these as I'm in the difficult final 60 cards or so from this set. 

Out of curiosity I looked up which running back now holds the record for most receptions in a season. It's Christian McCaffrey with 116 in 2019.

 

I know I shouldn't be chasing another football set until 1979 is done (and like 25 baseball sets are done) but I can't resist readily available 1976 football. One of the greatest football designs ever, even if the pictures are pretty static here. I adore football bench shots from the '70s and '80s. That's where football cards really took a nose-dive, when they scrapped bench shots.

 

These cards came from Diamond Jesters in another Time Travel swap. I'll be putting together a return send to Matt soon. I also got the 1985 Matt Malone card at the top of the post from him. Another casual collection project from a design I like that is easily obtained because they are always there.

 

But I know some are saying, gee whiz, isn't there any baseball on this thing?

 

Yeah, a little.

 

Fuji also sent the last 1980 Dodgers Police card I needed to finish that set. One of these days I'm going to stash all these oddly shaped sets into ill-fitting pages just to be done with it. But I still hope there's a page out there that I haven't discovered that will fit them perfectly.

 

 

And I also put in for a couple baseball cards in the Diamond Jesters Time Travel Trade. Two infielders. Well, one an infielder/outfielder and one who makes you guess at what position he plays.

Both of these sets are ones I could see collecting some day but neither are favorites and I don't ever see the enthusiasm being there, but who knows.

But that's the end of this post. I need to move right from this to writing a track and field story in order to fill some sports section space with something, anything other than football.