First off, thanks to those who showed me the way on TCDB for the 1977-79 Sportscaster cards. I received responses via the comments, email and on social media. I agree, it's quite the morass -- way too many variations -- but it's a little more decipherable (at least more readable) than those Donruss back variations.
I tend to excuse variations and such when they are cards connected to my childhood. I increasingly lose patience as the years get closer to the present time.
For example, I just had my first close-up experience with 2022 Topps Chrome Sonic. This set is a bigger quagmire than I thought.
Not that I paid much attention. I've been pretty dismissive of sets from the last four years. Thanks to unavailability and lack of appeal for sets since 2020 or so, I focus solely on a few main sets and the others hover around in the ether. So it took a TCDB trade offer from reader kcjays for me to take note. 2002 Chrome Sonic is really dumb -- I mean, I kind of vaguely knew that already, but now I really know it.
Here are the Chrome Sonic cards that I received in the trade.
And here are the regular Chrome cards of each of the Sonic subjects I received. I know, you're saying they look the same. Ho-HO, no they are not, Topps would like you to know (well, actually they don't really care if you know it or not because they don't bother to tell you stuff like that).
Here are each -- Sonic on the left and regular Chrome on the right -- if you study hard (like you have time for that), you may be able to determine the difference.
All right I'll dispense with the mystery, the Sonic cards (on the left) feature the Topps Chrome logo on the left, rather than on the right like the regular Chrome cards (shown on the right).
Uh ...
... except when the logo for the Sonic card is on the same side as the logo for the Chrome card, like in these two cases.
Getting dumber by the line, right? (P.S.: I had more trouble keeping these cards straight than at any time photographing cards for a post).
So what now?
It's time to get out our glasses/magnifying apps and check the tiny code on the back and then take a nap because of eye strain!
Here, I'll let TCDB explain it for me:
There you go.
Wow, was there a reason behind this set being made aside from confusing and irritating the hell out of collectors? Maybe there were special parallels or something? I am asking from a place of ignorance because I paid no attention to this set. It seems so ridiculous, like one of the dumbest sets I've ever heard of.
However, since I want every Dodger card that I don't have (yeah, I know what I said but that post just means I don't try as much anymore), I certainly welcome these. I'm also happy that kcjays threw in a couple other cards that were former Dodger wants:
These are much more distinct. although the Brad Penny card -- kc jays informed me -- is a 2004 Studio Update card that showed up in 2005 Donruss packs.
So card companies' bamboozling ways have been going on for awhile. Just seems like it's ramped up in the last 25-30 years.
Comments
I completely agree, I have no idea the reasoning behind the Chrome Sonic set.
The only reason I have the cards to trade is that I was at a card show, taking a break near the stage. A guy was nearby opening packs from a box of the product. I guess he was looking for a couple of specific cards or autos. After opening all the packs he walked away with 3-4 cards leaving the rest scattered on the stage, along with the wrappers. I asked him if he was going to come back and pick up the cards. The guy looked at me like I was nuts. I went back a couple of hours later and everything was still scattered so I gathered them up and took the base, refractors and parallel cards home.
I don’t know what the box cost him, but I think I was the winner.