Night Owl Cards

   One thing that has helped me pull away from modern cards at least a little bit, is how generic they look.   This is an issue almost across the board with current products and has been for the last 15-to-20 years. And it's no matter where you look.    Bowman, as a whole, is generic as it gets. I'd say I don't know why anyone is still collecting it, but I know the ones that do aren't prioritizing design. Panini features plenty of generic sets like Prizm and Donruss. Allen & Ginter has progressively gotten generic. Stadium Club is also like that. Flagship is hit and miss but several sets over the last 25 years could easily blend together. The only products that stand out to me are retro sets using old designs, like Heritage and Archives.   Inserts and parallels aren't immune, the same ones are used from year to year with not a lot of difference. 2025 marked a new level in generic parallels as many of them are almost indistinguishable from each other. ...

A member of The Infield is gone. The Dodgers announced today that Davey Lopes passed away at age 80. He was a central part of my earliest years as a baseball fan. That 1976 Topps Record-Breaker card is in the top 10 of cards that meant the most to me as a boy.   RIP. 

  When faced with the decision of watching the so-called "World Series rematch" between the Dodgers and Blue Jays or the Sabres' showdown with the Lightning last night on the TV, I chose the Buffaloes in their goat-head jerseys.   Rather easy choice actually. My wife's a Buffalo gal and back on the hockey bandwagon, the baseball game was No. 10 out of 162 and not worth the hype and, finally, have you seen the conditions outside? Does not look like baseball season to me!   It snowed last night and this morning. April 7th. I had to clear off the vehicle like it was February. And the wind hasn't stopped since February, too. That is nothing-to-do-but-watch-hockey-inside weather.    It turned out to be a great game (the Dodgers took care of business, too). The Sabres beat those annoying Lightning 4-2. Jack Quinn (see above) scored the empty-net clincher. The Sabres have been doing just about everything right since January and they're hanging onto their players, too...

The farther I get away from the age 18-49 demographic, the more the players that dominated the sports scene for seemingly forever fade out of the conversation.   You could have never convinced me in the 1970s and 1980s that guys like Reggie Jackson would slowly disappear, that their names would cease to be on everyone's lips, on every magazine cover, in every card set, in every sports column and TV broadcast.   Fewer and fewer sports fans can relate to the significant players and moments of the '70s and '80s and, yes, that means I have less to discuss on social media sites and the like. There are more modern players and moments that get all the attention and I sit on the sidelines either puzzled or with nothing to say.   One of those notables of the past who has become less and less significant with each passing year is Steve Garvey. I know a lot of people my age don't want to acknowledge that, but it's true. If someone isn't a Dodgers (or even Padres) fan and d...

  I made it to the monthly show across town today. It was the first time I was able to get there since January, having missed the last two because of poorly-timed weather.   This is good because the big Syracuse show is in a week and I'm probably not going to be there due to the lack of a vehicle.     The monthly show is definitely not the Syracuse show. I was reminded again by the ever-pervasive fantasy card tables that you can ignore at the Syracuse show because there is so much regular card show goodness. Today's show featured two tables that got my money. There were probably four tables total that offered the cards that interest me -- i.e. sports cards not encased in plastic.   But all things considered in the hobby (*waves hands at everything*), I'll take it.   This show will not be long for my world if one particular dealer decides it's not worth it (two of his seller buddies who used to accompany him at the monthly show have ditched it for Syrac...

   More than five years ago, I wrote a post titled " The Kings of the '70s " in which I determined which players had their own Topps cards for every year of the 1970s -- 1970 through 1979.   I've wanted to do the same for the 1980s ever since I wrote that post. I realized doing the '70s post that while I adore that decade as the one in which I discovered baseball and I have great fondness for the players from that time, I don't know many of those players' earlier history. For instance, I never knew Woodie Fryman as a Tiger. He was an Expo! Lou Piniella was a Royal? No way, he was a nasty Yankee!   Diving into all the players with a Topps card for every year of the '80s would truly cover all the players I knew -- from the start of their career til the end of the 1980s. Guys who started mid-1970s -- think Keith Hernandez -- were there through the entire '80s.   Like when compiling the '70s list, I was surprised by the number of players who receiv...