Night Owl Cards

  I could cite several factors that led to my beginnings as a card collector.   - In the summer of 1974, I was playing baseball in the backyard with my brother and a couple of boys in the neighborhood. We played with a tennis ball because regular baseballs broke windows and dented siding (or so we were told). It's possible we were playing ball the previous summer but I'm not sure.   - I was a reader. Loved books and magazines and those Peanuts comic books you could get on loan from the library. I liked stories. I don't recall reading specifically about baseball at that time, I think that came later.   - The 1974 Topps design is ideal for a young collector for focusing on the individual photos. It's not loud like 1972 or 1975. It's not dull like 1970 or 1973. It has fun flags and cartoons on the back.   But those are secondary reasons. The main reason I became a card collector is because of two people.   My mom and Tommy John are where it all started.  ...

  I picked up this card on Friday. Ryne Sandberg passed away Monday.   I was not a kid when Sandberg was starring for the Cubs. I was a senior in high school when his rookie card showed up, and I'm pretty sure I didn't know who he was when I pulled it. That was the last year of dedicated card collecting for me for the next six years. That's a lot of Sandberg cards I didn't see.   I'm also not a Cubs fan, and it feels odd writing a tribute. So I'm going to wander through topics while discussing Sandberg cards, too.   The Sandberg diecut card came from a collection I am assessing for a co-worker. She helps run a thrift shop through her church. The cards are the former collection of her neighbor. The collector's mom made the cards, and everything else in their garage, available to the shop.   It's apparent that the kid collected somewhere around 2005-15. There are also cards going back to 2001 (and some football cards from the late '80s but that was bef...

  You are going to see, or you have already read, many tributes to Rickey Henderson today.  A lot will discuss his mind-blowing skill on the base paths and how he changed the game in the 1980s. Many will discuss his entertaining personality and how he referred to himself in the third person. Some, like us card bloggers, will talk about his cards -- his rookie card in particular -- and how he became their favorite player. All of those tributes will seem to lack something in attempting to sum up the man. This one also will fall short. That's because Rickey Henderson, who passed at age 65, was the greatest I ever saw play. I am always uncertain when people ask me to come up with the best of whatever, musician, artist, designer, inventor, etc. How can you settle on just one? But with Henderson there is no doubt. He was it. I saw it and instantly knew. He's the best damn player I've ever seen. And how do you explain why he was so great and why he captivated collectors without mi...

  I know some readers have been expecting me to write about Fernando Valenzuela after news of his death. A few comments on the last post mentioned him even though I cited him just once in passing. I learned of the sad news as I ended work around midnight Tuesday. The work schedule is unrelenting midweek these days. This is why I almost never post on Wednesdays now, so there was no chance to get to it yesterday. But I was devastated. Valenzuela is probably among my top 10 favorite Dodgers, or at least should be. His arrival synced perfectly with my budding interest in young stars -- a common teenage fixation -- and the Dodgers were happily accommodating with not only Fernando but Sutcliffe, Steve Howe, Sax, Guerrero, Rudy Law and a bunch of others. I lived far away from Los Angeles, so I have no tales to tell of nearly running into Valenzuela in Dodger Stadium or him signing a ball for me. But I did witness his MLB career from the very beginning. I've written about him a bunch ...