Night Owl Cards

  One of the many running sub-themes of this blog is how unobservant I am, and how concerned I am about it.   I scold myself over and over for not noticing things on cards, whether it was painted hats when I was a kid collecting in the 1970s or widely broadcast errors on current cards over the last 20 years. When I do notice a small detail I'm almost triumphant because finally my brain wasn't on auto-pilot.   I get concerned about this "flaw" because my real-life, salaried job is about noticing things. I'm supposed to be an expert on this. I am scouring whatever I can to get sports stories in the newspaper, whether it's locally or nationally. I've become pretty good at it -- well, actually I've been pretty good at it for a few decades now.    So my theory is that I spend so much time on "noticing" in my work life that maybe subconsciously my brain doesn't want to notice so much when it comes to my hobby. That's what I tell myself anyw...

  This is not a post about Topps' decision a decade ago to drop managers from card sets. But what a fateful decision that was. I know I would be able to identify current managers -- heck even know their names better -- if they were still featured on baseball cards.   This is about a different time when managers went missing, and it was only a couple of them. And I sure did notice.   I started collecting in 1975. So I didn't know stand-alone manager cards, which were commonplace in the years prior. I knew managers as showing up as little head shot insets on the team card. That's where they appeared in the 1975 Topps set. Every team card came with a manager head shot in the lower corner.    This means that the manager in most cases showed up twice on the team card because he's also seated with his players and coaches in the team photo. But I didn't know that at the time. It was too tough for my little mind to figure out who was who in the mass of people. But I did...

  In my continuing quest to plug the gaps as far as any baseball card set issued during my youth, I recently landed the 1980 Burger King Pitch, Hit & Run set.   Like the Burger King team sets of the late 1970s/1980, this set's design was produced by Topps and used the flagship design from the year of issue. As a youngster, I was well-aware of the Burger King team sets, but I don't recall knowing about the Pitch, Hit & Run set. It's possible that I had outgrown the advertising used for this set (I was 14) and it passed me by. I know I was too old to participate in Pitch, Hit & Run activities.   Still, this was a huge oversight on my part, this set is 100% filled with the players from my youth and it also features one of my all-time favorite aspects of cards from this time -- updates and variations -- spin-offs from the flagship set, whether related to changing teams or for no good reason at all.   My favorite aspect of sets like O-Pee-Chee is alterations f...

 (Hello on National Cheesesteak Day. There are certain foods when you get older and health becomes a larger priority, that you just cross off the list and never think about them again. Cheesesteak is a good example. I used to eat them. But I can't remember the last time I had one now. I'm sure if I lived in Philadelphia, I probably still would be eating them, and getting stern looks from my doctor. Time for Cardboard Appreciation: This is the 336th in a series): I never give my brain enough credit when it comes to hunting down cards. This happens most often during card show visits. I'll shuffle through a bunch of cards in a discount bin or look through a binder and pull cards along the way. During the process, my brain will pipe up, almost imperceptibly, singing " you haaaaaavve that one. " Often I'll ignore it, or not even hear it. I know better, I know what's in my collection. I need that card. And, no, I don't have to check a want list. Then I'l...