Night Owl Cards

  Here you go, 2021 card collectors and companies, your cautionary year.   By 1994, card sets readily available to collectors had eclipsed 30 different kinds with various off-shoots and variations, demonstrating the company tricks that are still employed today. Collecting was no longer about the base set in '94 as "the chase" had become the thing and inserts and parallels exploded in content and popularity that year.   The hobby never seemed healthier or more vibrant. Then the baseball strike hit.   Fans left the game in droves and collectors walked away, partly due to the strike but also because the new direction of the hobby -- way too many sets to pursue -- didn't make sense to those used to the old way of collecting.   I was one of those who left in 1994. I collected some Topps, a few packs. That was it. By '96, I couldn't tell you a single thing that was happening in the hobby.   Those who remained, primarily kids who were just starting out in collecti...

(Spring Training games are on my TV! Spring Training games are on my TV! It's time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 299th in a series): I obtained this card from Jay at Cardboard Hemorrhage in one of his giveaways recently. The 1994 UD Heroes set is one of the better retro sets from the 1990s, and I'm casually collecting it -- so casually that you may never see a want list. Haddix is a popular figure among non-Hall of Famers because of his Hall of Fame feat. He tossed 12 innings of perfection only to finish with a loss when the perfect game, no-hitter and shutout ended in the 13th during a game against the Milwaukee Braves in 1959. For decades afterward, Haddix joined all of the other no-hit artists even though he never experienced the joy of the vast majority of no-hit hurlers, completing the game with the no-hitter intact and winning the game. MLB placed his achievement on the list of official no-hitters. Then, in 1991, baseball changed the qualifications for what is ...

My guilt overcame me yesterday and I went to the post office. I haven't been to the post office in weeks, intentionally keeping my distance and keeping card mailings to PWEs I can drop off at the mailbox. But the packages kept coming. I got four in the mail Monday, plus a couple of envelopes. Obviously, somebody is still going to the post office, I thought. So, I'd better get these long-delayed packages out of my house. So I ventured to the one post office in town and I can honestly say I will not do that again until things calm down. I'm not sure -- because I'm not prone to such things -- but I think I had an anxiety attack when I was there. By the time I was done, I felt p.o'd. Not pissed-off. Post-officed. The face covering thing, I think, is just too much for my senses. I get why people say they're necessary, even for a place where I am that has among the fewest positive COVID-19 cases in the state. But I can't get over the sight of seeing eve...

(Today is Administrative Professional's Day, what used to be known as National Secretary's Day. I have just started to become addicted to the show "Mad Men." I've only just started Season 2, so don't spoil anything for me, but good gosh, we treated our secretar ... er, administrative professionals horribly in the early '60s. I know, that's got nothing to do with cardboard. Here is Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 181st in a series): I'm not someone who goes around talking about the dreams they had last night, but I'll make an exception this time because it's related to baseball card collecting. I dreamed last night that I went to a baseball card show. It was kind of a combination baseball card show/baseball card shop. The whole show was contained within one store-front room. I stopped near the front desk. Jim Bouton apparently was the guest signer. I didn't see him, but he had left some business cards. The cards pictured Bou...

I'm afraid I'm going to have to split this card show report into three separate posts. I just don't have the time to scan all the cards and then write about them all in one sitting. I'll deal with the first two-thirds of the show here and then wrap it up in the next post. I mentioned that I arrived at the show late. It runs from 10 a.m.-4 p.m., but I almost always get there around 12:30-1 p.m. That's so I can avoid the big mob scene for whoever is signing autographs that day. (Yesterday it was former Syracuse great Floyd Little. I care nothing about SU, and yes, I know Little's history). But this time I didn't get there until 2 p.m. Just collective laziness on our part, I guess (and the fact I have a 14-year-old kid in the house). After getting out of the car, I practically ran to the building. Once inside, my eyes shot to one of the two places in the hall where my favorite dealer usually stands. He wasn't at either place. I traveled the entire ...