Night Owl Cards

So, there was this dude who worked for Upper Deck once. He didn't like the Dodgers. He was a Mariners fan or something. And this was before Randy Johnson and A-Rod and Buhner came along, so you know the dude really had issues. But according to Pete Williams' book,  Card Sharks , the Mariners fan thought it would be really funny to designate a Dodger card with the No. 666 for each Upper Deck set. And so it went for the next four years. Card no. 666 was a Dodger. Jose Gonzalez one year, Mickey Hatcher the next, Bob Ojeda the next, Jim Gott the next. Hilarity ensued. But then they realized it was ridiculously juvenile, sent the whole Upper Deck team in for counseling and emerged with a set in 1994 that didn't even go up to 600 cards. But the last laugh is on Mariners fan. Because the card above, No. 666 in the first Upper Deck set ever made, is now the King of All Night Cards. As voted on by The People, Gibson annihilated the Carlton Fisk Masterpiece card: 1. 1989 Upp...

Are you sick of seeing this card yet? One of these days I need to do a blog inventory and figure out which card has been shown the most often. Ideally, I'd show a card once and then never again. But I love cards too much to do that. It's like boring people to death with baby pictures. You don't care if others are interested or not, you just like the pictures SO much. But even in your bored-into-a-coma state you know that this card is one of the finalists in the Awesomest Night Card Tournament. It actually had a decent-sized battle with the Donruss Triple Play Wrigley Field card. I think if that Wrigley Field photo was on, say, a Masterpieces card, then the outcome would be different. But here are the voting totals: 2007 Upper Deck Masterpieces Carlton Fisk: 30 votes 1992 Triple Play Wrigley Field: 24 votes Carlton, take a hop, skip and a jump down the first base line and into the final in which your opponent will be this card: You realize I can't lose, do...

Are you bummed that the NFL season is over for the year, or conceivably longer? Depressed that you have to wait until March for another tournament-style sporting event? Well, I am here to accommodate your sports-addicted self. We are near the very end of the longest tournament I can think of ... in the 20 seconds in which I attempted to think of such things. The tournament has pitted the very best night cards I have ever seen against each other. They are battling to win the very first spot in my night card binder. This is far more exciting than seeing receivers drop footballs. We have even determined one of the cards that will be in the Awesomest Night Card finale! It's the 1989 Upper Deck Kirk Gibson World Series card. Gibson took on the entire 1981 All-Star Game in the last matchup and won easily. Gibby can do it all. Here are the results of the vote: 1. 1989 Upper Deck WS Kirk Gibson: 32 votes 2. 1982 Fleer '81 All-Star Game: 15 votes Gibson heads off to th...

I'm a little worn out by the drive to and from the card show yesterday. Two-and-a-half hours in a car for an hour-and-a-half in a convention hall doesn't seem like a fair ... oh what am I saying? Of course it's a fair trade if it involves cards! But I'm not up to an involved write-up on night cards, even though I've finally gotten to the semifinals of this thing. After whittling down 100 night cards, it's come down to the final four (please don't sue me, NCAA). The last card to reach the semifinals is the Triple Play card of Wrigley Field that you see here. It outlasted Nolan Ryan, believe it or not. Here are the vote totals: 1. 1992 Triple Play Wrigley Field: 19 votes 2. 1990 Score Nolan Ryan: 14 votes 3. 1978 Topps Rich Chiles: 10 votes 4. 2001 Upper Deck '70s Decade Ozzie Smith: 5 votes So, Wrigley Field can relax and kick up its feet for a week while two other night cards duke it out for a spot in the final. You're probably very fam...

I'm still feeling some negativity from the voters concerning this card, but it continues to stay alive in the final stages of the Awesomest Night Card Tournament. That's right, Carlton Fisk has shook, shook, shook his booty into the tourney semifinals. Here is the breakdown: 1. 2007 Upper Deck Masterpieces Carlton Fisk: 21 votes 2. 1994 Upper Deck Johnny Vander Meer: 15 votes 3. 1975 Topps Game 5, 1974 World Series: 12 votes 4. 2009 Topps Kevin Youkilis: 3 votes If you're paying attention, you have noticed that each of the three cards that advanced to the semifinals commemorated a specific moment in major league history. If that trend holds, then one of the next four candidates for the final semifinal spot has already wrapped things up, as it's the only one of the four that recognizes a specific moment. But that's for the voters to figure out. So here are the last four cards of round 2: 1. 1990 Score Nolan Ryan: This is the card that has the insi...

Don't you hate it when the best night cards face off before the finals? This card just beat three of the finest night cards that you will ever see. We may have an anticlimactic finale to the Awesome Night Card Tournament because I've had a feeling for a long time that the 1982 Fleer card of the '81 All-Star Game was going to win the whole thing. Here are the results of last week's super-challenging vote-off: 1. 1982 Fleer, '81 All-Star Game: 18 votes 2. 1972 Topps Stan Williams: 15 votes 3. 1994 Topps Hank Aaron: 15 votes 4. 1977 Topps, '76 ALCS Chris Chambliss: 6 votes Pretty close, eh? We're going to see an '82 Fleer in the semifinals! Bow down to '82 Fleer! OK, here is the third grouping for round 2. It's not as intriguing as the last group. But I think you'll manage: 1. 1975 Topps, Game 5 of the '74 World Series: This was the decisive game and shows Joe Rudi's winning HR in that game as Ron Cey looks on forlo...

Who says you need to see a face in a photo for it to be a good shot? There was a lot of support of the '86 Topps Bo Diaz card in the last grouping of awesome night cards. But the Kirk Gibson '88 Series card won fairly easily. For some reason, as good as the Diaz card is, it just can't run with the best night cards. Here is the voting: 1. 1989 Upper Deck '88 World Series Kirk Gibson: 27 votes 2. 1986 Topps Bo Diaz: 19 votes 3. 1990 Score Warren Moon: 3 votes 4. 1989 Upper Deck '88 World Series Orel Hershiser: 2 votes Gibson heads to the quarterfinals with his fist in the air. And that means we have arrived at the toughest voting group of the entire Awesomest Night Card Tournament. The four cards facing off this time are all terrific. I'm telling you now you're going to have a tough time choosing the best one. And it's going to be heartbreaking waving some of them goodbye. But that's the price these night cards need to pay to occupy t...

We made it! Did you see? Look at the post title! It's Round 2! Good god, I thought we'd never get there. It's totally my fault, I know. I take on these projects and have no idea how involved they're going to be. I have that problem in other areas, too. When writing feature stories for the paper, before I know it, the story has grown to 50 inches and I still have so much else to tell, but I know no one is going to read an 70-inch story. It's an issue I've been dealing with for just about my whole career. But you don't need to read my issues. You want to read about the results of the final grouping of round 1 and get on to round 2 of the Awesomest Night Card Tournament! OK, here you go. These are the vote totals for the final group: 1. 1992 Triple Play Wrigley Field, 16 votes 2. 1981 Donruss Mike Norris, 11 votes 3. 1991 Topps Traded Jack Morris, 7 votes 4. 1992 Stadium Club Ivan Rodriguez, 5 votes 5. 2010 Topps Brian McCann, 4 votes 6. 2008 ...

I'm a bit surprised that the Awesomest Night Card tournament has caught on as well as it has. Who knew there were so many night card fans! But it's understandable. If you haven't noticed, sporting events are starting later and later. I don't just mean for national events, but for your average high school activity, too. Playing at night is preferred. Everyone wants to play under the pretty lights. We're raising a generation of night owls. One day we'll all get up at noon and go to sleep at 3 a.m., and I won't be so unusual anymore. But while I'm still somewhat unique, let's get back to the night card voting. Here are the totals for the most recent candidates: 1. 1978 Topps Rich Chiles, 24 votes 2. 2004 Upper Deck Timeless Teams Memorable Moments Kirk Gibson, 6 votes 3. 1981 Fleer Rick Miller, 5 votes 4. 1987 Topps Royals Leaders, 3 votes 5. 2006 Topps Updates & Highlights Roy Halladay, 3 votes 6. 2010 Upper Deck Casey Blake, 3 votes ...

We have arrived at the second-to-last portion of the first round of the Awesomest Night Card Tournament. Next week, while ungrateful bastards are returning carefully thought-out gifts purchased by loved ones, I will post the final part to the first round. Then it is finally on to round two, which will go a lot quicker, I promise. I expect to have the champion of all the night cards, and the first entrant in my brand new night card binder, declared next month. And you thought there was nothing exciting going on in January. But, first, I must reveal the winner of part 13. It's the Ozzie Smith Upper Deck 1970s card. Honestly, it's a terrible photo. But apparently a brown-and-yellow Padres uniform conquers all. After a big battle with the 1990 Upper Deck Wade Boggs card, Ozzie pulled away late for the easy victory. Here is the poll tally: 1. 2001 Upper Deck Decade 1970s Ozzie Smith: 18 votes 2. 1990 Upper Deck Wade Boggs: 11 votes 3. 2009 Upper Deck OPC black border Du...