Night Owl Cards

Managers no longer get baseball cards and I've devoted more than one post to what a tragedy that is.  Thanks to legal hoo-ha and a general not caring about anything except stars and rookies by the general card collecting public, managers haven't shown up regularly on cards for nearly a dozen years. And now the poor people who have been collecting since 2020 are wondering what to do with their Wander Franco cards. Manager cards would never steer you wrong. Well, most of the time.   We knew this collecting in the 1980s. It was the era of the Second Manager Card Invasion. It correlated with the Second British Invasion. In fact both invasions first started in the 1960s and then returned in the '80s. You didn't know rock n roll and manager cards had something in common, huh? Well, that's what this blog is for.   Objectively, the manager cards of the 1960s were better, just like the British Invasion music of the '60s was better. But I didn't collect in...

Perhaps you've heard that 1.8 percent of major league baseball fans are happy because the Giants won the World Series again. As you can imagine, I'm part of the 98.2 percent that is not happy. In the least. I can't bring myself to say it was a great postseason or Series or any of that 'yay, baseball!' stuff because I'm too INVESTED. Also, I'll never get used to the fact that a team that ended the season six games behind gets a World Series trophy. That's regardless of whether it's the Giants or not ... OK, it annoys me more that it's the Giants ... but, really, baseball what are you doing to yourself? I know it's irreparable and most fans have moved on and the other sports have been dealing with this for a long time since way back when I was a child, but six games behind, man. Six. Games. Behind. Anyway, it's another lost postseason and to add to that joy I've worked 15 days straight and there's no real certainty about my n...

Ten things that stop traffic: 1. Construction 2. A red stoplight 3. Fallen tree limbs 4. An auto accident 5. A crossing guard 6. Ducks in the road 7. A boy chasing a ball 8. A funeral procession 9. An attractive woman And ... 10. Throwback Padres uniforms on a summer night! The uniform Jake Peavy is wearing is a tribute to the regular San Diego uniforms worn in 1972 and 1973. I suspect famed McDonald's owner Ray Kroc was the mad genius behind these things, and I wish they'd bring them back full-time. It'd be a true style-over-substance move. But the Padres don't have any substance. At least they'd have style. This card was sent to me by spiegel . He always throws in some night cards into his card packages that are generally dominated by Dodgers. This package happened to have a variety of items, including some notable late-'70s vintage. Behold: All of these were most-needed for my non-existent '77 Topps want list (I'll get it up ...

Little time today, so I'm getting right to it. Right here we have The Hammer. In all his 1971 glory. Forty-seven homers, 1.019 OPS that year. He was the man in 1971. He's still the man. This card is all mine. It is one of the cards that I thought I'd have the toughest time obtaining in my quest to finish off the '71 set. But after receiving the '71 Munson card, I've learned that just about anything is possible in the collecting game (Steve, the code cards are accumulating). Originally, I thought finishing the '71 set would be a lifetime project. I don't think that anymore. Granted, I still need the Clemente, the Mays and the Rose. Realistically, it could still take years. But also, I expect those cards to drop out of the sky in the next few months. Seriously, I expect to be walking down the street and they will float down from a cloud into my hands. That's how optimistic I am about this set now. I have reader Eggrocket to thank for the Aar...