Night Owl Cards

Seven years ago today, Night Owl Cards began. Inspired by The Baseball Card Blog and a few others, I tossed out my first effort in the middle of the night on Sept. 13, 2008. It's a little known fact that the seven-year mark in card blogs is termed the "Mantle-versary," after the jersey number worn by the obsession of the Topps trading card company, Mickey Mantle. I've known about Mickey Mantle from the time I first started buying cards as a 9-year-old. He showed up in the very first packs I ever bought, way back in 1975. This ... And this were two of the first cards I ever pulled out of packs that I purchased. And the cartoon on the back of Gorman Thomas' 1975 Topps card clued me in to Mantle's uniform number. Even though Mantle retired four years after I was born and played for a team I learned to dislike at an early age, I was forced to know the history of Mantle. As a card collector it was a requirement, and soon I kn...