Night Owl Cards

 (*sigh* Looked like a catch to me. Time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 362nd in a series:)    I picked up this card at the monthly show yesterday (more on that tomorrow). It's the first time I've come across this insert, though it's possible someone showed it off on a blog post 12 years ago or something.   It's a pretty cool medium-thick card. The boxscore is recessed into the card and it's a glorious moment-in-time item, which are some of the best kinds of cards. This one commemorates Carlos Delgado's four-home run game.   Surprisingly, this card is from the 2004 Upper Deck Play Ball set, which I've long disdained for the "melted faces" paintings of the base cards. That's all I've previously seen from the set -- the only cards in my collection are base Dodgers. It goes to show you how sets are always stashing the good cards in the inserts and collectors consequently hoard those cards.   This card was a dollar purchase and I quick...

(It's the day of Game 3 of the NLCS and I am going to have to find a creative way to watch the game tonight since Fox has deemed it unworthy for basic cable. Or maybe I'll just monitor online. That's sometimes less agonizing anyway. Time for Cardboard Appreciation. This is the 275th in a series): For the first time, I believe, I am showing a card on Cardboard Appreciation that I don't own. I have had my eyes on this card for quite awhile but it's been out of stock on COMC the whole time I have been aware of it. I haven't bothered searching for the card anywhere else. That's just the way it is with these Yankee Stadium Legacy cards. If you find one that fits into your collection, you're still not all that enthused about it. Let me explain why: This card features the first game I ever attended in person. July 15, 1978. This is why I want this card. People collect ToppsNow cards because they represent a game that they attended. This is really the...

When the 1979 baseball cards hit store shelves, my hatred for the Yankees was as high as it had ever been and perhaps has been since. The previous season, the Yankees had rallied to surpass my second favorite team and my brother's favorite team, the Red Sox, to make the playoffs, then defeated another favorite, the Royals, for the third straight time to reach the World Series, then beat my favorite team for a second straight time, the Dodgers. Hated them. Bucky f-ing Dent, Reggie Jackson's hip, Graig Nettles' glove, the smug, self-satisfied classmates. All of them. That feeling lasts to this day. But that doesn't mean I can't enjoy Yankees cards. Growing up in the Northeast, in Yankee territory, there were just parts of my childhood that are stamped with Yankeeness. The instrumental theme song before every game. The 1978 Yankee yearbook acquired when I saw my first MLB game in person. And, of course, the Yankee Burger King cards. Ideally, I would ha...

This is one of those posts that when I am writing it, I can hear people yelling at me, "BUT THE WORLD ISN'T LIKE THAT ANYMORE!" But I'm gonna keep going. Because I gotta get things out. I received this 2014 Topps Saberstars insert of Clayton Kershaw from one of my main Kershaw suppliers, 2 x 3 Heroes . (May he and Nachos Grande blog forever). I kind of miss the days when "Saber" meant "sabertooth tiger, COOOL, he was like a real tiger except, you know, meaner!!! " And I just looked up "FIP" the other day and I have a lingering headache. But all of that is not where I'm going with this post. What I'd like to know is where is the star treatment for Kershaw in the Topps base set? You know what the star treatment is, right? Perhaps it was just perception on my part, but when I was a youngster, it seemed like Topps would reserve a special photo for the biggest stars of the game. If someone was the greatest or most famous or...

I received a note in the mail from Andy of the must-see 78 Topps blog the other day. The note read thusly: "Yo. 78 Topps blog." Short and to the point. You may interpret "yo" as "hello" or "what's up" or "how y'all doin' out there tonight?" But I interpret it as "give me your own personal top-10 countdown of your favorite 1978 Topps baseball cards." I'd be happy to Andy. Keep in mind, this is my list, assembled in a matter of minutes during a Monday afternoon of making sure the dog didn't do any MORE damage to the Christmas tree. So I may have been distracted. Here we go: 10. Steve Stone, White Sox, card #153: I was tempted to put this card at No. 1. If someone had to pick one card to sum up the 1970s, this is it. Long, curly hair, mustache, open collar, gold chains, wacky White Sox get-up. This photo has it all. All Stone has to do is lose the cap and don a white jacket and he's ready for Studio 54. ...