Night Owl Cards

Clayton Kershaw didn't have a great outing against the Cubs today. He didn't have much command, he gave up three home runs, and you could tell that the Cubs were bent on making him work. Fortunately, the Dodgers' offense showed up big time. But whether Kershaw won or lost this game wasn't going to affect the price of my $80 rookie card of him. That's right, I said "$80 rookie card." I seem to be the only person who hasn't come to terms with this already (or the only one who cares), but I remain stunned by the prices of certain base rookie cards of star players. I've mentioned it already with 2011 Update's Mike Trout and 2015 flagship's Kris Bryant. These are very attainable cards going for crazy prices. Now it's happening with Kershaw. Maybe it's the recent statement by Buster Olney that Kershaw could never throw another pitch again and make the Hall of Fame, but I am suddenly aware of how much his rookie card is sellin...

It's pretty obvious that more than half the card collecting world is on vacation this week. Readership is down, comments are down (nobody loves Jackie) , the pace of posts are down, and every time I hop online someone is talking about traveling there, seeing that or drinking this. So I'm not going to knock myself out the next two days. Besides, nothing can compare to what's flashing across the screen direct from The National. It's been kind of fun on Twitter the last few days getting reports from the lucky few who are there. Lots of buzz about cardboard, both good and bad. Information. Ranting. And plenty of pretty pictures. SOOOOO many pretty pictures. The pictures are where my interests lie. What is Topps going to do about redemptions? Who is autographing next? Why is the VIP line already starting? I don't care about that. I want to gawk at cards. I know I can't afford the vast majority of what is there. But even when I'm at a regular, old card s...

Every year at this time, I kind of wander aimlessly through the card aisle. I never have very much money between August and December. That fact, combined with the tail end of the card collecting season, leaves me uninspired when purchasing new product. Mostly, I turn toward vintage and team-set efforts at this time. But there's always a part of me that MUST have something to rip periodically. Despite my aimlessness, I manage to find something each year at this time that piques my interest that didn't necessarily interest me the first time around. This year it's Topps Heritage blister packs. Yeah, I'm a sucker for the black borders. I've grabbed a few, not too many. But it's re-ignited my interest in the overall Heritage set. I know I disparaged 2012 Heritage when it first came out because I'm not crazy about the 1963 Topps design. But here's the thing: when you stack it up against what else is out there -- Topps base (uninspired design on super-...

First, if you haven't voted for which set blog you'd like me to start, head to this post and then vote in the poll on the sidebar. OK, onward: I received this card from Those Back Pages  a week or so ago. It was a Nebulous 9 need, which means I am super-happy to check it off the list. Donruss Triple Play should never, ever, ever be needed . Juan Samuel's awesome action was shipped to me as basically a one-card agreement. "I've got a card from your list for you," is what TBP said. So I expected to pull a single card out of the envelope. But this card came out, too: Excellent. A night card. And a stadium shot. It was a finalist in the Awesome Night Card tournament a year or so ago. I have a few copies of this card. It'd be cool if I could get nine of them and then put them in a page to kick off my night card binder. But then people might think I'm a Cubs fan, and I'd never want that to happen. But the point is, I wonder if there's ...