raking leafs

it's that time of year. there are leaves all over my lawn, and raking is required.  now that i think about it, there's a maple in the front yard and another in the back, so maybe there are leafs all over my lawn.  anyway, here are some different kinds of leafs that are not in my yard, but rather my steve garvey collection.

kicking things off with the big guns.  that's a memorabilia eight red parallel from 2019 leaf ultimate sports. it's got some nice dodger names on there, although darryl strawberry seems a bit out of place. just like another steve garvey collector, i had considered not going after these cards this year as the design is lacking and they are very similar to the cards from last year.  when i saw this one, however, the red patches pulled me in.  garvey's contribution to the card is the lamest, and i suspect strawberry's is mets material, but the other pieces are pretty nice.  

after i pulled the trigger on that card, i decided to go for all eight garvey cards issued by leaf in the ultimate and in the game sports releases.  i'm by no means looking to get all of the parallels, instead i'm content with one version of each, just like last year.  

this next one is also from ultimate sports - a bronze parallel of the "franchise" subset

duke snider subs in for strawberry, but the other players are the same. mike scioscia represents with a small sliver of red patch!

these cards are pretty boring in their design, and for the most part, they are devoid of player images.  to make matters worse, for some reason the names on the backs of the jerseys are removed (from those that would have had names on the back, anyway). 

garvey also made the checklist beyond just dodger-centric cards.  here he is with some contemporaries on another version of a memorabilia eight card:

i am guessing that the reggie swatch is from an angels jersey, even though they are showing a yankee jersey there. same thing for pete rose - that's definitely not a swatch from a reds jersey.

the other 2019 leaf release to feature the garv is in the game used sports, and he shows up on five cards.  the first is a 1976 all-star game history themed card:

that's some good star power there.  however, if you are looking for meaning or synchronicity, you won't find it.  at first, i thought there was a counterpart thing going on, and johnny bench and thurman munson were the starters at catcher in the game, but then there is carlton fisk on there, too. of the two third basemen on the card, only george brett was a starter - mike schmidt came off the bench as pete rose was at the hot corner for the national league. garvey did start at first (for the third straight season) and his counterpart was rod carew.  so, leaf could have easily issued this card with garvey, carew, rose, brett, bench, and munson and it would have been much more sensible.

there's no denying the connection between the players on this card:

those are eight league mvp's, including the national league mvp's from 1973 (rose), 1974 (garvey), 1975 and 1976 (morgan), and a co-mvp from 1979 (stargell) and the american league from 1973 (jackson), 1976 (munson), 1977 (carew), and 1980 (brett).  the weirdest thing about the card is that we get to see carew's face amongst all the jerseys!

carew's image shows up again on another card i picked up - this in the game used sports "the 10" card:

and he's not alone, with tom seaver and the hit king also getting some face time.  it's interesting that leaf used a different photo of carew from his stint with a different team, even though the swatches look the same as the previous card.  with rose, he's still a red but that swatch came from a phillies uniform.  seaver is definitely a met, and it's nice to see a bit of orange on his swatch. still a plain swatch for garvey.

that is actually the back of the card, here's the front:

yaz and nolan ryan mix things up a bit, which is cool.

the last couple of cards are pretty lame, but there was no turning back.  this one brings a bit of basketball to the garvey collection:

cool to have a roger murdock swatch! the idea here is to pair a couple of athletes who played in the same city or region, obviously. this is similar to the 2002-03 upper deck superstars set.  in that release, this sort of card featured kobe bryant and wayne gretzky and shawn green. they can't all be sandy koufax cards, although he had more to do with dodger baseball taking root in los angeles than garvey did. 

this last card is pretty boring, although i do like the concept:

garvey and reggie faced off in the world series four times (1974, 1977, 1978, and 1981).  they also both played in their final games in 1987, which is the point of this card.  ron cey and davey lopes also last played in 1987, and it would have been cool to have one of those guys, or at least garvey and cey together (we know leaf has cey swatches).

it would be nice to see some new topps cards of the garv, but he seems to have settled firmly in the non-licensed landscape with these cards and those offered by panini.  next year will bring some 1971 topps buybacks in the topps heritage release, but i don't expect to see many garvey rookie cards among them. i am happy to have these cards in my collection, and i appreciate the attention that leaf gives to my favorite player, but i'll continue to take a case by case approach to collecting new cards. it's no longer as automatic as having to rake leaves in the fall.