my favorite cards of the year - 2015 edition

i recently introduced my mini collection focusing on my favorite cards from each year that i've been a collector. the basic gist is that i wanted to create a space for the cards that i most appreciated having in my collection in the year that they were released. these were cards that i acquired in the year that they were issued, and that i considered to be my favorites at the time. i have disallowed (most) cards that are already in other mini collections in order to avoid having a mini collection consisting of more steve garvey, double plays, and dodger stadium cards.

2015 was an interesting year for me as i ended my first blog in july of that year. i was still collecting and trading but just not writing about it. i didn't buy as much as i had in previous years, but still wound up with a bunch of cards. for whatever reason, i was all in on the topps originals buybacks of dodger cards, but that doesn't factor in to my favorite cards of 2015.

favorite non-dodger card: stadium club george brett

i think everyone knows the story of how this photo, featured in the july 1976 edition of national geographic, inspired lorde's 2014 hit song "royals".  i knew the story, but hadn't seen the image until this card was released. once i saw the card, i understood how the image could make such an impression. brett was among my favorites early in my fandom (that all-star shield on 1978 topps cards had an impact on me) and i was happy to see a card of him not featuring him at the plate or manning third base.

favorite dodger card: leaf heroes of baseball don sutton

sutton was another all-star in the 1978 topps set, but as the ace of the team of my youth, my fandom for him was for other reasons. any card featuring the dodgers from the 1978 world series is going to rank high on my list (see my favorite dodger card from 2020, for example), and this is no exception despite the lack of the interlocking la on sutton's cap. kudos to leaf for leaving the dodger jersey number red on the front, and for not photoshopping out the jim gilliam memorial patch.

up next - 2013. stay tuned!