still scratching that 17 year itch

it wasn't too long after i had completed the 2007 topps chrome dodger team set that i decided to go after the blue refractor parallels. the base chrome cards seemed pretty lackluster, and with the chunky borders, the blue refractors were fantastically blue! it took me a while, but i got there, and i recently finished off the regular refractor and white refractor team sets, too.

here's the base dodger team set for comparison purposes later on.

j.d drew, andre ethier, rafael furcal

jeff kent, brad penny, juan pierre

chad billingsley, jason schmidt, matt kemp

randy wolf, takashi saito, russell martin

derek lowe, greg maddux, delwyn young  

the black borders don't do the base chrome any favors, and shame on topps (and other companies at the time) for including autographs as base cards.

now here is the blue refractor team set - note that there was no delwyn young card in the blue refractor style

j.d drew, andre ethier, rafael furcal

jeff kent, brad penny, juan pierre

chad billingsley, jason schmidt, matt kemp

randy wolf, takashi saito, russell martin

derek lowe, greg maddux  

having the blue refractors but not the regular refractors gnawed on me a bit, so i got that job done.

j.d drew, andre ethier, rafael furcal

jeff kent, brad penny, juan pierre

chad billingsley, jason schmidt, matt kemp

randy wolf, takashi saito, russell martin

derek lowe, greg maddux, delwyn young                

much, much brighter, of course. the young card is numbered to 500 in refractor form.

now for the white border refractors

j.d drew, andre ethier, rafael furcal

jeff kent, brad penny, juan pierre

chad billingsley, jason schmidt, matt kemp

randy wolf, takashi saito, russell martin

derek lowe, greg maddux, delwyn young    

the "pop" on these is largely background dependent. speaking of backgrounds, there was no nomar garciaparra chrome card in 2007, but he is in the background of chad billingsley's card.

the white refractors are numbered to 660 - hard to see on the scanned card back

but the delwyn young auto is only numbered to 200

interestingly enough, i have no xfractors in my collection. maybe that's next. or, the red refractor parallels. there is always something to chase!

the 17 year itch

after completing the 1992, 1993, and 1994 topps dodgers gold parallel team sets (and seeing night owl's complete 2008 topps series 1 and 2 dodgers gold parallel team set), i figured that it was time to complete a numbered gold parallel team set, and i decided that it would be 2007 topps. i chose that set mainly because it has big, chunky borders that allow for a lot of color, but also it does not include any rookie or early career clayton kershaw cards that i missed out on in real time!

i had maybe a third of the team set when i started, and it took me a few months to pull it all together, but i managed.  so, here is the complete 2007 topps gold parallel dodger team set

j.d. drew, andre ethier, rafael furcal

jeff kent, james loney, jonathan broxton

brad penny, grady little, delwyn young

greg maddux, juan pierre, jason schmidt

matt kemp, randy wolf, luis gonzalez

takashi saito, russell martin, wilson betemit

derek lowe, chad billingsley, ramon martinez

dodger team card

 

but that's not all - i also completed the update team set

brady clark, david wells, mark hendrickson

olmaedo saenz, hong-chih kuo, tony abreu

andy laroche, russell martin, brad penny

takashi saito, russell martin (alex rodriguez) combo, russell martin (cole hamels) combo

scott proctor

the proctor card was the last of these that i acquired. there weren't too many options when it came to purchasing the vagabond reliever's card, but thankfully one of the two sellers who had high hopes with their buy-it-now prices sent an offer that was pretty reasonable and i was able to complete the set.

there are a lot of "let's remember some guys" up there, but i remember being pretty happy with kemp and martin and ethier showing up. luis gonzalez not so much. and, as you can see, there are definitely some differences in the pigmentation of the gold across the collection.

another difference is the numbering on the back. topps switched the orientation of the serial numbering between flagship series 1 and 2 and update. ramon martinez is from series 2 and olmedo saenz is from update

ok, so it's hard to see, but on the flagship card, the 2007 is closest to the topps logo, and in update it's closest to the player inset photo. and, how great is it that topps noted each of these as "gold parallel" on the back?!

with the black borders, topps was in need of a different treatment for the other-colored border parallels (this was before camo /25 and all that). they went with copper

which was numbered to 56

the low print run black border parallels debuted in 2003 and were numbered to 52 copies. since then they have increased in production by one to match the "years of collecting" on the front. as far as i can tell, 2007 is the only year that the border for these cards hasn't been black.

i have no plans to chase the copper parallel set, but i do have more 17 year itch to scratch. stay tuned!

more adventures in team collecting

i've had my share of card purchases gone awry as far as picking up a card i didn't need thanks to faulty memory or an updated want list. these purchases frustrate me a bit, but it's my own fault so i don't get too worked up about it. as a team collector, there are other things to be frustrated about, especially with so many card sets and the reliance on online checklists. wrigley wax noted recently that he was duped by an online checklist into purchasing a couple of non-cub cards, and i've had the same experience with a few cards of players like rick monday and gary sheffield.

conversely, sometimes i will find cards not on the dodger checklist that belong in the dodger collection. many of these are o-pee-chee-esque cards as i call them - dodgers in all but team name only. case in point, this 2004 playoff prestige kevin brown card

it is assigned to the yankees as far as the official checklist goes which makes sense. i looked it up because the cards in this set are numbered sequentially by team and there was a gap in the dodger numbering. i like to have these cards in the dodger collection, too. this is just my preference and i don't blame the checklist makers.

similarly, i recently added this greg gagne card to finish off my 1996 fleer team set

gagne is shown as a royal, but identified as a dodger on the card, so the fleer checklist lists him as such. this was an easy card to target as a result.

and then there are the cards that are on the team checklist that arrive from sportlots sight unseen and leave me wondering why they are on my dodger checklist.  like this 2006 bowman heritage greg maddux card:

it looks like a cubs card, but it turns out that it's only because it is replicating a design from 1949. turn the card over, and you will see that it is, in fact, a dodger card

however, i do get frustrated with all of the parallels issued these days. i found this 2018 topps cody bellinger highlights card

in my dupes box. turns out it's a blue parallel and not a duplicate at all. check another one off the team checklist.

these days, even though i will never give up on the dodger collecting, i am more focused on my steve garvey collection which has challenges of its own, but at least i don't need to think about his team affiliation.

sights set on saito

i found one of the two cards i needed to finish off my 2007 topps chrome blue refractor parallel dodger team set right before thanksgiving

hall of famer greg maddux looks great in dodger blue surrounded by blue-chromey refractorness, don't you think?

i'm putting an apb out for takashi saito's card from this set.  find it and be rewarded beyond your most reasonable dreams!