when topps didn't, gio does

it's been a while since i made a custom card - a couple of years, i think - but i remember enough from my time churning them out that i can say the motivation for making them (customs of the non-art variety) stems from missed opportunities by those who made the real cards. someone was left off of a checklist? make a custom. didn't care for the photo the "real one" used? make a custom. significant event not covered by a highlight or record breaker card? make a custom. rookie not given a card? make a custom. player switched teams and the "wrong" team was represented in a set? make a custom. veteran fan favorite not given a proper send off? make a custom.

those were the reasons i and many others made and make custom cards, and there is none better in the game than gio from when topps had (base)balls. gio takes his creations a step further than most and produces physical, professionally printed sets that are fun to collect.

back in october of 2024, he dropped his "series 18" set that covered all six of the reasons for making customs that i gave above, with fantastic results. let's have a look.

1970 topps bert blyleven

bert made his big league debut in 1970, so could have been included in a later series. he was 19!

1971 topps larry doby and jon matlack

topps hadn't produced stand alone coach cards since the 1950's, but they've had at least one recently in the topps now universe. a doby expos card would have been sweet. as for matlack, he debuted in 1971 and, unlike blyleven, was included as part of a late series release. that card, however, was a three-player rookie card (with old friend ted martinez), so gio gave him his own solo rookie card.

1972 topps rusty staub traded

le grand orange was traded from the expos to the mets on april 5, 1972. that was later than the transactions involving steve carlton, joe morgan, and frank robinson, but still plenty of time for topps to include a traded card in the late series. they chose not to. 

1973 topps sadaharu oh

this is just a straight up "fantasy" card of the japanese legend. oh and the yomiuri giants won their 9th straight title in 1973.

1974 topps graig nettles

gio makes an improvement upon nettles' actual 1974 topps card

1975 topps steve blass and felipe alou

both blass and alou finished their major league careers in april of 1974 and so didn't make the 1975 topps checklist. gio gives them both a proper final tribute send off. i believe the blass is the second 1975 card he's made for blass. as for alou, his brother matty also played his last game in 1974 and was also denied a card. gio corrected that omission as well.

1976 topps red sox combo card

combo cards didn't really make it into the 1970's at topps. they were big in the 60's and have rebounded in the 2000's. having a card of the three red sox stud outfielders is great, similar to the card gio made for the dodgers' 30 home run quartet. i don't think he's tackled the legendary dodger infield yet though!

1977 topps frank robinson and gene tenace

both robinson and tenace were included in the 1977 topps set, but robinson was just a small part of the indians' team card and really deserved a final tribute to salute the end of his playing days in 1976. as for tenace, he received an airbrushed card from topps (and o-pee-chee) in 1977 following his signing with the padres in the offseason. one last look at tenace as an oakland athletic is welcomed!

1978 topps paul molitor and bob horner

a solo rookie card for molitor, who appeared in the set on a 4-in-1 card, and a "missing" rookie card for bob horner. in horner's case, there were no late series or traded or update sets issued in 1978, so it's more of a fantasy card. horner was drafted by the braves on june 6, 1978 and debuted in the big leagues less than two weeks later, going on to be named the national league's rookie of the year. 

gio was kind enough to include two copies of the molitor and horner cards for my 1978 topps master set.

1979 topps tom lasorda and billy martin

freddie patek wasn't the only all-star left without a banner in the 1979 topps set, as the managers of the 1978 midsummer classic were pretty much ignored. lasorda was present on the dodger team card, but martin was no longer the skipper of the yankees when the 1978 season ended so he wasn't in the set at all. i would welcome a return of solo manager cards to topps flagship, along with stadium cards.

here's the bonus card in the set - a 1973 kellogg's willie mays card

complete with stats on the back!

what a fantastic set!

then, last july, gio issued his 1980s career cappers set featuring retired greats who should have been better treated by topps at the end of their careers.

1980 topps jim hunter and lou brock

hunter was shut out in 1980, and brock only got half of a highlight card.

1981 topps willie horton and willie mccovey

horton's big league career ended in 1980, but he played in the pirates' organization for the next two seasons. in fact, his only real 1981 card is a tcma minor league card with the portland beavers, as for mccovey, he at least got a card from fleer in 1981 but nothing from topps or donruss.

1983 topps willie stargell

it's a willie parade! stargell was included in the donruss and fleer sets in '83, but not topps. topps didn't include wilver in their 2018 1983 anniversary insert sets, either.

1984 topps jim kaat, carl yastrzemski, gaylord perry, and johnny bench

three of these four were included on the iconic (yet disappointing) 1984 topps highlight card as retiring legends, but kitty kaat was nowhere to be found in '84 - not even in fleer or donruss. bench and yaz got 1984 all-star design cards from topps in 2019, but not regular cards that would have had their career stats on the back. kaat and perry were omitted altogether.

1985 topps amos otis and jim palmer

there were no cards of either otis or palmer in 1985. seeing otis in topps' 2020 1985 anniversary set would have been a miracle, but i was hoping to see palmer. no dice.

1987 topps george foster, cesar cedeno, and tony perez

the only 1987 card of any of these three stars was perez's 1987 fleer card. none of them were featured by topps in 2017 or 2022, either. it would be nice to see some foster and cedeno cards these days.

1988 topps phil niekro, reggie jackson, and steve garvey

all three of these players were given cards by score in 1988, and reggie also had a fleer card. niekro actually appeared in 1988 topps, but on a highlight card with his brother, joe, and as an indian. he finished his career as a brave, so gio's card is appreciated. 

like me, gio is a proponent of steve garvey as a hall of famer, and per my request, gio added an extra garvey card to my order for my collection. here's the back of garvey's 1988 topps career capper:

i've created a stat back for my version of garvey's card that should have been, with a front that was created by punk rock paint.

1989 topps don sutton, graig nettles, and steve carlton

once again, score to the rescue in 1989, at least by way of cards for sutton and nettles. there were no cards of carlton to be had aside from his baseball talk card (that shows him as a cardinal). sutton at least had a box bottom card, but that's not the same as a final tribute. of the three, a missing nettles card is the biggest head scratcher since he was on the expos roster the entire season. by the way, gio and i used the same photo of old man sutton for our 1989 cards. 

the bonus card in this set was a 1981 topps saduharo oh card

most recntly, gio announced the sale of his 1976 topps "power roll" dice game set. this is a masterpiece. the set includes 25 cards in the 1976 topps style, a pair of six sided dice, two mini pencils, a "wthballs" pinback button, and two pieces of bazooka gum. he went all out, for sure, and the cherry on top is that most of the cards feature verifiable 1976 season action shots, thanks to the presence of the various bicentennial patches on the players' sleeves.

my set took an adventure across the united states before arriving, but it's here and it is glorious. of course, gio added an extra steve garvey card

for my collection which is always appreciated. here's the back of garvey's card:

snake eyes for a garvey home run!

if you like custom cards or just miss the players of the 1970s, i strongly encourage you to check out gio's work. 

what about kenny lofton?

i was on the lookout for a kenny lofton autograph card the last couple of years since he was showing up as a dodger on some releases. i sort of forgot about it until late last year and started tracking them again. i wound up purchasing a 2024 topps tribute autograph - the blue parallel, actually

which is numbered to 199. here's the back

lofton wore number six during his lone season with the dodgers (jd drew wore lofton's normal number 7), which is always a reminder to me that the number that had been held out of circulation while steve garvey was on the writer's ballot for the hall of fame will likely never be retired by the club. i'm ok with that, but i do think that lofton is the fourth hall of famer to wear that number for the dodgers. more on that in a bit.

lofton has been showing up as an autograph subject on topps cards the last few years, with most of those cards showing him on teams other than the indians, with whom he spent the bulk of his career over three different stints. i suppose that's because topps no longer uses the indians team name for players from that era of the franchise, nor do they show the chief wahoo logo (his 2025 topps 1990 design autographs have him with "cleveland" and wearing a logo-less hat) which was very prevalent during lofton's playing days.

case in point, here is his 2008 topps card

with the nickname and logo prominently shown, even as the team had introduced the non-controversial "i" logo for their hats. for the record, i believe that the chief wahoo logo was offensive and not appropriate, and i think that the name change was the right move as well. i understand why topps avoids the use of both the name and logo, but it is part of the historical record so i use them here.

here's the back:

which is a true final tribute with his full career stats.

his 2008 topps opening day card looks the same, but with a red border

and the opening day logo watermarked on the back

and i've added both of these to my final tribute collection.

i reserve that collection for personal favorites and hall of fame caliber players, and lofton checks both boxes. moreso the latter, but i did enjoy following his career which i think should qualify him for the national baseball hall of fame. yes, kenny lofton is in my hall of famer collection!

i wanted a card from his time in cleveland, and found this 2013 topps tier one crowd pleasers autograph numbered to 59

for a song. here's the back:

with carlos beltran and andruw jones being elected to the hall last month, it is worth noting that there is another centerfielder who sits between those two in jaws ranking, and it's kenny lofton.

by any metric in those columns other than peak war and dwar, lofton surpassed jones and performed close to beltran (far exceeding him as a fielder). i think lofton's issue is his lack of power comparatively (his slugging percentage was .423 while both beltran and jones settled at .486). however, lofton's obp of .372 is better than either of theirs which brings his ops close to .800 (and better than hall of famer richie ashburn's). 

i got to see lofton play in person a few times. the first time was in 1996 (august 13 against the angels) when he was still in his first go-round with cleveland. he didn't steal a base in that game, but he did go 2 for 4 with a solo home run. the primary memory i have from that game was albert belle's solo shot in the second inning which is one of the hardest hit balls i have ever seen in person. absolutely crushed. i did get to see lofton steal a base in 2006 when he was with the dodgers. he also tripled in that game (june 9 against the rockies). 

lofton scored over 1,500 runs, had 2,428 hits, 945 walks, and 622 stolen bases during his career which ended with a .299 lifetime average. as i said earlier, i consider that to be a career worthy of the hall of fame, where he would join other dodgers to wear number 6 - joe medwick, joe torre, and hopefully one day, steve garvey.

you can see lofton and the other members of my hall of famer collection here.

big hurt to get over the hump

at last mention, i had 15 of the 30 super short print 3-d sluggers cards in my 2003 upper deck vintage set build. having half of them was still more than enough for me to consider the set complete, as the whole reason i started building it in 2003 was because of the 1965 topps design that upper deck stole, and the 3d cards had nothing to do with that design.

still, i keep my eyes open, and recently added frank thomas' card

to my collection and set build.

i also just last week added chipper jones' card (not shown), so i am now down to a baker's dozen of needs. well, 13 for the set plus a second shawn green card for the dodger collection.

the collection marches on!

a painted desert

if you read the tim wallach blog, you know about the 2025 topps shoebox treasures release. corey has turned wallach's appearance on that checklist into every player collector's goal, realized (check out his posts if you haven't seen them). as for me, no steve garvey on the checklist this year meant that i wasn't looking too closely at the set. until, that is, i saw this card

a watercolor version of the card that began the "tatooine" collection nearly 50 years ago?! yes please!! once i saw this card, i tracked down an ebay seller that had it and a bunch of others from the set for sale. i was able to add a couple of cards to my 1978 topps master set - the george foster/jim rice home run leaders

and keith hernandez

which, to me, was an interesting choice to paint as it's not one of the more iconic cards from the set. i added a fourth card to take advantage of some deal from the seller, and chose this one to round out the purchase

that's fernando valenzuela on a painted representation of his 1986 topps mini card. the back gives some explanation for choosing the card

noting that fernando had a career year in '86. the back also gives us the dodgers' hat logo and their uniform script. i appreciate the cartoon with the player holding a treasure map on the back as well. let's look at the others...

the cartoon kid has found the treasure (in a shoebox, of course) on the back of robinson's 1971 topps card

the text is pretty nondescript, so i'm glad andy friedman chose the 1970 world series highlight card to represent brooks. it's a bit odd that no logos were added to the card back, though. 

it's the same cartoon on the back of the league leader card

with the red sox' uniform script and the reds' hat logo. at first i thought that the "b" added there looked  like it could be the brooklyn dodgers' "b" rather than boston's, but it doesn't have the cutout in the left/middle part of the letter. instead, i accept that it's the blue boston "b" that was worn on the red hats like the one jim rice is wearing on the front of the card.

finally, the back of hernandez' card shows the discovery of a different treasure - the rookie cup!

and we also learn that the reason for the 1978 hernandez is that it was the first year that he won the gold glove, unseating four-time repeating winner steve garvey. that last bit is my contribution to the text, as garvey couldn't overcome the pete rose quote to make the card back.

there are some other cards from this release that i wouldn't mind owning, and i'll be keeping an eye out for them in bargain bins at future card shows.

got yer ginter?

i already shared the 2025 topps allen & ginter cards that i found in a hanger pack courtesy of a nearby lcs, but i also picked up some cards from that release from other sources.

i had preordered a couple of blasters directly from topps, and they arrived shortly after the official release date. i'll show some of the more interesting (to me) cards, including the livvy dunne base card

it's reminiscent of years gone by when kate upton made an a&g appearance. it's nice to see topps expanding the checklist a bit to include players like cesar tovar

who haven't been seen in modern releases for a while. i sort of understand orel hershiser reappearing in card sets this year as he has a hobby connection, but to see the late tovar included was a very welcome surprise. he has a ssp card in 2025 topps series 2 that celebrates his feat of playing an inning at every position in a single game, so perhaps having him in more sets is tied to that appearance.

old stalwarts remain on the checklist, of course, including mr. cub, whom i found in miniature variety

along with george brett

complete with that particularly overused image.

there were more minis to be found - here's one of the other non-baseball subjects

it's actress emma roberts, and it's an a&g back

i understand that she is a collector? or at least a breaker?

caden dana is a baseball player, and this is his gold border mini parallel

some of the insert sets are minis, as usual. here is the new mexico state bird

beep beep.

and here is a jellyfish

i found some high numbers, including a vladimir guerrero 

for my player collection

as for dodgers, i found hyeseong kim

and river ryan

ryan's card seems to be more yellowed than kim's. i noticed this with a few of the cards but i don't think it's a thing.

i had good dodger mini success - finding mookie betts' black border parallel

plus a kirk gibson chrome parallel

and a shohei ohtani 1889 n22 mini

the omnipresent wicked curves inserts including don drysdale 

and yoshinobu yamamoto

while i found freddie freeman and the rest of the 2024 dodgers celebrating their sweet victory

over the yankees in 2024.

that wasn't enough for me, so i bought a couple of lots of ginter off of ebay. with the first lot, i wound up with more dodgers

i included the duplicate of ryan to show how different his card stock looks. gary sheffield was a bit of a surprise to me but i'm always glad to see cards like his show up assigned to the dodgers.

i also found hideo nomo's mini parallel

plus a black border of kim's.

i now know that kentucky's state bird is the cardinal

is it missouri's? well, i don't have that card but it is not.

the other lot i purchased was focused on the full size inserts, and i added the sandy koufax and don sutton wicked curve cards to my collection

i spy jim gilliam behind koufax and i am pretty certain that steve garvey is the player behind sutton. so certain, in fact, that i've added a second sutton card to my collection to document the nl iron man in the background.

as for the sweet victory cards, i added the kirk gibson dodger card celebrating game 1 of the 1988 world series and the mookie betts (with an uncredited cody bellinger appearance) card that celebrates the dodgers' 2020 title

here's the back of gibby's card

of which i have added a duplicate to my "games i attended in person" mini-collection.

gibson also got a card for his 1984 world series title

and, to show that i can have non-dodger related content, here's scott rolen celebrating the cardinals' world series title

in 2006.

not all of the cards were world series victory celebrations. this andruw jones card

celebrates the 1999 nlcs. most are world series focused, however, and this chris sale card

lives in my name/number on the back collection even though he's standing in dodger stadium celebrating the 2018 dodger loss

a couple of wicked curves cards that struck my fancy were bert blyleven's

he's got good stirrup game, and catfish hunter's

i miss the oakland a's.

once i got through those lots, there were still some cards i wanted, so i went to sportlots. i bought orel hershiser's wicked curves card

and blake snell's

as well as that of clayton kershaw

along with his silver portrait parallel

i also needed kershaw's base card

plus several more dodgers, like mookie betts

and gibson

and these four

and these three, too.

and, if you think i have brian cranston's card in my dodger collection...

...you're gd right.

finally, i used ebay again to pick up some of my primary targets from this set. steve garvey has both a mini framed relic and a full sized relic, so here they are

along with the gold filigree parallel of the full sized relic

one of the lots i bought inlcuded one of the garvey full size relics, so i was able to add one to the dodger collection which doesn't happen often. buying multiples of the same card to feed different collections may seem strange to some, and i would expect there are a lot of folks looking at me like this

but my enthusiasm for doing so is not curbed. keep on collectin'!