making time for a different timeless team

about two years ago, i completed a dodger team set of relics from 2001 upper deck vintage. some of the relic cards from that set were among the first that i owned, but one had eluded me for quite some time.

yay. a bat relic card that celebrates the 1955 brooklyn dodgers with hall of famers jackie robinson and roy campanella and now gil hodges! plus hall of very good member don newcombe!

it's numbered to 100, and i could not afford what it was selling for 20 years ago. since then, it's been somewhat hard to find, but one came up in a true auction (while another sat on ebay with a large buy-it-now price) and i was able to come away the winner.

it's been just over 66 years since these four players celebrated together on the field at yankee stadium as they helped the dodgers to their first world series championship. in the decisive game 7, hodges drove in both runs, with campy scoring the first of them, and that was enough for johnny podres.  neither jackie nor newk made an appearance in game 7 as podres pitched a complete game and don hoak took over at third for jackie, who had hit just .182 in the first six games.

i am very happy to have added this card to my collection - the 1955 dodgers have really proven to be one of the most memorable - timeless, if you will - teams of the 20th century.

my favorite cards of the year - 2001 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.

my collecting was at a peak of sorts in 2001 after considering leaving the hobby in 1999 and before i would consider the same in 2003. the advent of game used cards piqued my interest, and i was also intrigued by a number of sets like greats of the game, ud decade 1970's, and vintage issues from topps (heritage), fleer (tradition), and upper deck (vintage).

favorite non-dodger card: topps antonio alfonseca 

i believe that it was during the 1997 world series that i learned of alfonseca' nickname (el pulpo - the octopus) and that the reason for that nickname was that he was polydactyly with six fingers on each hand. after that, i began looking at my cards to see if i could find one that showed his extra digit. unfortunately, i only had his 2000 fleer tradition card in my collection before this card was issued. i was happy to see that it gave a good look at his right hand and that extra digit. it would seem that it has no affect on his pitches, and i guess i liked this card more than i probably should have at the time, but as a kid i was always interested in ripley's believe it or not kind of stuff, and a six-fingered big league pitcher fit the bill.

favorite dodger card: upper deck vintage steve garvey timeless teams bat relic

so i know up top i mentioned that one of the rules of this collection is that i exclude steve garvey cards. well, rules are meant to be broken and this card was such a joy to discover that i decided to include it in this collection (in addition to my team collection and my garvey collection). i was talking with a coworker who had casually begun buying cards in 2001 about game used cards, and it occurred to me that i should search ebay to see if there were any cards being produced of garvey. up until that point, i had only seen game used cards from pacific that featured current players, but upper deck was putting out cards of retired players, too. i was shocked and then excited when the search results included this card. it is the first garvey relic i ever owned, but was followed by an onslaught of relic cards of my favorite player that year from other releases, including leaf certified materials which remains to this day my favorite game used set.

up next, 1997. stay tuned!

cardpocalypse 7 day trading card challenge, day 1: i who hesitated lost

i am going to partake in the cardpocalypse 7 day trading card challenge!

there are some great topics suggested, so why not. it will take me longer than 7 days to complete, i assure you. still, i've enjoyed reading many of the posts that have populated the blogroll already.

before i get to my favorite card acquired in the last couple of months, let me share with you a story about one i didn't obtain.  it was the first day of stay-at-home orders, and things were not very well defined. i was anxious and uncertain about many things, including health and employment. i wasn't sure if my work would be deemed essential or not, and so i was in extreme penny-pinching mode.  so, of course it happened that on that day i saw a listing for a steve garvey card i had not seen before.

this is a 1999 stadium giveaway to promote designated drivers (be a dry-er friar!) at padre games. i had heard of the card previously, but had not seen one with the free non-alcoholic beverage tab still attached. however, i could not bring myself to spend $15 on the card when i was questioning bigger issues. by the time i had become comfortable with making hobby related purchases, it was too late as someone else purchased the card.

so back to my favorite card that i have obtained since mid-march? there are a few, but today i think i will go with this 2001 upper deck vintage jackie robinson bat card

it came with a friend, too.

adding jackie and gil hodges to my collection means i have completed the individual bat cards from this release 19 years after it was released. back in 2001, as the game used cards became more widespread, i entered a simple ebay search for "steve garvey bat" and saw that he had a card in this set. it became the first garvey relic i ever purchased, and i quickly set out to obtain the ron cey, bill russell, and (sadly, no davey lopes) dusty baker cards as well, along with a second garvey card for my pc.

it was awesome to see the 1981 dodgers included in the set, and upper deck also included four players from the 1955 brooklyn squad. in addition to jackie and gil, they had cards of roy campanella and don newcombe.  i've had the campy and newk cards for a while, and so decided to finish the set.  both sets of players were also featured on the 'timeless teams' four-player bat cards. i've been able to acquire two copies of the 1981 card (one for the dodger collection and one for the garvey pc), but i am still missing the 1955 team quad bat card, so i can't quite say things are complete.

given the circumstances, i do not regret missing out on that garvey card, although i recently found a forgotten ebay gift card that i had picked up in january that i could have used at the time. ah well, i'm sure i will put that card to good use.

more consolidated 30-day baseball card challenge posts

i have previously posted cards representing 20 of the 30 days of the baseball card challenge started by tony at off hiatus.  i do plan to finish, even though i have been nowhere near meeting the intent of the challenge.  here are a few more entries.

day 21 - a card of a rookie you thought you were "investing" in.

my first thought was chipper jones' 1991 upper deck card, because i distinctly remember saying that i was going to be able to send a kid to college with a brick of those cards.  the truth is, i did engage in some prospecting earlier than 1991 in my collecting career even though i was a set, team, and very focused player collector - in that order.  i did not start to retain any rookie cards that were doubles (just needed one for the set (plus one for the dodger team set, if applicable) and the rest were trade bait) from 1978 through 1980.  this means that i sold/traded off a few eddie murray and bob horner rookies at the time for some beads and trinkets.  in 1981, however, fernandomania came along, and rookie cards hit home for me.  it was at that same time when i was an impressionable rookie card collector that a card vendor sang the praises of this 1981 topps reds future stars card

he said that paul householder was going to be the next mickey mantle.  i picked up householders cards from 1981 and 1982 as anyone would who knew this was going to be like holding '52 mantles.  it didn't pan out.

day 22 - a card of a common player that always seemed to elude you.

i opened a lot of packs of 1978 topps. a lot.  there were a few singles that i wound up purchasing at the card and comic shop, and a few more than that that i traded for, but my set was built mostly from packs.  mickey rivers was the last yankee i needed in the set.  his card

was one of the last cards i needed for the set, period.  the local card and comic shop did not have a mickey rivers card in their 1978 topps box, and i could not, for the life of me, find one in all of the packs i opened.  as a result, i was at the mercy of my neighbor who forced me to trade a 1978 topps steve garvey card (my pc would have to wait) for the rivers.  it was the first time that i understood that the value of any particular card is the price someone is willing to pay, not some arbitrary price guide that said i should have been able to get 2 or 3 rivers' for one garvey.

day 23 - a favorite oddball card from the 1950's

i don't have too many cards from the 1950's that aren't topps or bowman.  none, actually.  there was a time when i would have said that bowman was an oddball brand, but i was ignorant about baseball card history then.  instead,  i will identify the 1955 golden stamp tom lasorda card stamp as my favorite '50's oddball.

i don't own any of these stamps, but the vintage bargain bin guy from the local card show used to tempt me with them.  the only one that really interested me was the lasorda, as he was by no means a big name on the team.  plus, the photo shows him with a bag of balls that he was probably about to use to throw batting practice to anyone and everyone.  i used to want to make a 1957 topps lasorda 'final tribute' card, and i thought that this image would be the one that i would use, but i haven't gotten around to that yet.  nor have i bothered to pick up an actual lasorda stamp from this set.

day 24 - a favorite oddball card from the 1960's

forget what i said about bowman up above. even though fleer was a major card manufacturer at one time, i still consider their issues in the 1960's to be oddballs.  with that said, this 1960 fleer zack wheat card

was the first one that i ever saw - coming my way from an antique show in a barn somewhere on the prairies.  however, i prefer the 1961 fleer card that has wheat with ty cobb and home run baker

here's some old ballplayers in suits. let's put 'em on a card!

day 25 - a favorite oddball card from the 1970's

there were many things that i could count on when we would head down to dodger stadium to see a baseball game back in the late 1970's.  first, there wasn't going to be a rainout. second, my dad was going to get us there early enough to watch the visiting team take batting practice. third, most people would have transistor radios (including us) to listen to the radio broadcast. fourth, vin scully would be calling the game. fifth, the infield of steve garvey, davey lopes, bill russell, and ron cey would be playing.  i could go on and on.  perhaps the oddest regular occurrence for us was that it always seemed like we went to games that doug rau started.  i recall seeing don sutton pitch a couple of times, and burt hooton, too, but i am sure i saw rau more than all the other dodger pitchers.  that's why i like his 1977 kellogg's card so much.

for rau to have been featured in that limited set is, in hindsight, surprising.  however, it was a joy for me to come across as a young collector of dodger cards from the late 1970's.  rau won 73 games from 1974-1978 (his first five full seasons as a starter), and had an era of 3.20. he won 16 games in 1976 with a 2.57 era (0.05 higher than league leader john denny), which is why he was on the kellogg's checklist, i would imagine.  to me, he deserved to be there because he was the guy i saw pitching all the time.

day 26 - a favorite oddball from the 1980's

fleer stickers were fun, but in 1981 they competed with my hard-earned allowance against honest to goodness baseball cards.  as a result, i didn't buy many packs of the stickers, and none of the fleer star stickers that were also out on the shelves.  still, fleer did a smart thing and put laughlin images on the backs of the team logo stickers so they weren't a total loss after the stickers were applied to our school binders and folders.  this one from 1981 is one of my favorite oddballs from the decade when oddballs really took off

i had somehow previously come across a couple of laughlin world series cards from 1970 and 1971, so i was already familiar with the concept of these cards.  however, i didn't know anything about the 1952 all-star game, so it was my dad who pointed out that 42 on the card was jackie robinson. this was the first jackie robinson 'card' that i owned.

day 27 - a favorite oddball from the 1990's

i'll get right to the point here.  this 1990 baseball wit manny mota card

is one of my favorite oddballs from the '90's because it features a photo of mota from 1988 when the dodgers wore a vero beach 40th anniversary patch during spring training. that means it is a photo of mota as a coach, and i do enjoy coach cards.  plus, the photo on the card was taken by jon soo hoo, the official dodger team photographer, who is still going strong on instagram and everywhere else that dodger photos are displayed.

day 28 - a favorite relic/manufactured relic card

there are quite a few steve garvey relic cards that i really like, but one of my favorites are these two from 2001 upper deck decade 1970's

and 2001 upper deck vintage

they would absolutely be my favorite relic cards if davey lopes had been featured instead of rick monday and dusty baker, respectively.  now, i love mo and dusty, but a relic card featuring the entire infield? that would be the best.

only two topics left in the challenge, and i'll save those cards for another post.