Players I Collect 2016 - Part 3

Continuing on with the Players I Collect who had cards in 2016. Or at least the cards of them that I have.

Dwight Gooden
After a 6 year gap, there have been no lack of Dwight Gooden cards since 2012. Overall I have 106 Gooden cards, most of them from his 16 year career.

This is a reproduction of Gooden's 1985 card, which is the year I started collecting. I don't have the original of this but there was a Gooden "Record Breaker" card in 1985, which I do have.

Another insert in Topps. My first Gooden card is from the 1984 Topps Update set.

Goose Gossage
Although his best years were behind him, he still had some good years left in him when I started collecting in 1985. Oddly enough, however, I only have 23 Gossage cards, and 9 of them are post career.

Gossage retired in 1994 but there were no 1991 Topps cards for him.

Ken Griffey Jr.
As you might expect, there are plenty of Griffey post-career cards. He retired in 2010 and I already have 26 (out of the 459 total) post-season cards of his. Being inducted into the Hall of Fame this year, his first year of eligibility, certainly won't hurt his popularity with the hobby.

One of the few recent Panini sets I actually like.

1997 Topps is one of my favorite sets from the 1990s. My biggest beef with this Berger's Best set is that I would have liked it to be more about the card design than the player.

Power Alley indeed with 630 career home runs. I was in Toronto for a conference and saw the Mariners play the Blue Jays in June 1997, when Griffey and Mark McGwire were both on a pace to beat Roger Maris' single season home run record. I'd seen a Blue Jays-A's game a few days before and McGwire had hit a monster home run. At the Mariners game, I thought that if Griffey hit a homer, and one of them beat the Maris record, I'd be able to say that I saw one of the record breaking home runs in person. Griffey had a disappointing day but managed to just clear the outfield fence in his last at bat. Griffey ended up with 56 that year and McGwire hit 58. So close for both of them.