30-Day Baseball Card Challenge Day 2

Day 2 - A card with more than one player on it.

I had a hard time narrowing this down to one card so I'm going to cheat on the rules here (assuming there are rules) and feature 4 cards.

1993 Score #512

There are a lot of reasons to love this card. For one thing it features a rare play, the unassisted triple play. For another, it was pulled off by a Phillie. And finally, it wasn't just anybody involved, it was Barry Bonds.

1991 Studio

For its pun value alone.

2009 Topps Update #316

I got to see Pence's early years as an Astro and he was fun to watch. He sure enjoyed his first All-Star game in 2009.


Here's the whole challenge list.

Hall of Fame Inductee Jeff Bagwell Cards

Jeff Bagwell finally got nominated for the Baseball Hall of Fame this year. I've already made one post recently about him, and I've got enough Bagwell cards (536) to do several more. With this post I want to show some recently acquired Bagwell cards.

I was idly searching for Bagwell cards on eBay the other week and came across an offer for 30 different Bagwell cards for $10.75 (including shipping). The seller was nice enough to actually list the cards he was offering and I saw that I needed 27 of them. Most were 1990s inserts and parallels.  Here are my favorites.

1992 Score 100 Rising Stars #35

 24-year-old Bagwell looks like he just ran in off the high school playing field on this card.

1993 Topps Inaugural Rockies #227

Topps put out an entire parallel set to honor the new Rockies and another for the Marlins inaugural season. I believe these were only available as boxed sets. I had one other from the Rockies set but I've never seen one from the Marlins set. Pretty rare, I'd say.

1994 Pinnacle Power Surge #16

Not only a Bagwell card I didn't have but an insert set I didn't know about. This goes right into the reference books.

1994 Stadium Club Golden Rainbow #108

1994 saw a sharp rise in parallel sets. And this was how it was often done, putting foil on the front, or if the card already had foil, putting different foil. These weren't particularly hard to get in packs of 1994 Stadium Club.

1994 Upper Deck Electric Diamond #480

I always like this parallel. My recollection is that it was a tough pull in 1994 Upper Deck.

1995 Fleer Update Headliners #1

I have several cards from this insert but never noticed the text on the story from "The Fleer Times" behind the photograph on the front. It's describing a Phillies game where Tony Longmire hit a pinch hit home run to win a game over the Cardinals. Since Tony Longmire only hit 3 home runs in 1995 it probably wouldn't be too hard to find what game it was. I looked at the other cards I have and they all have the same background.

1995 Ultra Hitting Machines #1

1995 Ultra Hitting Machines Gold Medallion #1

I had the Frank Thomas version of the base card. Now I have the Gold Medallion version as well.

1996 Collector's Choice Crash The Game #19

Pretty extravagant finish for a contest card.

1998 Leaf Fractal Foundations #149

Leaf had a pretty complicated system of parallel cards in 1998.

1999 Sp Authentic Home Run Chronicles

1998, of course, was the year of the Home Run. I only have a few of these cards and find them unattractive. Lots of gold foil nonsense on the front. Since the card mentions a specific home run on a specific date, you'd think that maybe the photo would be of the player hitting that home run. Not in this case since the Astros were at home and Bagwell is in an away uniform.

2002 UD Superstars Keys to the City

This is an insert in a 2002 multi-sport set that I never heard of. 

Repack - Bang or Bust? Part 1

Last week I teased a repack break. The box had 15 packs containing 212 cards total.  Was the break a bang or bust?

As I've said before, any card I don't have is a card I need. So I'll be sort of happy if the box yields a lot of cards I don't have. Beyond that, I'm happier if I get a card that I can add to my reference book. I'm even happier if I can get a Phillie or post 1994 Astro card I don't have. And just if happy if I can get a player I collect.  I'm going to evaluate the box pack by pack in roughly the order they came out of the box.

1993 Triple Play

I remember buying a lot of 1992 Triple Play even though it was clearly designed for kids. I kind of liked the bold graphics. 1993 Triple Play, although still aimed at kids, was too bland for me and I didn't buy much. Consequently, of the 12 cards in this pack, I 'needed' 10 of them.

This card is a bang on two counts, it's a Phillies card I didn't have and it's a subset card I didn't have. Schilling is apparently beating a new glove into submission. I haven't figured out who that is on the back.

And another subset for the reference book.

There were really no inserts in this set but there was a game card. I already had one featuring Darrin Dalton of the Phillies. But I'd rather have a non-Phillie card in the reference book.

The card folds open to reveal a scratch off game. 

Overall, I'd rate this pack as a 'bang'.

1993 Upper Deck

There was a time that I didn't like 1993 Upper Deck much, but now I like it a lot. 15 cards in the pack and I needed 11, so clearly a bang. No great players in this pack but some good photos.

This kid must be at least 25 years old by now.

1989 Topps

I have this set completed, so I didn't expect anything here. Let's just call it a bust, but interesting to see this package again. 29 cards for  79 cents. Along with the Spring Fever Baseball contest, Topps was selling tee shirts.

I wish I'd have bought that Style E shirt although it would probably be a rag by now.

1988 O-Pee-Chee

I've picked up plenty of O-Pee-Chee cards in repacks over the years, but this is the first pack of this product I've ever seen.

Here's one of the problems of opening up 29 year old baseball cards with gum. The gum took off most of Mike's face.

I didn't have any of the 7 cards in this pack, so rate this a bang. Plus I pulled a few players I collect, including the above Hershiser card and Bret Saberhagen. Although I have nearly the complete 1988 Topps set, I don't have the Topps cards of these two.

1993 Ultra

One of the so-called "Super Premium" sets of the early 1990s. I like this set but it's a frequent find in repacks and I only pulled 3 (of 14 in the pack) that I needed. So this pack was a bust.  Just to remind you of what these cards looked like.

Glossy, full-bleed printing front and back. 2 photos in the back but a scarcity of stats. Just a little gold foil on the front.

1988 Score

Another set that loads up repacks. I have nearly the entire set although I'm pretty sure I never bought a pack when new. Of the 17 cards, I only needed 3, so call this a bust.

This was the first year for Score. As the new kid on the block, they brought a colorful card back, complete with a color photo and full career stats to the table. A bit ahead of their time I think.

1989 Topps

A regular 1989 Topps wax pack. A complete bust.

1991 Stadium Club Series 2

The set that started the "Super Premium" trend. "Produced with Kodak Technology". I needed 11 of the 12 cards from the pack, so a total bang. As with the 1993 Upper Deck, no great players but some good photos.

Stadium Club had two gimmicks. One was a system of stats called BARS. I can't claim I ever paid much attention to it. Every pack had a card to explain the system. The other was a copy of the players Topps rookie card on the back. I always liked that in this set. They did it again in 1992 but it didn't work as well since we'd seen all the rookie cards in 1991. Topps should try this again with a current Stadium Club issue.

I collect George Bell. Unlike a lot of cards the design element works pretty well with vertical and horizontal cards.

An Astros rainbow jersey and a good photo at 3rd base.

I'll get the rest of this box done later in the week.