The first group of cards to be examined is a pile of 56 starting off with this fellow:
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I think the best way to go about examining the rest of the cards in this group (although I've probably hit the highlight of the entire box with the first card) is to sort this pile by player and go from there. Here are the totals:
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1996 Collector's Choice
1996 Score Select
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1994 Collector's Choice
1996 Score Select
1996 Upper Deck Defensive Gems
1996 Upper Deck Strike Force
1997 Donruss
1997 Pacific
1997 Pinnacle Clout
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1992 Leaf
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1990 Topps
1992 Leaf
1992 Ultra
1993 O-Pee-Chee Premier
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1996 Score Select
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1991 Stadium Club Members Only No-Hitter
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1991 Stadium Club Members Only Batting Average Leader
1991 Stadium Club Members Only MVP
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1995 Stadium Club
1997 Fleer
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1997 Pacific
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1992 Classic Best
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1991 Upper Deck
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1994 Donruss
1994 Ultra
1994 Upper Deck
1997 Fleer
So far we can obviously tell I put together a pile of Braves together for some reason. Maybe they were doubles, maybe I was going to add them to my binder and never got around to it, maybe I had just picked them up at a shop or card show. Grissom and Lofton aren't in Braves unis, but they were Braves nonetheless. Now let's check out the non-Braves:
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1991 Upper Deck
1996 Donruss
1996 Leaf
1996 Pacific
1996 Pinnacle
1996 Score
1996 Topps
1996 Upper Deck
1997 Fleer
1997 Pacific
1997 Topps
1997 Ultra
Twelve cards of Greg Colbrunn? What is this, the "to burn" pile?
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1991 Upper Deck
1992 Score
1992 Studio
1993 Flair
1994 Bowman
1994 Collector's Choice
1994 Leaf
1995 Donruss
1995 Pinnacle
1996 Score
There's as many cards of Bryan Harvey as Maddux, Glavine and Smoltz, but things are becoming clear...
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1993 Leaf Gold Leaf Rookies
1993 Score
1993 Upper Deck
1994 Collector's Choice
1994 Donruss
Scott Brow (1)
1994 Ultra
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1996 Fleer Glossy parallel
So what do these five players have in common? They were all members of the Braves in 1997. Colbrunn was picked up in a trade with the Twins, and the rest all played in the Braves' minor leagues. Hartgraves made it to the majors in 1998, but the rest never made it past Richmond (or Greenville in Harvey's case). They were all acquired by the Braves though and I followed their every move closely enough to want to have those cards for my Braves set. Unlike Steve, I want a card of every player to ever put on a Braves uniform, and in this case whether they actually put on the uni or not. This pretty definitively dates this box to 1997. All these guys would have been interesting enough for me to pull from my common boxes in '97 but boring enough to ignore in'98. Also the most recent card set in the box is from 1997 and the hockey schedule found on top is is from '97-98. So this box could have been lost for as long as a decade, which is pretty amazing considering what else I found in the thing. But that's for another post...
3 comments:
Don't get me wrong... I want that too, and I used to be the exact same way. I have a bunch of Danny Heep cards to prove that. Danny never made it past Spring Training. I also have cards of people like Gene Lamont and Barry Foote because of that philosophy. I'm just more streamlined now. I still want them in minor league unis though, but that alas is another story. :)
What is truly ASTONISHING about this box?
They are all players:
Who no one but Braves fans care about. Come on man! I had to wait ten years for Smoltzie in a polo shirt? Where are the SP to 100,000 cards?
bay rat north west,
One man's trash...
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