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Friday, January 27, 2012

Half a set of Game cards

This week in posting has gone disastrously, so I'm going to write it off and finish up with a post I should have had up last year. At least I'll have caught up a little! I don't remember exactly what I traded to The Cardboard Don for these things. I'm pretty sure a relic was in there somewhere. I do remember the sketch card though, but I'm behind on posting that one too...

Ah well. one thing at a time. Here's half a set of 1970-71 Topps Baseball Scratch Off Game cards.


UGGGGH. Tim McCarver would have to be the first one out of the package.  These cards were inserts inside packs of 1970 and 1971 Topps. There were 24 cards, one "Team Captain" per team. I have no idea which team gets the privilege of boasting Tim as their team captain because he's such a team player he didn't bother to wear a cap on this card. I suppose I could look it up, but with Google's new policy on combining history among all Google accounts, I'm afraid to have "Tim McCarver" in my search history. My demographics are fairly well calibrated at Male, 25-34 (YESSSSSS) Interests: Sports Memorabilia, Cartoons, Art & Design, Stupid My Little Pony crap on YouTube (the stupider the better!), Armchair SOPA Activism and Showtunes. I can't risk messing that up and getting targeted ads for Tim's latest book.



MUCH BETTER. Mack Jones, team captain of the Expos. I miss the Expos. They didn't have as much money as the Nationals do.


Sal Bando, captain of the A's. People get all caught up in Reggie and forget Sal was a helluva player.


Here's two Tony Perez cards, but they are not doubles. How can this be? While Topps completely recycled this insert in 1971 right down to the players they put on the cards, they did make one change to the set:


The centers for 1970 inserts had a white background.


The centers for 1970 inserts had a red background. I got one of each for Tony. Not that I'm going to try to collect all 48 varieties of this set, hell no. I'm not even picky if the suckers have backs to them, which some of them do not.


Like this Boog Powell card here. The back half is completely ripped off. I ain't even mad. If you've seen one back to these things you've seen 'em all. Like this one here:


The Reds stole one from the A's in the 8th inning according to the back of this '71 Tony Perez card. Every single card has this exact back (minus the added scoring of course) so who cares if you only have half the card. This isn't exactly a condition sensitive set. A game card that came out of a fresh 1970 pack opened in a clean room would still only grade a PSA 4, tops. These things were never mint, ever.


Here's an awesome '70  Yastrzemski with bonus Killebrew!


Well speak of the devil... Here's full Harmon, with a little schmutz on the front. I can't tell exactly what that is. Might be a printing flaw or the card might have gotten run over by a bicycle that just rolled through hot tar. It's hard to tell.


Mel Stottlemyre was team captain of the Yankees? Wow, did their fortunes fall in the early '70s.

Nate Colbert joined Boog as a member of the 50% off club. Nate's missing back is a little more obvious on this scan.


Future Brave Jimmy Wynn is the captain of the 'stros. WHO BETTER REMAIN THE 'STROS. I can handle the Houston Astros in the American League, but not the Houston Oilers or the Houston Gamblers or the Houston Swamp Rats or whatever polls well in focus group testing. The only DECENT name they could possible change to is the Houston Colt '45s which would be promptly kiboshed because omg gun violence. Dammit Bud! Quit screwing up the game!


Dick Bosman got to be captain of the Senators as well as a coaster for an 8 oz. coke bottle.


 Last but not least is Lou Piniella, who is also not wearing a cap, but as anyone who has read Ball Four a couple dozen times knows, he was dumped from the Seattle Pilots and went on to win Rookie of the Year for the Royals. Lou is also one of the cards I got with pristine innards:


Damn, that's purdy. Maybe I should reconsider my position on Tiptons just for this set. Thanks be to the Don for this trade, I hope the return was deeemed acceptable. I'd hate to wake up to find a pony head in my bed.

3 comments:

Captain Canuck said...

if I know Don, it wouldn't be the head.....

just sayin'

Hackenbush said...

These weren't regional were they? I have lots of cards from 1970 and especially 1971 but none of the inserts. I can't imagine throwing them away since I have the 68 game cards and the 69 deckles. It's a mystery.

Fuji said...

Wish the made a modern day version of these cards... looks like a pretty fun game.