28 December 2015

Mother's Cookies Dave Henderson (1984 - 1993)

In Memoriam
David Lee Henderson
1958-2015
1984 Mother's Cookies Seattle Mariners #3

  

1985 Mother's Cookies Seattle Mariners #4

  

1986 Mother's Cookies Seattle Mariners #4

  

1988 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletcs #14

  

1989 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletics #13

 

1990 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletics #18

  

1991 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletics #18

  

1992 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletics #18

  

1993 Mother's Cookies Oakland Athletics #9


Thank you, Hendu, for all the smiles!

17 October 2015

2015 Seattle Mariners 5" x 8" Photo Cards

Behold the latest addition to my Hendu collection!


     The Mariners have been pretty good about producing these over-sized photos for their yearly fanfest events, much like the Orioles, Rangers and Astros still do.  And as most teams do, the checklist is a mixture of current and former players and announcers, which is great for collectors of players who aren't getting any love from the big trading card companies.  This is the only way I ever see new cards of Dave Henderson, Roberto Kelly and Hensley Meulens, so I'm grateful.  I'd been watching this one for while, hoping the price would drop, but finally just snagged it to be done with the waiting.  As is often the case, it is very difficult to find clean copies of these cards without autographs.

     Below are the cards I have seen cross eBay this year, organized by uniform number where available.  This list almost matches the 2015 Mariners FanFest autograh appearance lineup exactly, so it is possible only individuals who were scheduled to appear had cards produced.

10 Dave Valle
16 Austin Jackson
32 Taijuan Walker
33 J.A. Happ
42 Dave Henderson
54 Tom Wilhelmsen
65 James Paxton
NNO John Hicks
NNO Alex Jackson
NNO Patrick Kivlehan
NNO DJ Peterson
NNO Stefan Romero
NNO Dave Sims (broadcaster)
NNO Carson Smith
NNO Chris Taylor

    Here is the list of those scheduled to appear back on 24 & 25 January 2015 for FanFest:

Current Stars
Nelson Cruz
Charlie Furbush
J.A. Happ
Austin Jackson
James Paxton
Fernando Rodney
Taijuan Walker
Tom Wilhelmson
Mike Zunino

Mariners Legends
Jay Buhner
Julio Cruz
Dave Henderson
Dave Valle
Dan Wilson
Mariner Moose

Future Stars
John Hicks
Alex Jackson
Patrick Kivlehan
D.J. Peterson

Other Special Guests
Lloyd McClendon
Jack Zduriencik

Mariners Broadcasters
Mike Blowers
Aaron Goldsmith
Rick Rizzs
Dave Sims

The following cards are similar in design, but lack the position at the bottom of the card, there is just a thin blue stripe.  I'm not sure of these are also 2015 issues.

Aaron Goldsmith (broadcaster)
James Jones
Dominic Leone

15 August 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1991 O-Pee-Chee/Topps Pre-Production Sample Sheets

     I've covered this ground before, but it is not often that I'm able to add another item to my Hensley Meulens collection.  This post originates in yet another undocumented item that I just happened across on eBay.



     From 1971-1976, the O-Pee-Chee Company (often abbreviated to "OPC"), the Canadian firm that licensed with Topps to produce baseball cards for the Canadian market, issued sets that were nearly identical to Topps in design and card count. From 1977-1989, O-Pee-Chee issued sets that were usually half the card total of the Topps equivilent.  In 1990-1992, O-Pee-Chee briefly returned to issuing yearly sets that paralleled the entire Topps base set.  1992 would be the last Topps parallel set O-Pee-Chee would issue.

     As a preview of the 1991 sets, both Topps and O-Pee-Chee issued pre-production sample sheets showing off the design of the new Topps 40th anniversary set.  The sheets measure 7.5 inches by 10.5 inches, feature the full front representation of 9 cards from the upcoming set and a large advertisement for the set on the back.  Beckett does not recognize either set of pre-production samples and the Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards only recognizes a single sheet for for O-Pee-Chee.  The single Topps sheet is different in that each card has a separate back, and is often seen cut into individual cards.   Below are the sheets I have identified.  I do not know how many different sheets were issued.

1991 O-Pee-Chee Pre-Production Sample Sheets

NNO Sammy Sosa / Tommy Greene / Jeff Innis / Juan Samuel / Julio Valera / John McNamara / Darryl Strawberry AS / Pat Tabler / Chris Nabholz

NNO Barry Larkin / John Patterson / Jeff Kaiser / Rickey Henderson AS / Todd Hundley / Jeff Robinson / Rob Ducey / Steve Searcy / Juan Gonzalez

NNO Greg Colbrunn / Russ Swan / Ken Griffey Sr. / Matt Williams AS / Rex Hudler / Eric Davis / Jim Lefebvre / Alex Fernandez / Hensley Meulens

NNO Bill Bathe / Jeff Blauser / Jose Canseco AS / Wes Chamberlain / Norm Charlton / Mike Dunne / Craig Grebeck / Carmelo Martinez / Mike Scioscia AS

1991 Topps Pre-Production Sample Sheets

NNO Jose Canseco / Wade Boggs / Kirk Manwaring / Bo Jackson / Benito Santiago / Willie Randolph / Walt Weiss / Roger Clemens / Rickey Henderson


25 May 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1979-1983 Coral-Lee Postcards





     The semi-recognized nature of the 1979-83 Coral-Lee Postcard set has bugged me for awhile. Mainly what bothered me was the seemingly random ordering of the checklist by Beckett. Oddly, Beckett no longer includes this set in their database at Beckett.com.

Here is what the checklist looked like as of the 2004 Beckett Almanac:

1 Dave Lopes
2 Billy Martin MG
3 Willie Mays / Ronald Reagan PRES / Ed Stack
4 Pete Rose /issued in 1979
5 George Steinbrenner OWN / Billy Margin MG / Reggie Jackson / Thurman Munson
6 Fernando Valenzuela / Jose Lopes Portillo PRES / Nancy Reagan
7 Dave Winfield /UER Name spelled Windfield
8 Carl Yastrzemski / Jimmy Carter PRES
9 Bobby Grich /Card numbered as number 8 on back
10 Reggie Jackson
11 Joe Morgan /Phillies
17 Lou Piniella /Batting

     According to Beckett, they just listed the cards alphabetically, which is clearly not the case. After browsing around eBay for about 5 minutes, it also becomes clear that this is not a single set, but a mish-mash of multiple sets stuffed under a single heading. Coral-Lee Postcards were issued for a very wide variety of subjects, sports just being a minor component of that. However, judging from the backs of the cards above, all but three of them were part of a specific C/L Sports set that had their own numbering, while those three in question were from two other sets entirely. And it's odd that they actually numbered Piniella as #17 (the actual number on the card) instead of 12.

     The first Standard Catalog edition I own that recognizes the set is from 2005 and didn't make quite the hash of it as did Beckett. According to SCD, cards 14 and higher are all larger format 4"x 6" while all the rest measure 3.5"x 5.5". It could be the 'C' indicates the larger cards. The SCD checklist is missing cards 13 & 17, but still includes the two 'Reagan set' cards as #69 (Mays) and #81 (Valenzuela).

In an hour or so, I've reconstructed the C/L Sports checklist as follows:

1 Pete Rose (Phillies)
2 Davey Lopes (Dodgers)
3 Dave Winfield (Yankees)
4 Billy Martin (Oakland)
5 Billy Martin / George Steinbrenner / Thurman Munson / Reggie Jackson
6 Reggie Jackson (Angels)
7 Bruce Kison (Angels)
8 Bobby Grich (Angels)
9 Rod Carew (Angels)
10 Tommy John (Angels)
11 Dick Howser
12 George Brett
13 Brooks Robinson
14-C Cal Ripken Jr.
15-C Carl Yastrzemski
16-C Joe Morgan (Phillies)
17-C Lou Piniella (Yankees)
18-C Graig Nettles (Yankees)
19-C Lyle Alzado (Raiders)
20-C Dan Marino (Dolphins)
21-C Cliff Branch (Raiders)
22-C Don Shula / Dan Marino (Dolphins)
23-C Joe Theismann (Redskins)
24-C John Riggins (49ers)
25-C Jim Plunkett (Raiders)
26-C Marcus Allen (Raiders)
27-C Joe Montana (49ers)
28-C Joe Namath (Jets)


     I'm not sure if this is complete, but I have completely re-worked the baseball checklist in the Inventory Manager over at SportsCardForum.com. The presence of the later football cards makes it clear this was intended as a multi-sport set and not just baseball.

     Of the three oddball cards, the Willie Mays and Fernando Valenzuela cards actually belong to a larger set about Ronald Reagan. The Carl Yastrzemski postcard is listed as "CL-LTD. SER#100/57" and seems to come from a Jimmy Carter postcard set.

22 May 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1980 Chicago Tribune Sox & Cubs Scrapbook

     As they did in 1977, in 1980 the Chicago Tribune again issued series of quarter-page sized photos of  players, along with a limited set of statistics for the players' entire career.  The series kicked off on 22 June and was set to run until 17 July, concluding with the teams' managers, but it actually didn't finish until 18 July.  Maybe they missed someone and inserted a new pair of players or simply miscounted the number of days.  In any case, the series ran for 27 days and covered 52 players and both managers.  The complete checklist is below.


22 June - Edward Farmer (Sox) / Bruce Sutter (Cubs)

23 June - Chet Lemon (Sox) / Jerry Martin (Cubs)

24 June - Michael Squires (Sox) / Bill Buckner (Cubs)

25 June - Bruce Kimm (Sox) / Barry Foote (Cubs)

26 June - Thad Bosley (Sox) / Scot Thompson (Cubs)

27 June - Lamar Johnson (Sox) / Dave Kingman (Cubs)

28 June - Robert Molinaro (Sox) / Mike Vail (Cubs)

29 June - Richard Dotson (Sox) / Dennis Lamp (Cubs)

30 June - Ken Kravec (Sox) / Doug Capilla (Cubs)

01 July - Kevin Bell (Sox) / Clifford Johnson (Cubs)

02 July - Wayne Nordhagen (Sox) / Ken Henderson (Cubs)

03 July - Richard Wortham (Sox) / Bill Caudill (Cubs)

04 July - Britt Burns (Sox) / Rick Reuschel (Cubs)

05 July - Steve Trout (Sox) / Mike Krukow (Cubs)

06 July - Greg Pryor (Sox) / Mike Tyson (Cubs)

07 July - Harold Baines (Sox) / Larry Biittner (Cubs)

08 July - Todd Cruz (Sox) / Mick Kelleher (Cubs)

09 July - Ross Baumgarten (Sox) / Lynn McGlothlen (Cubs)

10 July - Mike Proly (Sox) / Willie Hernandez (Cubs)

11 July - Lamarr Hoyt (Sox) / Steve Dillard (Cubs)

12 July - Ron Pruitt (Sox) / George Riley (Cubs)

13 July - Jim Morrison (Sox) / Ivan DeJesus (Cubs)

14 July - Guy Hoffman (Sox) / Dick Tidrow (Cubs)

15 July - Randy Johnson (Sox) / Tim Blackwell (Cubs)

16 July - Ricky Seilheimer (Sox) / Lenny Randle (Cubs)

17 July - Jesus Figueroa (Sox) / Preston (Mike) O'Berry (Cubs)

18 July - Tony LaRussa MGR (Sox) / Preston Gomez MGR (Cubs)


20 May 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1963 Chicago Tribune Autograph Album

From the Chicago Tribune Archives


     In 1963, the Chicago Tribune ran a series of photo profiles on the Cubs and White Sox in the daily sports section which ran from 04 July to 04 August.  The series alternated Sox/Cubs players every other day and concluding with the teams' managers.  Each day a new player was presented with a facsimile autographed photo and a short biographical sketch of their accomplishments.   There was a small blurb on the front page of the July 4th issue announcing the series, saying they used the latest photos taken by Tribune cameramen.  Here is the checklist.

04 July Nelson Fox Chicago White Sox
05 July Ron Santo Chicago Cubs
06 July Floyd Robinson Chicago White Sox
07 July Ken Hubbs Chicago Cubs
08 July Juan Pizarro Chicago White Sox
09 July Larry Jackson Chicago Cubs
10 July Ray Herbert Chicago White Sox
11 July Dick Ellsworth Chicago Cubs
12 July Pete Ward Chicago White Sox
13 July Ernie Banks Chicago Cubs
14 July Ron Hansen Chicago White Sox
15 July Andy Rodgers Chicago Cubs
16 July Mike Hershberger Chicago White Sox
17 July Bob Buhl Chicago Cubs
18 July Camilo Carreon Chicago White Sox
19 July Richard Bertell Chicago Cubs
20 July Dave Nicholson Chicago White Sox
21 July Glen Hobbie Chicago Cubs
22 July Jim Landis Chicago White Sox
23 July Billy Williams Chicago Cubs
24 July Charlie Maxwell Chicago White Sox
25 July Lindy McDaniel Chicago Cubs
26 July J.C. Martin Chicago White Sox
27 July Lou Brock Chicago Cubs
28 July Hoyt Wilhelm Chicago White Sox
29 July Don Landrum Chicago Cubs
30 July Jim Brosnan Chicago White Sox
31 July Don Elston Chicago Cubs
01 August Gary Peters Chicago White Sox
02 August Paul Toth Chicago Cubs
03 August John Buzhardt Chicago White Sox
04 August Al Lopez / Bob Kennedy

15 May 2015

1986 Meadow Gold Dave Winfield

    One of the more frustrating aspects of being a player collector is chasing a card that, by all appearances, should be fairly easy to find yet ends up being one of the most elusive.  In 1986, Meadow Gold Dairy, a subsidiary of Beatrice Foods at the time, produced three series of baseball cards printed on the packaging of their various Double Play products.  The sets were produced in cooperation with MLBPA's main licensee, Michael Schecter Associates (MSA), so the logo-less photos are all familiar from other 1984-1986 MSA issues.  If you search eBay, you can usually find the boxes and wrappers for all of the 1986 Meadow Gold products.

     The first set issued came in packages of BubbleGum Coolers and Assorted Jr. Pops (basically popsicles and fudgesicles). The cards from this 20-card set came two cards to a box on a perforated strip, two cards folded around an offer card. These were what became known in the hobby as the "1986 Meadow Gold Stat Backs" because they feature biographical and statistical information on the backs of the cards.  These are by far the most common of the 1986 Meadow Gold issues.  Dave Winfield was paired with Pete Rose, but I haven't decided whether or not to pick up the intact cards, yet.

  

    The second set issued came printed on one of the end flaps of half gallon boxes of Double Play ice cream.  As anyone who grew up in the 1970s-1990s can tell you, those old rectangular boxes of ice cream were a real pain to scoop from, and when doing so, you almost always ended up getting ice cream all over the back of your scooping hand and all down the handle of the scoop.  Needless to say, the end flaps would be thoroughly coated in sticky, half-melted ice cream.  As a result, it should come as no surprise that this series is a little more difficult to find.  This 16-card set became most commonly known as the "1986 Meadow Gold Blank Back" set.  Not really surprising, given that the back of the card was part of the inside of an ice cream box.


    According to the 2004 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards (I just don't feel like pulling a newer copy off the shelf at the moment), Willie McGee was reportedly the toughest player to find from the set, but it took me the better part of a decade to track down Winfield without having to purchase a complete set of boxes.  I was lucky enough to find two flat boxes, so I can cut the card off one, and keep the other intact.  Most of the cards in these two sets feature the same photos, but the Blank Back cards have the backgrounds replaced with an empty sky blue backdrop.  Most of the cards use the same photos for both sets, but the Winfield card uses the older image for the Stat Back (seen earliest on his 1983 Topps Glossy Send-In card) and the Blank Back uses a newer image (seen first on the 1985 General Mills MSA issue, and later on his All-Star card, #717 from the 1986 Topps base set).  This card effectively completes 1986 for my Dave Winfield collection.


    Winfield wasn't part of the third Meadow Gold set of 1986. It was printed as line art versions of the player photos from the other two sets, and was printed on the backs of milk cartons.  This set was limited to 11 cards and was less popular than the other two sets, being both messy and ugly.



17 April 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1981 San Diego Union - Meet the Padres


    Yet another uncatalogued newspaper "card" set came to my attention thanks to a post in the "Ozzie Smith collectors thread" over at Freedom Cardboard today.  It seems that in 1981, The San Diego Union printed a series of player profiles to introduce the 1981 Padres to the city.  The series ran from March 8th to April 17th in the sports section and kicked off in style with the Wizard, and this message:

A Message To Our Readers 

   From the manager down through the ranks, the 1981
Padres sport a new look -- so new, many baseball fans literally won't be able to tell the players without a score- card.
   Therefore, beginning today and continuing daily until
the start of the San Diego Padres season April 9, The San Diego Union will present each member of the 1981 Padres in the form of a baseball card.

The set actually ran eight days longer than advertised and wrapped up at 41 "cards".  Curiously, for someone who didn't really factor into the Padres in any meaningful way, Randy Bass was featured twice, on March 16th and March 20th.

Scan courtesy of Mozzie22
8 March 1981
Ozzie Smith
9 March 1981
Craig Stimac
10 March 1981
Broderick Perkins
11 March 1981
Dave Cash
12 March 1981
Jerry Turner
13 March 1981
Bill Fahey
14 March 1981
Eric Rasmussen
15 March 1981
Tim Flannery
16 March 1981
Randy Bass
17 March 1981
Luis Salazar
18 March 1981
Gary Lucas
19 March 1981
John Curtis
20 March 1981
Randy Bass
21 March 1981
Steve Swisher
22 March 1981
Mike Phillips
23 March 1981
Dave Edwards
24 March 1981
Barry Evans
25 March 1981
Eric Show
26 March 1981
Jerry Mumphrey
27 March 1981
Rick Wise
28 March 1981
Kim Seaman
29 March 1981
Gene Richards
30 March 1981
Tom Tellman
31 March 1981
Juan Eichelberger
1 April 1981
Steve Mura
2 April 1981
John Urrea
3 April 1981
Terry Kennedy
4 April 1981
Alan Wiggins
5 April 1981
John Littlefield
6 April 1981
Bobby Tolan (hitting coach)
7 April 1981
Danny Boone
8 April 1981
Juan Bonilla
9 April 1981
Ruppert Jones
10 April 1981
Joe Lefebvre
11 April 1981
Tim Lollar
12 April 1981
Chris Welsh
13 April 1981
Frank Howard (manager)
14 April 1981
Chuck Estrada (pitching coach)
15 April 1981
Eddie Brinkman (infield coach)
16 April 1981
Jack Krol (third base coach)
17 April 1981
Ed Stevens (coach)

Thanks to GenealogyBank.com for carrying the San Diego Union archives, making this post possible.  While I don't have access to any further years of the newspaper, I am told this feature ran for a few more years.

04 April 2015

Checklist Translations: 1997 ProCard CPBL Baseball Hall of Fame [UPDATED]

    The third and final set issued by ProCard to cover the 1996 season introduced the "chrome" effect to Taiwan.  This shiny 122-card set was released in September 1997, was sold boxes of 24 packs, 6 cards to a pack.  Pack retailed for 150 yuan, which was about $4.50 US.  If I understand what Jack Li says in his blog post about the set, it was a bit too expensive for the market and wasn't terribly popular at the time.  As a result, this can be a fairly tough set to complete.  Interestingly, both Korea and Taiwan have had sets fashioned after Topps Finest or Chrome, but I can't think of a single similar set from Japan.



03 April 2015

New Acereros de Monclova Stickers & Album


    The Mexican League's Acereros de Monclova have issued a new set of stickers and album covering their history from 1974 to 2015, to mark the team's 40th anniversary.  The new set looks very similar to the previous set issued in 2011, and if the images from their Facebook Page are any indication, some of the stickers may be repeats from the earlier set.  As before, there are both individual stickers of players, as well as 8-sticker puzzles, to fill out the 196-sticker set.

    This time around, instead of only offering the sets at the ballpark and through mail order, both the new and old sets are being sold on Mercado Libre, the main eBay-equivalent marketplace for most of Latin America.  The price for both sets, album included, is 200 pesos, which is about $13.50 US.  However, it would appear they are currently only shipping within Mexico.  Links to each album on Mercado Libre are below:

Álbum Y Estampas Acereros De Monclova 2015




Thanks to Mexican Super Collector Arturo for the news!

21 March 2015

Checklist Translations: 1990-1992 Chiclets Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL)

     The inaugural season of the CPBL was accompanied by several different sets of baseball cards in various forms.  For the first three years of it's existence, the American Chicle Company (or their Adams subsidiary) produced sets of baseball cards for the CPBL under the Chiclets brand (芝蘭口香糖).  Technically this is a single set, spread across the first three seasons of the CPBL, and is numbered contiguously from 1-400.

     Slight digression - As with most CPBL sets, the cards were actually issued the year following the year they represent, so the 1990 was actually released in 1991  After all, there was no 1989 season, so it would have been very difficult for anyone to acquire all the photos necessary to produce a decent sized 1990 set during the 1990 season and still have it in stores before the year was out.  Today it could probably be done, but remember this was in the days before digital photography.  Aside from some small, team-based sets, this tradition has continued to the present.  Now the official CPBL sets tend to include a reference to the season number in the set names with 1990 being the first.  So the set that will be issued in 2015 will cover then 2014 season and probably have a "CPBL 25th" referenced somewhere.

     Chiclets cards were issued with the well-known candy-coated gum.  The first series of cards had a colorful design that was coordinated with each teams' colors and, as with almost all cards from the region, prominently featured the player's uniform number along with name, team and position.  Foreign players also had their names printed in English on both front and back.  The backs have the card number in the upper left corner, the usual player biographical details and a summary of their 1990 statistics.  The first series includes cards 1-118.  The first 17 cards feature a coloring variation on the back and can be found with both a much lighter border than the rest of the set, being more of a blue-gray as well as the richer blue of the remaining 101 cards.


26 February 2015

Hobby Archaeology: 1977 Chicago Tribune Cubs & Sox Scrapbook


     From June 12th to July 9th of the 1977 season, the Chicago Tribune produced a series of "cards" in the sports section of the newspaper for a Cub and White Sox player, intended to be cut from the paper and saved.  The feature was titled Cubs & Sox Scrapbook and presented over-sized portraits of a player from each team, along with several years of statistics below the photo. I was somewhat surprised to see one of these had been submitted to COMC, but not surprised to see that it had not been identified.
1977 Chicago Tribune Chicago Cubs/White Sox Scrapbook #TINO - Tim Nordbrook - Courtesy of COMC.com
     Previously, Beckett had listed these photos as two separate sets; 1977 Cubs Tribune and 1977 White Sox Tribune.  Neither checklist was complete, listing only 14 Cubs and 27 White Sox, and they really should not have been listed separately.  The Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards doesn't list the set at all, but then they don't usually seem to recognize newspaper sets.  Fortunately the Chicago Tribune has placed their archives online, so this set can now be properly documented.   The set ran for 28 days and includes 54 players and both teams' managers.  Below is what should be the complete set with links to the Chicago Tribune archive pages.

June 12, Cubs-Sox Scrapbook Announcement

June 12, Bobby Murcer (Cubs) & Richie Zisk (White Sox)

June 13, Manny Trillo (Cubs) & Chet Lemon (White Sox)

June 14, Ray Burris (Cubs) & Steve Stone (White Sox)

June 15, Greg Gross (Cubs) & Jim Spencer (White Sox)

June 16, Jerry Morales (Cubs) & Tim Nordbrook (White Sox)

June 17, Donnie Moore (Cubs) & Lerrin LaGrow (White Sox)

June 18, Mick Kelleher (Cubs) & Eric Soderholm (White Sox)

June 19, Ivan DeJesus (Cubs) & Alan Bannister (White Sox)

June 20, Bill Bonham (Cubs) & Chris Knapp (White Sox)

June 21, Jim Todd (Cubs) & Dave Hamilton (White Sox)

June 22, Joe Wallis (Cubs) & Oscar Gamble (White Sox)

June 23, Steve Ontiveros (Cubs) & Jack Brohamer (White Sox)

June 24, Mike Krukow (Cubs) & Bart Johnson (White Sox)

June 25, Willie Hernandez (Cubs) & Bruce Dal Canton (White Sox)

June 26, Bruce Sutter (Cubs) & Wilbur Wood (White Sox)

June 27, Steve Swisher (Cubs) & Brian Downing (White Sox)

June 28, Dave Rosello (Cubs) & Jorge Orta (White Sox)

June 29, Rick Reuschel (Cubs) & Don Kirkwood (White Sox)

June 30, Bill Buckner (Cubs) & Lamar Johnson (White Sox)

July 1, Jose Cardenal (Cubs) & Wayne Nordhagen (White Sox)

July 2, Paul Reuschel (Cubs) & Ken Kravec (White Sox)

July 3, Larry Biitner (Cubs) & Ralph Garr (White Sox)

July 4, Bobby Darwin (Cubs), Francisco Barrios (White Sox)

July 5, Gene Clines (Cubs) & Royle Stillman (White Sox)

July 6, George Mitterwald (Cubs) & Jim Essian (White Sox)

July 7, Steve Renko (Cubs) & Kevin Bell (White Sox)

July 8, Pete Broberg (Cubs) & Jack Kucek (White Sox)

July 9, Herman Franks (Cubs) & Bob Lemon (White Sox)


25 February 2015

Inconsequential Variations (Part the Fourth): TCMA Collector's Kit Reprints

 

    In the late 1980s, it was fairly common to see a variety of "Baseball Card Collecting Kits" being sold in all manner of retail outlets.  I recall seeing them in bookstores, grocery stores, hobby shops as well as Wal Mart and KMart.  I believe the main three early companies to produce them were Hygrade, Treat and Collector's Marketing Corp. (CMC).  The typical kit would include a 3-ring binder (usually a 1-inch for cheaper kits, and 2-inch for "deluxe" kits), 20 or so 9-pocket plastic sheets, some penny sleeves, an guide on card collecting (usually containing a brief history of the hobby, glossary and a rough grading-guide) as well as a fairly random assortment of baseball cards to get you started.   These were usually some old Topps, Donruss and O-Pee-Chee cards, some reprints of well known candy and tobacco cards, some of the orange or green bordered Hygrade All-Time Greats cards and occasionally a small stack of cards from TCMA.

    The TCMA cards were themselves a wide assortment of various All-Time team cards and minor league issues from about 1978-1986.  While most of the cards in these kits were either obvious reprints or genuine commons from recent sets, the TCMA cards were almost entirely reprints produced specifically for this type of product.

     In most cases, the reprint TCMA cards might be virtually indistinguishable from the originally issued cards, but most of the minor league cards stand out. The main differences between TCMA's original minor league cards and the collecting kit reprints are in the card stock, presence of the MLB logo on the back and/or white borders on the front.

     In most cases, though, the hobby doesn't seem to take any notice of these reprints as something different from the original cards.  However, when picking up card lots containing TCMA cards, you can almost always tell where they originally came from due to the specific assortment of cards, as well as how much more common these cards are than the rest of their respective sets.  You can look up all of these cards on COMC.com and see the differences, but I have included links to COMC images in several cases.

    The following minor league cards are known TCMA reprints, and can easily be distinguished from the originals.  Most of the reprints feature an MLB logo on the back, but some reprints can be found without the logo indicating more than one print run of the overall reprint sheet.

1979 TCMA Tacoma Tugs Ron Hassey
1979 TCMA Tidewater Tides Kelvin Chapman

Reprints feature an MLB logo by the copyright line on the back.
1979 TCMA Minor League #361 - Ron Hassey - Courtesy of COMC.com 1979 TCMA Minor League #361 - Ron Hassey - Courtesy of COMC.com    

1980 Waterbury Reds Tom Foley
1980 Columbus Astros Matt Galante

    Originals feature red border on front and blue ink on the back.  Reprints have a thin white border around the red on the front, and black ink on the back.

1980 TCMA Minor League #745 - Tom Foley - Courtesy of COMC.com

1981 TCMA Wisconsin Rapids Twins #15/0576 Michael Cole
1981 TCMA Wausau Timbers #26/0558 Ivan Calderon

     Reprints feature an MLB logo by the copyright line on the back.

1983 TCMA Redwood Pioneers Kirk McCaskill
1983 TCMA Salt Lake City Gulls Spike Owen

     Many of the original 1983 minor league sets were printed on brown/gray card stock.  The reprints are printed on white card stock and feature an MLB logo on the back.

1984 TCMA Richmond Braves #2 Rufino Linares
1984 TCMA Cedar Rapids Reds #17 Kurt Stillwell

     Originals feature a green border and use both blue and black ink on the back.  Reprints have a thin white border around the green on the front and use only black on the back.
1984 TCMA Minor League #2 - Rufino Linares - Courtesy of COMC.com 1984 TCMA Minor League #2 - Rufino Linares - Courtesy of COMC.com
1984 TCMA Minor League #2 - Rufino Linares - Courtesy of COMC.com 1984 TCMA Minor League #2 - Rufino Linares - Courtesy of COMC.com

1985 TCMA Durham Bulls Paul Assenmacher
1985 TCMA Syracuse Chiefs  Tom Filer

     Originals feature an almost turquoise blue border on front and the TCMA block on the reverse is white on blue background.  Reprints have a thin white border around the front and use a much lighter blue, and use only black ink on the back.

1985 TCMA Minor League #282 - Paul Assenmacher - Courtesy of COMC.com 1985 TCMA Minor League #282 - Paul Assenmacher - Courtesy of COMC.com
1985 TCMA Minor League #282 - Paul Assenmacher - Courtesy of COMC.com 1985 TCMA Minor League #282 - Paul Assenmacher - Courtesy of COMC.com

1986 TCMA Albany-Colonie Yankees Darren Reed
1986 TCMA Jackson Mets Mike Santiago
1986 TCMA Omaha Royals Dave Schuler

   Originals feature the TCMA block on the reverse with white letters on green background.  Reprints use only black ink on the reverse.

1986 TCMA Minor League #50 - Darren Reed - Courtesy of COMC.com 1986 TCMA Minor League #50 - Darren Reed - Courtesy of COMC.com


The other more commonly reprinted cards that turn up in these collections are the following from earlier TCMA team sets:

1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees Miller Huggins
1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees Bob Meusel

     The original has a black border design and a sepia tone photo.  The reprint card features a gold border design and a black & white photo and exist both with and without an MLB logo by the copyright line.
1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees #28 - Miller Huggins - Courtesy of COMC.com 1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees #28 - Miller Huggins - Courtesy of COMC.com
1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees #28 - Miller Huggins - Courtesy of COMC.com 1979 TCMA 1927 New York Yankees #28 - Miller Huggins - Courtesy of COMC.com

1978 TCMA The 1960's #0011 Roger Maris
1978 TCMA The 1960's #0022 Ron Santo

     This set apparently had at least two original print runs, one using green ink on the reverse, and one using black.  The reprints feature black ink and an MLB logo by the copyright line on the back.

1979 TCMA The 1950's #43 Dodger Power
1979 TCMA The 1950's #63 Chuck Tanner
1979 TCMA The 1950's #134 Herb Score
1979 TCMA The 1950's #173 Marv Throneberry
1979 TCMA The 1950's #216 Rocky Colavito
1979 TCMA The 1950's #228 Don Zimmer

     Reprints feature an MLB logo by the copyright line on the back.

1979 TCMA Japanese Pro Baseball Dave Hilton
1979 TCMA Japanese Pro Baseball Vernon Law

    Reprints feature an MLB logo on the back under the league flag emblem.

1979 TCMA Japanese Pro Baseball #17 - Vern Law - Courtesy of COMC.com 1979 TCMA Japanese Pro Baseball #17 - Vern Law - Courtesy of COMC.com


1980 TCMA 1959 Los Angeles Dodgers World Champions #029 Johnny Podres

    On this particular, the original version has a color photo on front.  The reprint has a black & white photo.  There may be two reprint versions, as COMC also has a color copy, but with the MLB logo on the back.

1981 TCMA The 1960's #363 Duke Snider
1981 TCMA The 1960's #402 Billy Williams

     Reprints feature an MLB logo on the back.

1981 TCMA 1959 Go-Go White Sox #2 Nellie Fox (reprints feature the color photo)
1981 TCMA 1959 Go-Go White Sox #3 Luis Aparicio

     There are at least three different versions of the Aparicio (different photos, different borders), but the reprints feature an MLB logo on the back.

1982 TCMA Baseball's Greatest Hitters #12 Mickey Vernon
1982 TCMA Baseball's Greatest Sluggers #10 Frank Howard
1982 TCMA Baseball's Greatest Sluggers #12 Frank Robinson

     Reprints feature an MLB logo on the back.  It is possible this whole set was reprinted, but these seem to turn up the most.

1983 TCMA 1942 Play Ball #2 Joe DiMaggio
1983 TCMA 1942 Play Ball #32 Mel Ott
1983 TCMA 1942 Play Ball #42 Casey Stengel
1983 TCMA 1943 Play Ball #30 Whitlow Wyatt
1983 TCMA 1945 Play Ball #17 Ed Lopat
1983 TCMA All-Time Pirates #11 Elroy Face
1983 TCMA All-Time Cardinals #8 Bob Gibson
1983 TCMA 1942-46 St. Louis Cardinals #17 Enos Slaughter

     Reprints feature an MLB logo on the back.

1984 TCMA 1946 Play Ball #7 Phil Rizzuto

     Reprints feature an MLB logo on the back.

1985 TCMA Most Valuable Player National League Roberto Clemente
1985 TCMA Rookie of the Year Thurman Munson

     Original sets came on a perforated sheet with a blue back.  Reprints have a red back with MLB logo and sharp edges.

1985 TCMA Most Valuable Player National League #N/A - Roberto Clemente - Courtesy of COMC.com 1985 TCMA Most Valuable Player National League #N/A - Roberto Clemente - Courtesy of COMC.com

1986 TCMA All-Time Indians Joe Jackson
1986 TCMA All-Time Jimmie Foxx 
1986 TCMA All-Time Twins Jim Kaat
1986 TCMA All-Time Brewers Harvey Kuenn
1986 TCMA All-Time Pirates Ralph Kiner
1986 TCMA All-Time A's Jim "Catfish" Hunter
1986 TCMA All-Time Rangers Jon Matlack
1986 TCMA All-Time Expos Rusty Staub
1986 TCMA All-Time Expos Jim Fanning
1986 TCMA All-Time Angels Rick Reichardt
1986 TCMA All-Time Orioles Jim Palmer
1986 TCMA All-Time Braves Tommy Holmes
1986 TCMA All-Time Mariners Dan Meyer
1986 TCMA All-Time Astros Bill Virdon
1986 TCMA All-Time Mets Bud Harrelson
1986 TCMA All-Time Reds Johnny Bench (black & white photo)
1986 TCMA All-Time Phillies Chuck Klein

     These are tough to call "reprints" as the set was practically new when it was reprinted.  In any case all of the above cards can be found with and without the MLB logo on the back.

1987 TCMA 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers Pee Wee Reese / Jim Gilliam
1987 TCMA 1950 Philadelphia Phillies Del Ennis
1987 TCMA 1969 New York Mets Cleon Jones / Tommie Agee / Ron Swoboda

     Similar to the All-Time team cards, the only difference on these three cards is the presence or absence of the MLB logo on the back.

1981 Detroit News Norm Cash #73