UCB roundtable: Top 5 favorite baseball cards?
[Wednesday's UCB roundtable question came from Joseph McBrayer of The McBrayer-Baseball Blog.]
Do you all collect baseball cards and if so, what cards are in your top 5 of all time favorite?
Baseball cards accounted for at least half of our childhood experience with baseball. The first cards we collected were 1978 Topps, and as a little kid, we would go to the monthly flea market with our mom and kid brother to visit the baseball card vendors (incidentally, one of the young men who sold cards would, 25 years later, be sitting next to us at a local SABR roundtable meeting). During our freshman year in high school, we even opened a little baseball card shop with our friend (our highlight was when Cardinal coach Rich Hacker dropped by).
It will come as little surprise to anyone who knows us (or at least our writing) that we claim to have the most different variations of Keith Hernandez cards. Our favorite was always his 1981 Topps, which showed his tiger-like fielding stance, his striped socks, flip-up sunglasses and a beautiful view of his mitt, which we always lusted for (we settled for a Hutch fielder’s glove with no signature). Other favorites:
- 1954 Jackie Robinson: This one belonged to our father-in-law, a lifelong Dodgers’ fan, when he was a kid. A special gift, and a special player.
- 1956 Sandy Koufax rookie: Ditto
- 1981 Fleer George Brett: In the spot on the card where mortal players’ positions were listed, Brett’s instead had “390 Average.” How cool is that?
- 1984 Donruss Don Mattingly rookie: A beautiful card that everyone wanted back in the day. Heck, that 1984 Donruss design was so elegant that it made cards of guys like Scott Garrelts look magnificent. Almost.
- 1987 Topps BJ Surhoff “Future Star”: We actually mailed it to Surhoff and he returned it autographed. Loved the Future Stars logo, though not as much as the Topps All-Star Rookie Cup that it replaced.
