1998 Topps Baseball and a lazy December 2012 afternoon
Hank36
Posts: 175 ✭✭
For my entire adult life, I've lugged around (among other things) Topps Baseball complete sets (and Traded sets) going back to 1975. They were never intended as an investment, but for the past fifteen years or so they have pretty much stayed in their boxes. More to the point, the most recent set I owned was the 1997 set.
I'm not sure why I stopped in 1998--probably due more to disenchantment with the sport than with the hobby, although my life was considerably different in the late '90's than it is now.
Last week, after surfing around the internet, comparison shopping, I got a little crazy and picked up a sealed 1998 Topps factory set at a very favorable price. It arrived this afternoon. Some random thoughts:
1. Did Topps ever address the issue of cards sticking together after being in the box for a long period of time? Prying apart cards brought back memories--not good ones--of struggling with other 90's sets, beginning (I believe) in 1994. Ugh.
2. Also, my eyes are killing me. While these aren't unattractive cards, photowise, reading them was a chore. It's much easier to go through and organize a set when you can have the internet nearby, and not have to rely on the microscopic print on checklist cards. A quick survey indicates that the 1998 card design may have been the most optically challenging company history.
3. Got a really cool Rickey Henderson die-cut insert where he's wearing one of those Disney-style Anaheim Angels uniforms. But why didn't he have a base card in the regular set?
4. It also came with a hermetically sealed 1964 Clemente. Since I can't scratch off the back of the card...does anybody know who pitched 2 shutouts in 1 double header?
5. Also got a '56 Clemente reprint and a '59 refractor. Pretty nifty insert haul.
I'm thinking of pressing ahead with the 1999 set, especially since the price of a sealed factory set doesn't seem to have--how do I put this--gone up in value at all at all in the past thirteen years or so.
I'm not sure why I stopped in 1998--probably due more to disenchantment with the sport than with the hobby, although my life was considerably different in the late '90's than it is now.
Last week, after surfing around the internet, comparison shopping, I got a little crazy and picked up a sealed 1998 Topps factory set at a very favorable price. It arrived this afternoon. Some random thoughts:
1. Did Topps ever address the issue of cards sticking together after being in the box for a long period of time? Prying apart cards brought back memories--not good ones--of struggling with other 90's sets, beginning (I believe) in 1994. Ugh.
2. Also, my eyes are killing me. While these aren't unattractive cards, photowise, reading them was a chore. It's much easier to go through and organize a set when you can have the internet nearby, and not have to rely on the microscopic print on checklist cards. A quick survey indicates that the 1998 card design may have been the most optically challenging company history.
3. Got a really cool Rickey Henderson die-cut insert where he's wearing one of those Disney-style Anaheim Angels uniforms. But why didn't he have a base card in the regular set?
4. It also came with a hermetically sealed 1964 Clemente. Since I can't scratch off the back of the card...does anybody know who pitched 2 shutouts in 1 double header?
5. Also got a '56 Clemente reprint and a '59 refractor. Pretty nifty insert haul.
I'm thinking of pressing ahead with the 1999 set, especially since the price of a sealed factory set doesn't seem to have--how do I put this--gone up in value at all at all in the past thirteen years or so.
0
Comments