2013 Topps Heritage Originals - 1964 Topps B-Sides

In my opionion 1964 Topps has a terribly ugly flip side. 

1964 Topps #412 Ray Culp (b-Side)

The ugly part for me is that creamsicle orange.  There have been a few other Topps issues with orange backs, but they are typically a bit darker.  This light orange is just yucky looking to me.  

The rest of the b-side is fine. Minor and Major league stats, Bio info and a brief passage regarding the player.  Can you imagine the buzz a rookie pitcher would get if he tossed 5 shutouts in his rookie campaign? 

One really interesting aspect of 1964 Topps b-side is the trivia question with the scratch off answer. Anxious to find out how Topps Heritage handles this.  It adds a bit of expense to create the card, and I am not sure that collectors will want to deface their cards.

Curisously 15 first inning runs is not the record. In 1894 the Boston Beaneaters had a 16 run first.  The Dodgers put the 15 spot on the Reds in a game on May 21, 1952.  At one point in that first inning the Dodgers had 14 consecutive batters reach base. 

Sloppy Topps
And here we have a sloppy topps candidate.  The Dodgers didn't move to Los Angeles until 1958 so there is a bit of an inaccuracy in the trivia answer.  Good thing there weren't card blogs forums and twitter to back Topps for shoddy Quality Control in 1964.

Prior 1964 Topps the Originals Postings 

1964 Topps Design (Ray Culp, Lou Brock, Gus Triandos) 

1964 Topps Rookie Cards (Dick Allen)

1964 Topps League Leader Cards (Hank Aaron, Ken Boyer, Bill White) 

1964 Topps Team Cards (Phillies, Reds)  

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

Other Sources
Bob Lemke's Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards 
eBay
Surf Baseball Card Collectiblies, Philadelphia Phillies 

2013 Topps Heritage Topps Originals - 1964 Topps Team Cards

some of the team cards for 1964 Topps seem to be taken at an extreme distance - The Reds card below isn't so bad but the Phillies card looks like they are in a room down the hall.

1964 Topps #403 Cincinnati Reds 

1964 Topps #293 Phillies Team

Notice anything else odd about these two cards.  The Phils are titled "PHILLIES TEAM" while the "CINCNNATI REDS" get the full name and nickname treatment.  It appears that the Phils as well as several other teams in one of the middle series of 1964 Topps are given the nickname-team treatment while the lower and hi series cards get the more traditional full team name.

It will be interesting to see if Topps carries this through in Heritage. I doubt this will happen due to copyright issues or some other legality, regardless we will find out in a week.

Here is a breakdown of how the cards are titled in 1964 Topps.  

Nickname Only

 

293 Phillies
318 Twins

343 Senators

 

Full Team name

 

27 Mets

87 Cardinals

132 Braves

151 Athletics

172 Indians

213 Angels

237 Cubs

257 Giants

 ...

373 Pirates

403 Reds

433 Yankees

473 Orioles

496 White Sox

531 Dodgers

579 Red 

 

Oddly the two teams that are Identified as nickname-team are the Twins and Senators - Which are teams that are connected because the Twins were once the Senators. Apparently among the variations in 2013 Topps Heritage are cards of Nationals players labeled as Senators.   

Prior 1964 Topps the Originals Postings 

1964 Topps Design (Ray Culp, Lou Brock, Gus Triandos) 

1964 Topps Rookie Cards (Dick Allen)

1964 Topps League Leader Cards (Hank Aaron, Ken Boyer, Bill White) 

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

Other Sources
Bob Lemke's Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards 
eBay
Surf Baseball Card Collectiblies, Philadelphia Phillies 

2013 Topps Heritage the Originals - 1964 Topps League Leaders Cards

There are a couple of subsets in 1964 Topps, the first of which numerically are the League Leaders cards.

1964 Topps #11 NL League Leaders RBI

Last year Night Owl Cards put together bit of analysis of the league leaders card. To me this olympic podium design is the best. Decent size picture of the overall leader followed by two smaller pix of the runner up and third place finishers.

The LL cards in 1964 fit the overall design well. The two fonts on the card title are similar to the rookie cards and the player name plates carry over the feel of the base cards.

There are 12 League Leader cards in 1964 Topps. 1 card per league for each of 6 categories ERA, Pitching (Wins), Strikeouts,  Batting (avg), HR,  and RBI

For the Collector

The above LL card was picked up at a card show last year for $2. It is in ok condition, not bad for the price of a 2013 retail pack you get a vintage card with Hank Aaron in the lead spot! - that is like stealing. Low recent ebay auction closed at $1.54 shipped. A graded PSA 9 card was the Hi end at $308.00.

Prior 1964 Topps the Originals Postings 

1964 Topps Design (Ray Culp, Lou Brock, Gus Triandos) 

1964 Topps Rookie Cards (Dick Allen)

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

Other Sources
Bob Lemke's Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards 
eBay
Surf Baseball Card Collectiblies, Philadelphia Phillies 

2013 Topps Heritage the Originals - 1964 Topps RCs #263 Richie Allen

This is the second post in our retrospective of 1964 Topps in anticipation of the upcoming 2013 Topps Heritage release.

In 1964 Topps issued Rookie Cards with pairs of players from the same team. One of the better RC in the set is of Dick (He should be a Hall of Famer) Allen.

1964 Topps #263 Richie Allen/John Herrnstein 

Early in his career Allen was known by or referred to as Richie Allen and that the way he is displayed on his 1964 Rookie Card. To Topps he didn't become Dick Allen until 1973 and he went through and interim period 1970-1972 as Rich Allen.

The 64 Rookie Design is solid.  The smaller titling of "1964 Rookie Stars" atop the team name looks stylish and fits in well with the base set design.  The solid black background for the nameplate mimics the base card nameplate as well.

I have featured Dick Allen hear nearly enough, but I think you may see him hear one or two more times while we look at 1964 Topps.

Most of you likely know about the fine site Dick Allen Hall of Fame which is in addition to being dedicated to Dick Allen also has several fine custom cards of many ball players.

1964 Topps Rookies 

Other Notable RCs in the set HoF #541 HoF Phil Niekro, #287 Tony Conigliaro, #146 Tommy John #244 Tony LaRussa, and #167 Lou Piniella.  The LaRussa card is a base card the other four are all two player cards similar to the Richie Allen card above.   

Additional 1964 features the 2nd year card of Pete Rose (#125). This is his first solo card - The 1963 Topps Rose card was a Quad (#537) 

Prior 1964 Topps the Originals Postings 

1964 Topps Design (Ray Culp, Lou Brock, Gus Triandos) 

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

Other Sources
Dick Allen Player Collection Index
Bob Lemke's Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards 
eBay
Surf Baseball Card Collectiblies, Philadelphia Phillies 

2013 Topps Heritage the Originals - 1964 Topps

Ok we have a couple of weeks to go gaga over 2013 Topps. In today's 72 hour news cycle world it is well beyond time to move on - well except for that Pete Rose blip last week.

We have about two weeks to prepare for the onslaught of 2013 Topps Heritage. I will once again embark on a project that I do not know if I will finish, but wanted to look back at the original 1964 Topps upon which 2013 Heritage is based. 

1964 Topps #412 Ray Culp 

1964 Topps is the first set I encountered as an adult collector that I was unaware of as a kid. When I first saw it at my first returning collector card show, I winced.  It was just to boring.  Since that day in probably 2006 or 2007 the design has grown on me a bit, but I still typically bypass the cards from this set when I come across them in a mixed bin.

I would think 1964T is for the collectors that lean towards minimalist design. The design is more than functional with team name prominently displayed across the top and a player nameplate with position on the bottom. Topps gave the Phils the blue nameplate which works as a complimentry color to the red team colors. I am not nuts about the black lettering for the team name which is a bit bland.

The Player photo is pretty large for the era and I do llike the way the caps (or glove in Ray Culp's case) bleeds from the photo above frame into the team name. There is a likely a graphic design term for this - for whatever reasons it is a concept that Topps has gotten away from - it does show up sparingly in 2010 Topps but you have to look. So yes we have had about 20 consecutive years of chrome but no overbleed photography.  Lets mix it up Topps.

Caps Above the Line 

  

1964 Topps #29 Lou Brock

Here ia a favorite 64T card in the Phungo HoF collection. I liked Lou Brock as a kid for a variety of reasons. I am also a fan of cards of players on teams other then the one for which they are best known. Brock was traded in the middle of the 1964 Season - this is his last card as a Cub. The Cubs are represented by at least 4 Hall of Fame players in 1964 Topps - Brock, Ron Santo, Billie Williams, and Ernie Banks.  

The 64 Topps Lou Brock Card is a fine example of the cap reaching into the Team Name portion of the card. There is a lot to like about the shot.  I particularly like the Cubs logo on the uni sleeve.

1964 Topps Gus Triandos

I wonder if Topps will photoshop free agent/traded players in 2013 Heritage.  In the original 1964T set they simply left players in their old caps while changing the team name on the card.  I would like to see Topps stick to the 1964 format in 2013. The Phils even conveniently picked up a Detroit Tigers player in Delmon Young for 2013 which would make it real easy for Topps to rhyme a Heritage card with this Gus Triandos 1964 Topps original. 

Looking ahead

I am working on a look at the 1964 Topps Rookie Cards - hopefully we will have a posting ready for Wednesday.   

More info on 1964 Topps

The full series is in the process of being covered at the 1964 Topps Blog 

The Phillies Room has a posting on the 1964 Topps Phillies as part of the ongoing Topps Phillies Series.

Dean's Cards

Beckett

Links

Lou Brock HoF Index

Happy Presidents Day

There are typically a couple of non-baseball subjects in each Phungo release. Presidents are a common target since statues of statesmen can be found in so many areas.    

2013 Phungo #65 John F Kennedy 

This is a JFK statue outside the JFK Museum in Hyannis, MA. which is on Cape Cod.  We didn't go into the museum, but enjoyed a day out in Hyannis hitting the various Junk shops bars and restaurants. 

Kennedy joins the various other presidents honored on Phungo cards including Washington, Lincoln and Jefferson a couple of times.

Swag from Night Owl Cards

I don't know how he does it - Not only does Night Owl Cards blog at epic proportions, but he is also one of the best traders out there. Here are a couple of Phillies Highlights from a package that NOC sent our way recently.

2012 Topps Chrome Red Refractor #36 Cole Hamels

I have been testing using a smart phone to capture my card images - so you will need to bear with me till I get a little better at finding well lit locations.

The red border really helps out the Phillies 2012 Topps Cards, which rightfully is consider a pretty hurting design.

 

2012 Bowman Gold #184 Chase Utley
2013 Topps Calling Card #CC5 Jonathan Papelbon
2010 UD Biography #SB26 Ryan Howard

Wow a 2013 Topps Insert card - I have only picked up a hanger box and a single pack of retail of 2013 Topps so this is my first insert to feature a Phillies player - pretty sweet to get that in the mail within a month of the products initial release,

2011 Topps Diamond Stars #DS-22 Ryan Howard
1991 Topps Stickers #262 Tug McGraw
2012 Topps Chrome #15 Jimmy Rollins

Here we have another Ryan Hoard insert - I don't have a lot of 2011 DS cards and this is a welcome addition. Thats a Tug McGraw sticker in the middle.  This might be the first 1981 Topps sticker in my collection. Jimmy Rollins from last years chrome set.

What is in a Card Number - 2013 Topps

This has been some discussion about card numbers in 2013 Topps. They have sort of gotten away from their use of Hero Numbers which we discussed here last year at this time.  Topps has gone to using Uniform Numbers for card numbers. 

 

2013 Topps #26 Chase Utley

This covers a lot of cards in Series 1.  Pretty much every number up through the middle 60s his a uniform number.  This means that the lower level tier hero numbers aren't given to the same caliber players they may have been at one time 50 = Adam Wainwrigth, 40 = Chien Ming-Wang, 60 = Jon Rauch.  The big ones 100 = Mike Moustakas, 200 = Scott Downs, 300 = Daniel Murphy are perhaps even more egregious violations of the old school Hero Number system.

I honesty down understand the hubbub.  They are baseball cards and if Topps wants to change it up this year or for a few years thats fine with me. 

Or maybe I just like the fact that Phungo Cards are numbers in the same fashion.

2013 Phungo #26 Chase Utley

So it turns out Utley, Ryan Howard, Justin Veralander Prince Fielder and a bunch of other guys have the same card number in 2013 Phungo and Topps. Whats not to like?  

The numbers carry through to the 100 200 and 300 series 122 = Andrew McCutchen 128 = Buster Posey 214 = Granderson 217 = Brian Matusz. 308 = Desmond Jennings.  

But there are oddities, the #7 Mantle card has been dropped - Topps probably ran out of photos to use.

I do think Topps did miss out on an opportunity.

2012 Phungo Retired Number #42-WASa Jackie Robinson
 
Jackie Robinson's number has been retired across baseball - so other than Mariano Rivera there aren't really any players to award the number.  I think this is an opportunity for Topps why not bestow the card number on Jackie Robinson to honor his legacy.Or perhaps award the number to a prominent African American player who represents Robinson's ideals - In 2013 I gave card #42 to Juan Pierre - A respected player both on and off the field. Just a thought. It works for Phungo, why not Topps?
  
Sources and Links
Chase Utley player collection index

Topps Series 1 Checker Cardboard Connection
  

The Celtics Bill Russell Cards from Too Many Verlanders

Way back in December Too Many Verlanders was involved in some house cleaning - getting rid of unneeded or unwanted cards.  Somebody had already scarfed up the Phillies by the time I got involved in the fun.  There are tons of things I am interested in so I asked for any Celtics and Vikings cards that TMV could send my way. I know, I know - I have strange allegiances - someday I will ge to that.

One of the fun insert sets I forgot was the Topps Missing Years Series of Bill Russell cards that were issued in the 2007-08 basketball set. A couple of these cards were among the bounty sent over from TMV

2007-2008 Topps Bill Russell Missing Years (1965) 

2007-2008 Topps Bill Russell Missing Years (1967)
2007-2008 Topps Bill Russell Missing Years (1961) 

All are pretty decent examples of the original Topps cards.  The 1965 Topps set will always be a favorite.  The 65 and 67 photos are both pretty decent action shots, although Willis Reed was a rookie in the 1964-65 season so that picture may be post 1965.  There was also a 1960 Missing Years card in the batch - which gives me 4 cards from the 11 card set which runs from 1958-1968.

Happy New Year - Year of the Snake

This weekend marked the beginning of the Chinese New Year - 2013 falls under the Snake on the Asian Zodiac. Other snake years include 2001, 1989, 1977, 1965, 1953, 1941, 1929, 1917, 1905, 1893, 1881 and 1869.  
 
Here is our quick look at some of Baseball's year of the snake players.  

2013 Phungo #34 Roy Halladay

Halladay is likely my favorite player that came up on the Snake search.  Hopefully Roy is healthy in 2013 and the Phillies can get back to their winning ways. This is a good Phungo card from this years set.  Decent photo of Hallady in action.  The picture is from a game in August in which Halladay was not particularly effective giving up 5 ER over 7 innings, but the Phils showed up that night with a 12 run outburst.  Once again I have given Halladay the designation as the teams ACE, but that may change after the '13 season - It may be time for Cole Hamels to step up.



Year of the Snake Players

1989 - Jason Heyward, Giancarlo Stanton, Madison Bumgarner.

2013 Phungo #16 Giancarlo Stanton  

1977 - Halladay, Andruw Jones, Carlos Beltran, Juan Pierre
1965 - Craig Biggio
1953 - George Brett, Jim Rice

1994 Topps #180 George Brett
 

1941- Pete Rose

1980 Topps Burger King #4 Pete Rose

1929 - Jim Piersall, Curt Simmons
1917 - Lou Bodreau, Phil Rizutto 
1905 - Leo Durocher
1893 - George Sisler
1881 - Johnny Evers

 2010 Obak #108 Tinkers-Evers-Chance, Baseball's Sad Lexicon





Looking Back

Previous Chinese New Year Posts

Year of the Dragon (2012)
Year of the Rabbit (2011)
Year of the Tiger 2010
Year of the Ox (2009)
 

Are baseball card packs more ex$pensive then they were when you were a kid?

Yes of course.

2013 Topps #197 Tyler Cloyd (is he really higher priced then a 1979 Mike Schmidt?)

Well this is certainly the assumption put forth my many a collector when they review Topps 2013. A reviewer may love or hate the design, the inserts, the checklist or whatever - regardles a frequent complaint is that collecting cards and builing complete sets used to be a cheaper hobby.

I wondered if this could be proven out.

The first thing I did was track down the price point of several different sets of Topps cards.  It doesn't take a math whis to figure out that a 20 cent pack in 1979 is cheaper then a the 2013 pack that goes for $1.99.

The tricky part is converting that 20 cents from 1979 into something meaningful today. I went to an Inflation Calculator created by the Bureau of Labor and Statistics - If you think there calculator is a bunch of mularkey (which it may be)  then move on or find another conversion algorithm.

What I did with the calculator is try and figure out how much a dollar in a certain year would be worth today.

That is the most complicated part of the table below:

Year	Pack Cost	Cards	per 12 cards	Per 660 Cards	$1 =?  In 2012		Price Adj 12 Cards	Price Adj 660 cards		Year
2013	$1.99	12	1.99	109.45	1		$1.99	109.45		2013
2012	$1.99	12	1.99	109.45	1		$1.99	109.45		2012
2008	$1.99	11	2.17	119.40	1.07		$2.32	127.76		2008
2005	$2.00	10	2.40	132.00	1.18		$2.83	155.76		2005
2003	$1.59	10	1.91	104.94	1.25		$2.39	131.18		2003
2000	$1.29	11	1.41	77.40	1.33		$1.87	102.94		2000
1997	$0.99	8	1.49	81.68	1.43		$2.12	116.80		1997
1995	$1.29	11	1.41	77.40	1.51		$2.12	116.87		1995
1994	$0.79	10	0.95	52.14	1.55		$1.47	80.82		1994
1993	$0.69	15	0.55	30.36	1.59		$0.88	48.27		1993
1989	$0.45	15	0.36	19.80	1.85		$0.67	36.63		1989
1984	$0.30	15	0.24	13.20	2.21		$0.53	29.17		1984
1980	$0.25	15	0.20	11.00	2.79		$0.56	30.69		1980
1979	$0.20	12	0.20	11.00	3.16		$0.63	34.76		1979
1972	$0.10	10	0.12	6.60	5.49		$0.66	36.23		1972

How does this work?

The first 5 columns are all pretty simple. Packs varied a bit in the number of cards per pack so in column 4 we have calculated the price for a 12 card pack. The following column is the price to build a 660 card set.  I realize that sets vary widely in number of cards from year to year.  I used the contemporary numbers as an attempt to maintain some equilibrium in size. 

The Red column is the conversion number.  This tells me how much a dollar from a certain year would buy in 2012 dollars.  A dollar in 1979 is the equivalent of $3.16 today conversely a 2013 dollar is worth roughly 1/3 of a 1979 dollar.  This means you have to take the price of a product purchased in 1979 and multiply it by 3.16 to figure out what you would be paying for that item today - for a 12 card pack of 1979 Topps that would be 63 cents today.   


There you have it. 

The 12 card pack you bought in 1979 cost you 63 cents in 2013 Dollars vs the pack you picked up at Target over the weekend which went for $2.  So yes you are paying 3 times as much for a pack of cards as you were 34 years ago.  Topps cards are far exceeding the rate of inflation since then. 

However.....

The big jump came, oddly, in 1994.  The pack price jumped a dime, but the cards per pack went down 5 cards from 15 to 10 - that is a 33% drop. This is from my missing years in collecting, but I imagine 2 factors were in play 1) competition from UD to make innovative cards drove up the price as relics and autograph cards made there way into Topps. 2) The 1994 MLB strike may have led to some sort increased compensation for the MLBPA which historically got a lot of their funding from licensing of items like trading cards and apparel.    

It turns out since the cost for a pack of cards hasn't gone up since 2005 the cost relative to inflation has actually gone down over the last decade - and significantly down from the 2005 peak.

Notes
- Somebody please check my math - I haven't done word problems since 4th grade so this could all be hooey. 
- 2013 and 2012 have the same inflation ratio because the BoL&S only does the calculations ever other month and there hasn't been an update for the current year.  
- As far as building sets - for the economics to work out you would have to have darn good collation out of retail packs or have a few friends to trade with.      
- some folks may note that today's 12 card pack may perhaps contain 3 or 4 inserts.  I factored that into the calculations as part of a theoretical world where you could trade your insert cards for base cards. This of course in the far fetched world that is more similar to 1979 when you had a neighbor you could trade with.
- If you really give a damn about the cheapest way to get the 2013 Topps Set is to wait 10 months and pick up the factory set for about 1/2 the price of what a retail box goes for today - but what is the fun in that?

Sources
Pack Prices 1997- present Baseballcardpedia
Pack Prices 1979-1995 - ebay (shown on retail boxes)
Pack Price 1972 my memory - Could be wrong on this one.

Bureau of Labor Inflation Calculator