Blaster Break: 2024 Topps Update - inserts (Plus Justin Topa IG Link)

On Monday we covered base cards, today we are going to take a look at the inserts and noteworthy cards. 

Orioles

The blaster was a bit of an Oriole Hot Pack. out of 84 cards Eight were Orioles. We discussed the crummy Stars of MLB cards earlier this week and I am confusing the new Mystical cards with Stars - although they are slightly better. I prefer players wearing their teams uniforms for the ASG, but this year I did not mind the design that much. Regardless the Orioles have lots of young talent and are my favorite AL team, it was nice to get a bunch of them in one pack. 

Shohei Ohtani

I have no idea how many Ohtani cards are in Series 3 but picking up a trio in a blaster feels pretty strong. \

The bottom right card is from a new insert called "All Class". I don't get it, but if I am going to get one that is not a Phillies Player Ohtani is solid. The All Class insert falls at a rate of 1:32 for blasters.

The HR Record Card will go into my game dated binder. The Trout Shared card will go into the Versus collection (2 teams repped on one card)

Retro and Game Dated Cards

Couple of 1989 Retro-Selfies. Big Day in the Volpe Household when he gets to share a room with Willie Mays. Anthony Rizzo is destined for the Game Dated Binder. Ronel Blanco joins one of my favorite collections No-Hitter Cards! 

2024 Update Blaster Review

The Highs of the Blaster was getting a Paul Skenes Card (see Monday's Post), a couple of Ohtani's, a bunch of Orioles and I will also admit I kinda liked the Jack-O-Lanterns Insert. A number of singles will go towards special collections. 

Lows: No Justin Topa card which was #1 on my wish list, and only one Phillies Card. 

There are 2 cards I haven't covered yet one is the Phillies Card (which is a Low) and one is of a Hall of Famer - a high. 

So Mixed bag some fun inserts, but no Topa and a dud Phillie. 

Sources and Links

Topps

Babe Ruth Birthday: 1973 Topps #1 League Leaders Home Runs

Today we continue our #1 card obsession by noting the 121st anniversary of Babe Ruth's February 6ht birthday.

1973 Topps #1 All Time Home Run Leaders Ruth, Aaron, Mays

 Love how Topps had the foresight to realize that this card was in it's waning moment. The following year Aaron would be sitting at 713 at press time, and a month into the 1975 season Hammerin Hank would be atop the pyramid.

Willie Mays on the edge of retirement and retuning to New York is just icing on the baseball card cake.

1973 Topps #1 All Time Home Run Leaders Ruth, Aaron, Mays (b-side)

I kind of like what Topps did here, listing each of the three leaders with their annual Home Run totals. I still haven't gotten any 2016 Topps but I fear one of the things I will mention when I finally get my hands on some of this years cards is the lack of imagination in the new set. Of course back in 1973 Topps was significantly younger, I suppose the chance of producing pleasant surprises were higher.

#1 Club
This beauty has to be on the top end of the #1 club and it easily beats out the 2015 Derek Jeter card. 1973 is the first of four consecutive years in which Hank Aaron is featured on the #1 card, he also appeared on 1963T #1 as the fifth man in a quintet of Batting average leaders. Willie Mays previously appeared as the sole occupant on the 1966T #1 card. 1973 is Babe Ruth's only appearance in the top spot.

Sources and Links
#1 Club
Babe Ruth HoF Index
Hank Aaron HoF Index
Willie Mays HoF Index

1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

Regardless of your thoughts on Alex Rodriguez climbing up another rung on the Lifetime Home Run Ladder the occasion does give us an opportunity to re-examine the careers of baseball legends of the past.

A-Rod is currently (2015 04 27) standing at 659 Home Runs, one behind Hall of Fame Centerfielder Willie Mays.

 1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

When he retired Mays' 660 Career Home Runs ranked #3 on the list behind Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron.

The above card honors Mays' 1954 MVP season when he finished 3rd in NL Home Runs (41) behind Ted Kluzewsk (49) and Gil Hodges (42). Mays may not have won the HR title that year but he got his MVP for leading the league in Batting Average, Slugging, OPS and OPS+ while being a member of the NL Pennant Winning New York Giants who went on to sweep the Cleveland Indians in the World Series.

If one uses WAR as the MVP barometer the BBWAA got this one right. Mays led the League in WAR for All players,  His Offensive WAR tied Duke Snider but he exceeded the Duke in dWAR

Willie May received 2/3 of the 24 first place MVP votes. Seven of the eight remaining top votes went to Ted Kluzewski, with Mays teammate Alvin Dark mysteriously getting the last #1 vote (3.6 WAR)

1961 Topps MVP Subset
Apparently Topps Airbrushed Mays' cap. I guess they wanted a photo from the year that the MVP was awarded, but did not want to show the defunct New York Giants logo. Or perhaps they could not for legal reasons.

Regardless it is the rare airbrushing of a card for a player who did not switch teams until a decade later

FTC (For the Collector)
I laid down $9 for this card at a show in 2009. That is probably a bit of an overpay for a card in such marginal condition.

flip

 1961 Topps #482 Willie Mays 1954 MVP

Nice text, there is acknowledgement of Mays' military service in the year immediately prior to his MVP.  Also note that here on the back of the card Topps elects to use the New York Giants team name.

1954 was the first of two MVP awards for Mays, the second coming in 1965. To honor the award Topps placed Mays on card #1 in 1966. This year's Heritage set that homages 1966T paired Mays with current Giants star Buster Posey on Card #1

History Changes

Career Home Run Leaders (games through 2015 04 26 - from Baseball-ref)

The leader board as of press time on April 27 2015. 

Sources and Links
Phungo HoF Index - Willie Mays
Baseball-ref

Philly Show 2014 12 06 - Vintage Phillies

This weekend Team Phungo was at the Valley Forge show for 4 hours os so and picked up a bunch of vintage cards. I concentrated on my Phillies 50s and 60s Topps checkers and Card of Hall of Famers from the same era. There was an additional focus on 1966 Topps in preparation for the release of 2015 Heritage in just a couple of months.

Highlights

1966 Topps Bobby Wine
1966 Topps John Boozer

Who would have thought I would pick up Wine and Boozer cards from the same 50 year old set on the same day. I could also toss out a quip regarding having a Wine Boozer combo on the 1964 Phils may have led to their collapse.

Joking aside, I was very happy to pick up the above cards. The pair which went for 50 cents each closed out the lower & Mid Series cards for my 1966T Phillies team set. Still have 3 cards remaining from the scarce high series.

At least part of the reason 1966T gets dismissed is it arrived on the heals of the popular 1965 Topps set. The upcoming Heritage set may give us a chance to reconsider the orignal set. The two cards above illustrate one of the nice aspects of 1966 Topps. The photographs on the cards come from a variety of angles and often feature faux-action. In my opinion the tedium of repeated head shots throughout recent Heritage sets has heard the set.

We will be taking a look the originals set over the coming weeks and I am sure I will return to that point often.

More Set Closing

1958 Topps Granny Hamner

This was the last card I needed for 1958 Topps, I also picked up the 1960 Topps Bobby Del Greco card to close that set.  Each card was $1.50 although the above Hamner was tossed in for free when I bought twenty 1954T Commons.

The two cards also give team Phungo a run of completed Phillies Team Sets that run for 1958-60 - oddly my longest run among vintage sets.

Other Highlights 

1966 Topps Chisox Clubbers

I am just going to post pix of some other cards now. Time permitting I will return to discuss these cards at some point in the future. Right now I just wanted to post a cross section of the pickups and also give some pricing details which may interest other collectors. The Clubbers card went for 50 cents. Picked up this card as part of our 2015 Heritage research.   

1959 Topps #23 Murry Dickson

$2. Down to 2 more cards to complete the entire 1959 Topps Set! 

1939 Diamond Stars Van Mungo

$14. I think this was the priciest pick up  of the day. Trying to pick up a Diamond Stars card at each big show I attend. This is a pretty sharp looking one. 

 1961 Topps #478 Roger Maris 1960 AL MVP

$8. This is a subset I have been working on. Pretty happy to pull this one in for $8

 1952 Topps George Kell

$10. 1952T of a Hall of Famer.

1934 Goudey Woody English

1934 is my favorite Goudey set. 

 1961 Topps World Series Highlight

$2. Picked this one up just for the hat.

 1960 Topps Hank Aaron All-Star

$10. A subset that I am contemplating building.

1962 Topps Willie Mays All-Star

 $10. Yet another All-Star Subber I am considering building 

HoF Index: Willie Mays

This is the Phungo Hall of Fame Index for Willie Mays Cards.

1959 Topps #464 Baseball Highlights Willie Mays

1959 Topps #464 Baseball Highlights Willie Mays - 60th Anniversary of the Catch

1959 Topps Willie Mays Foursome - (Mays Feature) 
1961 Topps #482 1954 MVP Willie Mays - (A-Rod at 659 HRs)

1961 Topps #579 Willie Mays All-Star - (2010 Heritage Review)

1965 Topps #4 League Leaders Home Rurs (2014 Heritage Preview)
1973 Topps #1 LL All Time HR Ruth Aaron Mays

60th Anniversary of the Catch: 1959 Topps #464 Willie Mays

Today marks the 60th Anniversary of one of the most iconic moments in Baseball History. Willie Mays' play which is now simply known as "The Catch"

1959 Topps #464 Baseball Highlights Willie Mays

The Catch helped the Giants maintain an 8th inning tie in Game one of the 1954 World Series. The Giants won the game in the 10th on a Walk off Home Run by Dusty Rhodes. 

Five years later Topps honored the moment as part of their 1959 Baseball Thrills Subset. The story of the catch is recounted on the cards b-side. 
 

1959 Topps #464 Baseball Highlights Willie Mays (b-side)

Original Artwork

The Original Artwork for this card was posted on Twitter by Baseball by BSmile.


For more information on this card as well as the other four Willie Mays cards in 1959 Topps check out our 2011 Willie Mays Quartet posting here.   

 

Sources and Links

1959 Topps Baseball Thrills Index

1959 Topps Willie Mays Quartet 
Baseball by BSmile (Twitter)
Baseball-ref




Willie Mays Index

Thanks to many outlets on Twitter that reminded me of today's Anniversary.   

Update
2018 01 08 - Added Original Artwork section 

1959 Topps Baseball Thrills Index

This is an Index of our series on the 1959 Topps Baseball Thrills Subset - The original postings ran in 2014. 

 

1959 Topps Baseball Thrills #464 Willie Mays 

#461 Mickey Mantle

#462 Rocky Colavito

#463 Al Kaline
#464 Willie Mays
#465 Roy Sievers
#466 Billy Pierce
#467 Hank Aaron  
#468 Duke Snider

#469 Ernie Banks

 #470 Stan Musial

2014 Heritage the Originals - 1965 Topps #4 League Leaders Home Runs

The typical format of the 1965 Topps League Leaders has been referred to by Night Owl Cards as Olympic Podium style. The League Leader on the Top, with two smaller photos of the 2nd and 3rd  place finishers. Of course in many categories there are ties. Take the 1964 Home Run Leaders

1965 Topps #4 League Leaders Home Run

This LL card is packed full of players - It is kind of a cool one for Phillies Fans. You get Johnny Callison plus 3 Hall of Famers.  I am sure it is a must have for Giants fans as well, I mean how many LL cards have 3 players from the same team.

Willie Mays and Billy Williams sort of get equal billing, although Mays had 14 more Home Runs then Williams (47-33). Callison and the other folks on the bottom tier each tallied 31 dingers.  This can all be seen on the flip of the card:

 

1965 Topps #4 LL Home Runs (b-side)

Kind of interesting feature here, the HR hitters are listed down to 18 and then we are presented with a separate list of all the players that hit a Grand Slam. The latter list includes the only career grand slam hit by Pete Rose, which was off the Phillies and Dallas Green.  

Traditional 1965T Olympic Podium

1965 Topps #3 LL Home Runs (image swiped from baseball card database)

The AL counterpart to our titular card is a fine example of the 3 man LL card, with some stellar reps in Harmon Killewbrew, Boog Powell, and Mickey Mantle. 

MLB 2013 did feature some ties in the LL categories, it will be interesting to see how this is handled for Topps in 2014 Heritage.

More Banished Chris Short
A few weeks ago we discussed the omission of Phillies pitcher Chris Short from Topps cards prior to 1967. The fine creative folks over at Cards that Never Were figured out that this meant that Topps had to create an NL ERA LL card without Short, who placed 3rd in 1964. CTNW put together their own custom card that is pretty sweet.  Cards that Never Were is on a bit of Chris Short binge - their example of the 1965T Chris Short card is here. (hat tip to Chris Short fan Jim From Downingtown for pointing me to the CTNW LL posting)

1965 Topps/2014 Heritage Index   

Base - #534 John Herrnstein 

Rookie Cup - #460 Dick Allen 

Rookie Stars - #282 Dick Estelle & Masanori Murakami 

2010 Topps Vintage Collection - #VLC2 Johnny Mize

World Series - #139 The Cards Celebrate

More info on 1965 Topps
The entire 1965 Topps Series was covered by Kevin B of Orioles Card "O" the day on The Great 1965 Topps Project
Cardboard Connection
Sports Collectors Digest (TS O' Connell)
Golden Age of Baseball Cards
Dean's Cards
Beckett

PSA

Sources

Night Owl Cards 

Cards that Never Were

baseball card database

baseball-ref.com

2014 Topps 

2011 - The Year in Card Blogging - Favorite Posts from the Past Year!

I was hoping to get a little more response for this and then I sort of back burnered it, but I am finally publishing the Favorite/Best Card Blog Posts of 2011.  

While I may not have gotten as many folks submitting columns as I would have liked, I was satisfied with the variety.  My goal was to come up with the blog equivalent of those "The Best American Sports Writing Year XXXX" compilations that are put out annually.  If you checked out these compilations the stories are all over the map - Big time Sports, High school sports, Unknown sports, celebrites etc, but at some level they are connected to Sports.  

Our goal is similar, but with the unifying theme being sports/trading card collecting. 

Can't Have Too Many Cards - has a great post on a very nice looking set of Hassan Tobacco cards from 1910  

http://canthavetoomanycards.blogspot.com/2011/11/1910-t30-arctic-series.html

Cardboard Icons wrote this really sweet column chronicling his daughters first game.  How could any father not choose this as their own post of the year.   

http://cardboardicons.com/2011/10/07/one-of-the-greatest-baseball-days-ever/

Cardboard Junkie - This is great, you get all the emotions of a pack break as only DayF can do them.  

http://cardjunk.blogspot.com/2011/08/platinum-rage.html

Diamond Cuts and Wax Stains, who keeps us updated on our favorite winter sport, hockey (as well as OPC cards). put together this interesting post discussing Goalie Size

http://1967ers.wordpress.com/2011/06/14/size-matters/ 

Finally I went with my Wille Mays post that I teased this feature last month.  

1959 Topps #563 Willie Mays

I like this one because I am talking about cards, and I think I may be bringing some interesting information to the new collector regarding a star and what a specific set has to offer. 

There you have it, it's only five posts but we cover a lot of territory - Beautiful 100 year old Non-sports Cards, Pack Breaks, Changes in the game, Vintage Hall of Famers and Personal Joys related to sports.  I could not have been happier with the selections.   

If anyone would like to add their own favorite posting to The Best of 2011, please let me know either in the comments or via email and I will add it to the list.  For additional information click here. 

Thanks

Team Phungo

Team Phungo Wants Your Best Post of 2011!!!

Could this card be related to the Phungo Best Post of 2011???



1959 Topps Willie Mays

Could the above Willie Mays card be related to the Phungo Best Post of 2011???

Team Phungo wants to know what YOUR Best or Favorite post of 2011 was.

I want to collect all of the favorite posts from 2011 into a digest and publish the together.

for more info click here

Say Hey! 1959 Topps Willie Mays Foursome

In Celebration of Willie Mays 80th Birthday today we present the 1959 Topps Willie Mays FourSome. 

The 1959 Topps Set features Four Willie Mays Cards (plus the Giants Team Card)

We lead off with a card that Connects a Phillies Legend with Mr Mays.

1959 Topps #317 N L Hitting Kings Ashburn & Mays

Mays Base Card from the classic 1959 set

    

1959 Topps #50 Willie Mays

Mays was also featured in the Hi Numbered All-Star Subset.

1959 Topps #563 Willie Mays All-Star

We finish One of my all-time favorite cards is this one which honors a catch you will see repeatedly this weekend if your a baseball junkie.

1959 Topps #464 Baseball Highlights Willie Mays 

How can you not love this card.  I have been seeing the grainy footage of this catch since I was a kid and here it is on a 50 year old baseball card.

For the Collector

One of the oddities about the 1959 Topps set is the All-Star set.  Despite being part of the High Number Series the All-Star cards of stars are typically much cheaper then the more common base cards.  The Hi Number May All-Star has sold recently on eBay for $9.33 (rough) to $13.01 (more passable).  Low Recent auction for the other special cards was $7.00 for Ashburn/Mays and $7.03 for the Mays Catch.

The lowest price I found for the #50 Base card in reasonable condition was $31 for a Graded (VG) card, Although the card is available via BIN for $28.  

The cards featured in the above post were acquired at the following prices

$21.50 - #50 Willie Mays

$4.50 - #317 Ashburn/Mays

$7.00 - #464 Mays Catch

$13.59 - #563 Mays All-Star 

All prices listed include S&H, The Cards that I actually picked up were likely part of a larger lot and there may be a slight volume discount reflected in the purchase price.

  

Other Voices
Cardboard Connection - Willie Mays Baseball Card TimeLine 


Sources
ebay.com

The Original 1961 Topps - All Star Cards

Similar to the new Topps Heritage cards, the All-Star cards for 1961 Topps were found among the High Numbers. Consequently they hard pretty hard to find. In my opinion they are more scarce then the cards issued in the previous three sets (58-60).

There is only one Phillies cards among the 1961 All-Star set and that is card #569 of Frank Herrera. Unfortunately I do not have that card in the Phungo Collection. However, I do have this very nice 1961 All-Star card:



1961 Topps #579 Willie Mays All-Star


The 2010 Heritage cards mimic the 61 design well:
2010 Topps Heritage #498 Johan Santana

The cutout is the same right down to the headlines on the paper. "The Sporting News" has been replaced by "Topps News"


2010 Topps Heritage #498 Johan Santana (b-side)
1961 Topps #579 Willie Mays All-Star(b-side)
click to enlarge

The Flip sides of the 1961 and 2010 Heritage All-Star cards are similar and feature a good paragraph on the featured player. I am particularly impressed with the Heritage cards as most of today's cards are relatively short on copy. One note on the Heritage cards, the All-Star cards have the backs reversed - similar to the base cards which were mentioned previously.

Clones
1970 Topps #461 Carl Yastrzemski All-Star

Topps re-used the paper shredding design for their 1970 All-Star Cards. It is a design I like and I wouldn't mind seeing them bring it back every 10 years or so.

For a look back at some previous Phungo articles on the original 1961 Topps check out these links:

The Phillies
Topps Inserts

Philly Card Show Report - Splurge the 1959s

1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson

If you are building a vintage set you at some point have to decide how you are going to handle the star cards, special cards, short prints and Hall of Famers. Because of the laws of supply and demand, these cards are typically both harder to locate and more expen$ive.

For the most part my 59 set is made up of cards I would describe as in good condition. I avoid cards that are written on, torn cut up etc. Dinged Corners and surface wear don't bother me to much.

That brings us to 1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson. This is THE rookie card of the 1959 Topps Set. It is also part of the somewhat scarcer high number series of 59 Topps. I already have all three Mantle cards from the Set and the Mays base card, so I was well aware that this was likely the next big fish from the set.

This card has some minor creasing, surface wear and soft edges. If I were a Cardinals fan and wanted a Gibson Rookie to be the center of my collection, I would probably have passed on this card.

But as a good card of a big name Hall of Fame player that I need to build a 50 year old vintage set - This card is perfectly fine.
For the Collector

This particular card went for $30. On ebay a card in similar condition just sold for $34.99 shipped. A noticeably better conditioned card went for $39.98 which appears to be a pretty good deal to me. Beyond that there are several auctions that finished in the $85-$100 range. A really crisp graded card top ended at $1384.00 on November 22nd.



1959 Topps #317 NL Hitting Kings Ashburn and Mays

I believer there are three cards featuring Willie Mays in the 1959 Topps set, this one also features Phillies Hall of Famer and fan favorite Richie Ashburn. This went for a reasonable $4.50. I also picked up the #20 Duke Snider card for $2.50, but it is in really poor condition, and looking back I probably should have bypassed that card.
Commons



1959 Topps #517 Joe Koppe
1959 Topps #440 "Lou" Burdette
1959 Topps #206 Carl Furillo
1959 Topps #359 Bill White

The Koppe card is really not a common, it is part of the High Numbered Series which start at #507. The "Lou" Burdette card is notable for the misspelling of his first name LEW short for Lewis. This card "inspired" the much derided 2007 Topps Heritage super-scarce parallel "Jon" Smoltz card. What is Carl Furillo doing in the bargain bin??. And finally Bill White, who was one of the first black players in the Majors and as the President of the National League (1989-94) was the first African-American to hold such an office for a Major Sports League.

The Joe Koppe card as well as 7 other hi numbers went for $1.75. The regular set commons of which I picked up about 30 went for 35 cents each.

If you would like to contribute to the Phungo 1959 Topps Set Building challenge please let me know, I have lots of common duplicates to trade. My 1959 Topps Want List is chronicled here.

Speaking of 1959 Topps and 2007 Topps Heritage

Yep this was Team Phungo's last splurge of the 2009 Collecting Year. I finally broke down and decided to build the Topps 1959 Homage set - 2007 Topps Heritage. The two boxes went for a reasonable 90.00 combined and I got the dealer to toss in some new hobby packs 09 Heritage High Numbers at a discount.