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Saturday, January 29, 2022

Play your cards right

Some oddball cards today. And I mean, literally, some oddball cards today.

Card Number 907: US Playing Card Company Baseball Major League All-Stars, 1990; #NNO (Jack of Diamonds)


Yes, this is from a set of playing cards with colour pictures of baseball players on. This is a very intriguing photo. My guess is that Tony is scrutinising the play while doing some stretches in the on deck area.

The back is a boring card back. It has to be if anyone is going to actually play cards using this set.  I've played a lot of card games in my time - whist, canasta, pinochle. Novelty card sets don't tend to get used for games in my experience. However, judging by the playwear, this card was used in a few hands of some card games.


Card Number 908: US Playing Card Company Major League Baseball Aces, 1992; #NNO (3 of Diamonds)

Tony is still in the diamond suit in this deck, but seems to have been demoted from one of the face cards to a lowly number. 


This photo has been cropped to chop off Tony's feet and the end of his bat. I know that might annoy one of my regular readers!

The back looks more stylish than the cardbacks from the deck released in 1990.


And a bonus "card".

Card Number 909: Cartwright's Aces, 1992-3; #9

This was from a 12-card series issued with the short-lived Cartwright's Journal of Baseball Collectibles, which included trading cards in each issue. The Journal lasted for five issues in 1992 and 1993 and somehow released 9 card series, many with parallels. There is more information in this Wrigley Wax blog post.

The card is rather nicely done.


Despite the playing card imagery in the word 'aces' and the design of the set logo on the back, this isn't actually a playing card.

There is a minimal write up on the back. 


Something that stands out to me is there is no licensing information on this card at all. That's also true of the US Playing Card Company cards as well - but they were licensed and had the relevant logos on the box containing the cards. I suspect Cartwright's didn't have an agreement in place otherwise there would have been some very small print on the card. 

Total: 909 cards

3 comments:

  1. Back when the Playing Card sets came out a group of my trading friends and I would actually play Poker with them. What did we use for gambling currency? Why nothing more then Baseball cards. Commons, semistars and stars. We used Becketts prices and we would just go at it. We were such nerds! Life is good!

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    Replies
    1. That sounds brilliant. I'd be more interested in poker if I was playing for baseball cards!

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  2. I just found a Gwynn playing card in a dime box yesterday. Can't remember if it's one of these or not though. A few years ago some of my Vietnamese students taught me Tiến lên. It's so addicting and easily my favorite card game.

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