One card only - Tony's first home run

Opinion is divided on 'manufactured relics' like this card. They're usually found as bonus cards in blaster boxes. While I realise they aren't to every collector's taste, they're a bit out of the ordinary and I like adding them to my collection. This particular one was an eBay purchase from a seller in Germany.

Card Number 1035: Topps First Home Run Medallions, 2015; #FHRM-TG

These cards were bonus cards in blaster boxes of Series Two of Topps's flagship set. The 'medallion' is a heavy piece of metal embedded in a partial hole scooped out of the foamboard material used to make the 'card'.

Credit to Topps for using a photo of Tony in a uniform from roughly the right era to commemorate an event in 1982. (I feel like I'm crediting Topps for doing the bare minimum these days!)

If I was more co-ordinated I would have posted this on 22nd August! But sadly I have only just realised I have missed that by a handful of days. 

Wrigley Field is on my list of ball parks I want to visit. As Tony hit his first home run there, I think I might have to make it a priority when I'm next planning a trip to the USA.

Total: 1035 cards

Modern Monday... (2015 is still modern, right?)

Generally speaking I get my recently released cards from people in the UK Facebook groups breaking new product wanting to move on the cards they don't want. It seems that in the last couple of months the number of people buying boxes and ripping packs has really slowed down.

However, what counts as 'modern' for a "Modern Monday" post. Well, 2015 wasn't that long ago, even if it does feel like it was.

Card Number 861: Topps, 2015; #FHR-18

Come on, Topps! Card number 18 in an insert series? When you could so easily have given Tony number 19? I swear, sometimes it feels like you don't even try...

This insert series comemorated the first home run of several players. There were 40 inserts in both Series 1 and Series 2 of Topps's flagship set and both are numbered FHR-01 to FHR-40. Because, Topps, I guess.

We get a photo of Tony in the classic early 80s Padres road uniform on the front, along with the date of Tony's first major league home run. 

I was going to look up the date on Baseball Reference, but Topps have put details on the back. Should I fact check this? It is a Topps card...

I went and checked. Tony hit a home run off Bill Campbell in the sixth inning. He had two hits that game and scored two runs.

That last sentence is an opinion rather than a fact. Did Tony develop more power later in his career? He was never much of a home run slugger even though he played through the power slugger record-chasing era.

Card Number 862: Topps Stadium Club, 2015; #265

Whoah! That is a card.

My only criticism of this card is that, like all modern Stadium Club cards, it's warping slightly. 

But still, what a lovely card. Quite apart from the photo on the front, everything on the back is spot on, from the use of the word "thwack" in the write up to the one line of career stats, to the picture showing Tony with a handful of bats. 

I know I give Topps a hard time sometimes on this blog -  in fact, even in the first half of this blog post! But in this case, I have nothing but admiration for what they have done here.

Total: 862 cards

Modern Monday - shiny Donruss

Card number 837: DonRuss "Tony Gwynn Tribute", 2015; #2

I've already blogged about four fifths of this shiny little insert set. The fifth and final shiny card is about Tony's induction in the Hall of Fame.

This is the first of these cards that I have scanned using the overhead scanner, which properly captures it's sheer shininess!

If you've ever watched the video of Tony getting the call to say he was in the Hall of Fame, you can see how much it meant to him, and how nervous he was. According to He Left His Heart in San Diego, Tony thought he might not have done enough in his career to get elected. He is quite obviously overcome by emotion when he actually takes the call.

Card Number 838: DonRuss Optic, 2017; #164

'Optic' is the Panini-era DonRuss version of Chrome. Although this comes as a standalone set, it's basically the same cards as the regular DonRuss set with a shiny coating. 

There is also an Optic logo on the front and a different card number on the back. They chose an interesting vignette from Tony's career for the factoid. 

Tony had a good season in 1994. In addition to his post-war record batting average, he also nabbed the winning run in the All-Star Game. It was the first time the National League won the game after six defeats on a row. You can watch Tony's game-winning slide on YouTube - it starts at 4 minutes, 52 seconds on this video!

Panini get a bit of stick for their unlicensed baseball cards issued under various 'zombie brands', but their cards are a decent level of quality and their attention to detail in terms of factoids is very good as well. It's nice to read about something a bit different on a cardback!

Total: 838 cards

Revisiting Tony's Topps rookie card...

To celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2001, Topps picked 50 cards to reprint in a large insert series. Naturally, they included Tony's "iconic" rookie card from 1983.

Card Number 752: Topps Through the Years, 2001; #36

Topps added a gold foil 50th Anniversary stamp to the front. Although it's instantly noticeable that this is printed on much better card stock than Tony's actual rookie cards ever were.

Ignore the number '482' on the back - that was the number of Tony's card in the 1983 set. There is a little line below the 1982 highlights that says it's card number 36 of 50.

I wish Topps still did a highlight for players on cardbacks. 

A few years later Topps dusted off the 1983 template again.

Card Number 753: Topps Archives, 2015; #201

This card is in danger of setting off the Anachronism Klaxon for having photos of Tony late on in his career in the design template from the beginning of his career. If the cameo photo looks familiar, it's because it had been used by Topps before, for example, on Tony's Allen & Ginter card in 2013.

The retro styling extended to the back with the little outline of the batter next to the number. However, by this point there was no room for factoids next to the giant stats box!

The card stock, however, was in keeping with the 1983 design.

I have a small but growing collection of reprints and reimaginings of this card (and the O-Pee-Chee version from 1983 as well). I won't be surprised if Topps print even more in future. 

Total: 753 cards

Now Topps shows some heart

A couple of months ago I blogged Score's card from 1997 referencing the 'Heart of the Order'. Topps waited 18 years amd then released an insert series called the same name.

Card number 677: Topps Heart of the Order insert, 2015; #HOR-11

This is quite an unusual card for Topps as it relied heavily on a quirky design and less on the photo. The racked bats are an interesting design choice but make the card look a little bit dated. I wouldn't have been surprised if it was 20 years older. 

I received this card from Jamie, who posted a large spreadsheet of cards he had available in one of the Facebook groups for UK-based collectors. This was the only Tony Gwynn card on his list, and one I had not seen before, from an insert series I hadn't seen before either. Cards from 2015 don't come up that often in the groups - it's from a lean spell in the hobby just before baseball card collecting really started to take off again.

This card was released the year after Tony passed away but his passing isn't mentioned on the card back. Instead they tried to justify including Tony in an insert set called the 'Heart of the Order' with stats about his place in the Padres' batting line up. 

I was surprised that Tony batted most often in third place in the line-up because he's often described as a lead off hitter, who left other batters in clean up duty. Given Tony's improved batting average in third spot, maybe he should have played there even more often. (Although this is a Topps card we are talking about, so take these statistics with a hefty pinch of salt. Topps have been known to get things wrong!)

All told though, this is an interesting looking insert and I'm grateful to Jamie for listing his cards so it was easy to find the one I needed, and for being willing to send out just one card from his large list!

Total: 677 cards 

The beginning of the new era of Diamond Kings

After writing yesterday about how Panini have sort of kept the DonRuss brand going, today's post features cards from the Diamond Kings range. Panini now issue this as a brand in its own right, but "Diamond Kings" started out in the DonRuss base sets of the 1980s. The first 26 cards in the DonRuss flagship sets were illustrated portraits of baseball stars - one from each team. I have previously blogged several of these that feature Tony.

When Panini were trying to find a winning formula for their unlicensed baseball cards, they gave the Pinnacle brand a go in 2013, but that seemed to fall a bit flat. Panini released cards under the DonRuss brand in 2014 and that must have worked well enough for Panini to continue releasing "DonRuss" cards. In 2015, they built on the cachet of DonRuss and launched Diamond Kings as a standalone set. It has been released every year since.

Card Number 646: Panini Diamond Kings, 2015; #133

This is from the first year of the Diamond Kings. There isn't an artist credited with this picture, so I imagine it's been done by a Panini staff designer using photoshop rather than creating art from scratch.

The back has a great entry for my collection of descriptions off cardbacks: "San Diego's beloved batting wizard."

The uncredited broadcaster quoted on the back as saying that Tony "could hit .320 with a broom" is Sean Salisbury, the former NFL quarterback turned journalist who was working for Yahoo Sports at the time of Tony's death. (He is quoted in this article on the NBC San Diego website.) It seems strange that the cardback compiler would use the quote with such a vague accreditation. 

Like Gwynn, Sean Salisbury was born in Long Beach, although he grew up in Escondido near San Diego. He is three years younger than Tony, having been born in 1963, and played for the San Diego Chargers among other teams. His career would have overlapped with Tony's quite a bit and he obviously knew Tony as in the rest of that quote he says Tony made an impact on his family. 

Another interesting fact about Sean Salisbury is that he was an advisor on Adam Sandler's remake of the movie Mean Machine, and taught Sandler what he needed to do to portray a quarterback. However, despite all that, Sean missed out his chance to have his name appear on the back of this baseball card, which would have added to the very small number of trading cards he appeared on during his career. Trading Card Database only lists 37 cards for him.

Card Number 647: Panini Diamond Kings DK Originals, 2017; #DO-24

What's more fun than an unlicensed base card? An unlicensed insert card.

The portrait photo on this has scary eyes!

There isn't really much to say about this card. It's one of those ones to have in the collection because it's a Tony Gwynn card, rather than because it had any particularly exciting features. 

Tony's scary eyes are on the back too, along with a quote from Tony where he credits Ted Williams with helping him improve his batting. The flowery description is reserved for Ted who is described as "another sweet-swinging Californian." 

Otherwise, this card is almost the pictorial definition of unremarkable. 

Total: 647 cards

Tuesday Tribute Triple

I recently bought a few cards from an eBay vendor that shipped very quickly from the USA. However, unfortunately some of the cards arrived with dinged corners. The dealer refunded the money for those cards and said they didn't want me to send them back. So, basically what I'm saying is the cards in today's post were effectively free. I will hopefully replace these in my binders at some point. However, for now, they are shiny placeholders.

How shiny? Well, they broke my scanner.

This is more reflective (ha!) of how they actually look.

They are three more cards in the 5-strong "Tribute" insert series that DonRuss including in their 2015 set. One of the cards from the set was the 100th card to feature on this blog.

Card Number 423: DonRuss "Tony Gwynn Tribute", 2015; #1

Until the cards arrived I hadn't noticed that the little picture of Tony on the front was different on each one. This card shows him following through on a swing, but it really looks like he's busting out some dance moves!

This card commemorates Tony's perennial selection for the All Star teams and particularly focuses on his first appearance, in 1984.

Tony was the lead-off hitter for the National League team in the 1984 All-Star Game, with a hit and a strike out from 3 at bats. He also stole a base. It was a night game at Candlestick Park in San Francisco and the National League won 3-1.

Card Number 424: DonRuss "Tony Gwynn Tribute", 2015; #3

The third card in the series is about Tony's career hits. (You can really see the corner ding on this one!)

There's a slightly forced write up on the back, punning on the idea of Tony having hits if he was a musician. Tony's wife, Alicia, is actually in the music industry. She owns a record label and studio in Indianapolis. Tony's daughter, Anisha, released an album called '19' back in 2003 and the single from that album ('No Means No') was in the R&B charts for 19 weeks! This version on YouTube apparently features Tony. If DonRuss were going to riff (ha!) on the music idea, it's a shame they didn't mention this.

Card Number 425: DonRuss "Tony Gwynn Tribute", 2015; #5

I only bought the odd numbers in this series this time around.

The final card in the Tribute series is about Tony's career batting average.

There's some real truth in the comment that Tony's batting average was a throwback to baseball history. If you look on Baseball Reference at the Career Batting Average Leaders, Tony's is the only colour photo. 

Tony is joint 18th on the all-time list and most of the players ahead of him had passed away before he was born. The exceptions are Ty Cobb (died, 1961), Rogers Hornsby (died, 1963), Lefty O'Doul (died, 1969), George Sisler (died, 1973), Bill Terry (died, 1989) and Ted Williams who lived until 2002. Tony is the only player in the top 20 to play baseball after 1960. That was Ted Williams' final season in the game and the year Tony was born. So there was literally nobody hitting to the same consistency as Tony throughout his entire lifetime!

Total cards: 425

Modern Monday - recent(ish) DonRuss base

I was scrolling through Facebook and noticed a post that Andy M had made in the Baseball Cards UK group about a mystery box he had purchased and was opening. Now I am a fan of mystery packs and repacks and am always interested at what tips up in them. (I regularly read Sportscards from the Dollar Store to get my fix of repacks. I would have no money if I lived in North America.)

Andy seemed a bit disappointed with the contents of the box, which he laid out for everyone to see. It was a mix of packs and one "hit" card. Most of the packs were quite recent. One of them really caught my eye and I left a comment asking if it had survived the opening. 

Can you guess why?

This is the 2015 DonRuss 'hobby' packet. And that's Tony on the front!

Andy might have been a bit surprised anyone was interested in the packet. He  replied that it was still in reasonable condition. He then asked if I had the Tony Gwynn base card from that year, because there had been one in the pack.

Long story short, I didn't have that card, but now I do! (And yes, Andy also sent me the packet.)

Card Number 328: DonRuss, 2015; #193

Panini era DonRuss cards don't have licensing, and it's easy to dismiss them. However, in recent years the only company with a licence has repeatedly put out horrible flagship sets. The design of this card is lovely in comparison.

In 2015 they designed the cardbacks to look like classic 80s DonRuss cards, right down to the use of the player's full name. (Jeff at Wax Pack Wonders will appreciate this! He's done a whole series on the names on DonRuss cards.) One difference from the 80s cards is the addition of Sr. after Tony's name. Tony Jr, who was born in the 80s, has subsequently had a career and cards of his own.

By now you probably know my feelings about stats boxes - everything or one line is OK. This is a great summary stats box. Those are Tony's totals. The little write up notes that Tony wasn't a power hitter but that he earned 97.6% of the vote for the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. 

There's a story in He Left His Heart in San Diego, that Tony felt that he wouldn't be voted in to the hall on the first ballot. A couple of years ago the Padres posted the video of him getting the call to welcome him to the Hall after the votes have been processed. He got very emotional. I felt emotional watching it too.

I've got a few more recent DonRuss cards. These have arrived in various lots.

Card Number 329: DonRuss, 2017; #190

To date, this is the only card from 2017 in my collection of Tony Gwynn cards!

It's noticeable again, that for an unlicensed card where they have had to photoshop out any references to the Padres, this card still manages to get a lot right. It is a lovely bordered card - compare it to the 2017 Topps design which is the absolute nadir of their cards in the last decade, and you can see how nice it is. This looks timeless. Those Topps cards look terribly dated now, just three years later!

The back is nothing special. The write up is a vignette from the All Star Game in 1994 when Tony scored a run in dramatic fashion.

One way that Panini get around not having a Major League Baseball licence is through linking up with the Major League Baseball Players Association and the National Hall of Fame and Museum. The Hall of Fame has some rights to sell images. I think it may be a condition of being inducted into the Hall that they can sign licensing agreements using a player's name and image.

Card Number 330: DonRuss, 2018; #258

This is the third card in a row that takes care to show the back of Tony's shirt with his name and number. That's all they can show!

The lines across the card are a deliberate homage to the design of the DonRuss set from 1984. Just so collectors aren't confused into thinking this is a card from '84, they've included the '18 on the front as well. (Bonus Point for the year on the front!)

The back is black and white again. Note the phrase "Professional Batting Totals". They're not mentioning the words "Major" or "League".

Technically, though, Tony was a "professional" when he was playing in the minor leagues at Walla Walla, Amarillo, and for the Hawaii Islanders. Should they have added his statistics in? He really lit up the minor leagues so all those figures would get a very healthy bump if they were included.

I have posted some other modern DonRuss cards on the blog previously. Here are some more cards from 2018, and some from 2020! There also was a special Tribute series in the 2015 set and one of them was the 100th card featured on this blog.

Total: 330/394

Blog Post 100

This is the 100th daily post I have published in a row.

This lockdown project started on Tony's birthday back in May and here we are three months later, over 270 cards blogged, and really chasing down that 394-card target.

It's not always easy to maintain a focus on blogging. (My own personal blogs are rather neglected.) Here are the things I've found helpful over the past 14 weeks and 2 days.

I batch-write my posts, often on a weekend, so I just give them a quick check and publish them in the morning.

I've adopted a rough structure for half the week. One Card Only on Sundays, three random cards in the Monday Mixer, comparing cards that differ only in tiny details in the Tuesday Twins. Having those three daily themes anchor the week really helps. 

I play around with post themes. Sometimes it's a run of cards from a particular manufacturer or a certain set. The Back to Base posts are the best examples of these. Sometimes I slice it another way and do a few cards from the same year, or showing a particular action. Cards that feature other players appear in Sharing the Spotlight posts. I don't have a rigid schedule for these.

I've also tried to mark special occasions, like Tony's debut date, or the date he recorded his 3000th hit.

And I celebrate my own milestones, like the 100th card on the blog, or this, the 100th post!

There are a lot of people I would really like to thank for their help getting this far. The UK baseball card collecting groups are a supportive community of people who love baseball and love baseball cards. I'm grateful to a lot of them for supplying cards for this blog. Some of the people who have helped me out are Dean, Jasper, Ian, Rodney, Allan, Jack, Fraser, Marc, Matt, and especially to Gawain and Laura who have both been singled out for shout outs before. Gawain in particular has kept me very busy with a giant stack of cards to sort through. A special thanks to Bill from New Mexico who also sent me some cards.

I really appreciate everyone who has taken the time to leave a comment on the blog, but especially to Mark, whose blog, The Chronicles of Fuji, is one of my favourite card blogs. I think he has commented here on almost every single post which I have found massively encouraging. It's a lot of small things that have added up over the course of 100 posts to a really meaningful thing! 

And finally, a huge thank you to my wife, Cathy, who has let me disappear off to write blog posts on so many occasions. Cathy is a big baseball fan too. When we decided to do a road trip in 2016, she organised it so we could go to Cooperstown and visit the Hall of Fame. She also timed it so we went to Fenway Park on Star Wars night! This blog probably wouldn't have happened if she hadn't said, 'Yes, go for it!'

Here's a picture of her enjoying some ballpark fries at Fenway!

I don't want this to be the first post on this blog without a baseball card in it, and I wanted to be a bit of a special one, so here is the only card in my collection from a range that is perfect for a post where I mentioned going to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

Card Number 272: Topps Museum Collection, 2005; #70

Tony is running, eyes on the base, he's going to make it!

That's some write up on the cardback!

Thank you for reading, whether this is the first post you've read or the one hundredth!

Total: 272/394

Aztec Hero

Writing about my own university days in yesterday's blogpost reminded me of a few cards I own that feature Tony in his college playing days.

Tony earned a scholarship to San Diego State University, but to play basketball. He played Point Guard for the SDSU Aztecs for four seasons and still holds the following records for them:

• Career Assists
• Most Assists in a Season (with two other placings in the top ten)
• Most Assists in a Game - first, second, and third place on the all-time list

Despite his scholarship, eventually Tony was allowed to represent the Aztecs at baseball as well. He was drafted to the NBA San Diego Clippers and the MLB San Diego Padres after college, and opted for baseball because he felt that would offer him a longer career.

There are trading cards with pictures of Tony as a basketball player. However, the ones in this post show him playing college baseball.

Card Number 147: Panini Contenders, 2015; #91

It should come as no surprise that Panini, the masters of licensing loopholes, found a way to produce interesting baseball cards without a MLB licence. This card is an "Officially Licensed Collegiate Product". Well, it's a bit of money for the alma mater. I'm sure none of the players would mind.

I think this is quite an attractive card, but as we will see they made the most of that photo.

Here it is again on the back.

There are 99 cards in the base set featuring contemporary players like Aaron Judge who had been drafted just two years previously and hall-of-famers like Tony, Dave Winfield and Ozzie Smith.

There were also several insert series in the set, including the next card.

Card Number 148: Panini Contenders, 2015; #O-14

I told you that photo was doing a lot of work for Panini. Here it is on a second card. This verson is less cropped and shopped than on the base card, but is also less crisp.

Guess what photo they used on the back of the card.

Yes, there it is again. I don't know if this is a record for numbers of times the same photo has been used in a card set, but it's got to be in there somewhere. There were 47 cards in the "Old School Colours" insert series. 

Panini weren't the first card company to use photos of famous players in their college days to get round licensing restrictions. The year before this Panini set came out, Upper Deck included Tony in their 'Legends' section of their 'College Colors' range.

Card Number 149: Upper Deck College Colors, 2014; #7

I think the choice of a black and white photo is deliberate to invoke feelings of 'it was a long time ago...'

One thing about this photo is that at least you can make out most of the word 'Aztecs' on Tony's uniform.

Like the Panini cards, the photo is re-used on the back.

This is another "Officially Licensed Collegiate Product". That licensing stamp is a new one on this blog and makes a change from the MLBPA or the National Baseball Museum and Hall of Fame, which are two other organisations licensing photos to baseball card companies while MLB restricts their official licence to just the one company. 

Incidentally, this 26-card set is listed as a 'promo' set on Trading Card Database and is a multi-sport set, not a baseball card set, with 13 legends and 13 'rookies' from various sports. Other "legends" with cards in the set include Michael Jordan, Peyton Manning and Tiger Woods. 

The craft of baseball card companies to find new ways to print 'official' cards of players using innovative licensing makes me wonder if eventually we will get cards with Little League photos of Major Leaguers. Panini have gone a step in that direction already.

Card Number 150, Panini Century, 2010; #34

Before he went to university, Tony went to Long Beach Polytechnic High School. Given that he is wearing a sweatshirt saying 'Poly' on it, I think it's a reasonable assumption this is a photo of him in high school.

Yes, the grey square is a small scrap of cloth. This is a relic card. The weird chunk of white space is because there were autographed versions of this card. This is the unmarked version but the space for the auto is still there.

It's a pretty dull cardback, although it is serially numbered. The blurb about the cloth patch says it is from a game-worn item, but there isn't any detail about the game. I don't know why card companies  don't specify in which game, or games, the items were worn. It seems like that would be information they would know if the items are as authentic as they say they are. 

That feels like a nice way to reach the 150 card mark on this blog!

Total: 150/394

Archetype

Readers of a certain age might get a Living Colour earworm from this post's title. (Were you into rock in the early 1990s? I was.)

The post title isn't actually a reference to a song that is now 30 years old (how?!?), but instead to a really nice insert card released by Topps a mere 5 years ago.

Card Number 126: Topps, 2015 (Archetypes Insert); #A-17
The photo on the front has been edited to make it look like its been drawn or painted, which gives it quite an ethereal quality.

The back talks about Tony's bat control. It really was no accident that he made so many hits in his career and very rarely struck out. Tony was a placement hitter, not a power slugger, and he aimed to steer the ball down the gaps in the infield.

Tony was active when the great craze for hitting home runs hotted up in the late 90s. His contemporaries like Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa were smashing the ball out of the park on a regular basis and breaking record after record. It appears from what people have said about him, that Tony went through more than one period of introspection regarding his hitting wondering whether he should chase more home runs. Whether he could have done that without the steroids that provided many of the big hitters with their power is an unanswerable question.

Happily, Tony decided to stick with the controlled hitting, which is why he retained such a high career batting average title and so many hits. Placement is a skill gained through hard work and there are no short cuts. The legacy of the power hitters who attracted the headlines during Tony's latter career is tainted because so many did take short cuts through using performance enhancing drugs.

Total: 126/394

One (Hundredth) Card Only - DonRuss Tribute

We have reached the century of cards shown on this blog. I thought it would be fitting to pick one of the shiniest cards in my possession to be the 100th card.

Card Number 100: DonRuss "Tony Gwynn Tribute", 2015; #4
Tony died in 2014 and the following season Panini included a five card insert series into its DonRuss range. This insert series is so shiny it broke my scanner!

It looks silver until you try and photograph it and turn your phone to a slight angle.

The card back is much easier to scan.

This card chronicles Tony's 8 National League batting titles. The others in the series, which I am yet to acquire, cover his 15 appearances as an All Star, his induction in the Hall of Fame in 2007, his career hits total, and his career batting average. Sadly they didn't include his highest batting average, which would have been perfect for this blog.

So, we are a hundred cards in, and I'm not getting bored yet. There's some fun coming tomorrow in the Monday Mixer!

Total: 100/394