Tuesday Twins - more Gold Label parallels

Following on from yesterday's Gold Label cards from 2021, here are some more from the Topps range that perpetuates the class system.

Card Number 963: Topps Gold Label Class 1, 2019; #92

As with the more recent cards that I blogged yesterday, this card juxtaposes an older photo of Tony with a more recent one. In this case it's a photo from either 1985 or 1986 and a photo that's probably from 2001.

Like the cards from 2021, the cardback has Tony's 'average season' stats and states that Tony's season best batting average was .372. I still can't decide if this is an error by Topps or just someone behind the scenes being a pedantic dork and discounting the stats from 1994 because it wasn't a 162 game season. Whatever the reason, Topps has been printing this stat for a while. 

The factoid is a useful illustration of how well Tony hit in the clutch. He didn't often get to two strikes as he liked to swing at the first pitch if he could. But when he got to two strikes, it was very rare that he would get to three.

Card Number 963: Topps Gold Label Class 1 (black parallel), 2019; #92

Like yesterday, here is a black parallel to compare with the regular class 1 card.

The black parallel looks much more striking as a card, and also makes the 'class 1' lettering much more obvious in the scan.

I have a confession - the cardback I showed you previously could have been from either the regular or the parallel. I scanned them together and can't tell them apart. Here's a scan of both of them to show what I mean.

And, as a bonus, another card from the same set and same year...

Card Number 965: Topps Gold Label Class 2, 2019; #92

I really like the white Padres uniform with the yellow, orange and brown accents. That uniform is the one worn by the team in the 1984 World Series, and replaced almost immediately with the switch to pinstripes for the 1985 season. (Maybe it's because I'm a child of the seventies, but it feels to me that the move to pinstripes in the 1980s was a boring choice!)

The cardback is the same again, complete with the description of Tony's batting after two strikes as "preposterous", and a mention of Wade Boggs.

With baseball itself very much in the balance for 2022, I don't know if Gold Label is scheduled to appear again. I'm waiting to see if Topps persist with claiming Tony's best batting average is .372. If Topps do, then I might get in touch with them and ask what their reasoning is. 

Total: 965 cards

Modern Monday - High Tek

Remember Topps Tek? Topps kind of revisited that 90s madness with a six year run of sets called High Tek from 2014-2019. Like the original Tek sets, these 'cards' were printed on acetate. In 2019, there were 112 cards in the set and 9 parallel versions of each card.

Card Number 787: Topps High Tek, 2019; #105

The blue outlining on this is a relic of it being scanned on my flatbed scanner. This is not a blue parallel - in real life it looks like the image on Trading Card Database, with a shimmery foil effect where the blue lines are on this. (That image on TCDB was uploaded by Richard - Hi Richard! - who also sent me this card.)

The scannerific blue effect is also visible on the back. The blue parallel card images on TCDb don't have the blue effect on the back, which is why I can say for certain this isn't the blue parallel version. (That image on TCDB was also uploaded by Richard - Hi Richard! - as you might expect from a supercollector.)

There isn't much else on that cardback. 

I don't know how popular acetate cards are. Topps seems to have pulled back from producing them the past couple of years. One advantage they have is that they don't curl like a lot of shiny regular 'chrome' cards curl over time. They also stay in place on the scanner even if the scans come out a bit odd.

Total: 787 cards

Great Ginter cards

I have been critical of the Allen & Ginter range from Topps previously on this blog. Like the other retro ranges that Topps produce, the cards can feel a bit tired. However, one of their inserts is up there as one of my favourite card designs ever - the Star Signs insert from 2019. Topps had a good year in 2019, insert-wise because here's another nice insert from the same year.

Card Number 635: Topps Allen & Ginter 'Ginter's Greats' insert, 2019; #GG13

Greatest ever to hold a bat and ball, says the tagline. No arguments with that.

There were 50 cards in this set of all-time greats. There's a lot to like in this picture, from the background with the heraldic crossed bats and baseball, through to the choice of image - Tony with his arms folded, concentrating on something. 

It has a great write up on the cardback too, recounting Tony's success against Hall of Fame pitcher Greg Maddux. Does anyone want to suggest what word is replaced in the quote by [blanking]?

Topps were definitely playing a strong game with the cards featuring Tony in 2019. The base card is pretty nice too. But I really like this parallel version.

Card Number 636: Topps Allen & Ginter Gold Hot Box parallel, 2019; #77

I can't find a statistic for the frequency of 'hot boxes' but from looking at rip videos, all the base cards in a hot box had this gold foil filigree border. 

The border really enhances this product and I can imagine ripping a box and finding these cards as the ordinary 'base' cards would be pretty special.

The back is the same as the regular base card, with its pretentious writing out of the numbers using words. I can forgive the pretentiousness this time because the front is so nice.

I am slowly starting to appreciate Allen & Ginter a bit more. 2019 is fast becoming my favourite set because of this nice parallel and the high quality insert cards.

Total: 636 cards

Modern Monday in the Museum

I received this card from Graham, alongside the Gold Label cards I blogged about a couple of weeks ago.

Card Number 533: Topps Museum Collection (copper parallel), 2019; #81

Topps Museum Collection is one of those high end sets that I rely on other people buying boxes, breaking them, and then wanting to sell on some of the cards to try and make some of their money back.

Personally, I think this 'copper parallel' with its brown frame looks nicer than the regular Museum cards. But I have that sense of incompleteness that I get when I have a parallel and don't have the vanilla base version.

If you ever want to know if a pin-striped Padre was photographed in the 80s or the 90s then look for the colour in the word Padres, and the colour of the batting helmet. Brown = up to and including the 1990 season. Blue = from 1991 onwards. It's a slight shame that this copper parallel isn't framing a photo of Tony in a complementary brown batting helmet.

The write up on the cardback is suitably 'museum-y', mentioning "the game's annals".

Topps have also found a new way to package information. I hadn't seen Tony's All Star appearances presented that way before - 15 appearances in the last 16 years of the 20th Century. Fair play to Topps, they have found a way to phrase that which sounds very special. 

Total: 533 cards

Modern Monday - Gold Label

Topps revived their premium card range called Gold Label in 2016. It's a strange set, with three different 'classes' of card released for each player, with a different photo on each one, which turns a 100-card set into a 300-card set straightaway.

I acquired these cards from Graham M in the UK collectors Facebook group.

Card Number 510: Topps Gold Label (class 3), 2019; #92

In 2019 the class 1 card showed Tony running, the class 2 card showed him batting in a 1984 uniform, and the class 3 card looked like this:

The second photo of Tony (behind the gold band) was the same on all three classes of cards. In addition to the three different classes of card, there were also coloured parallels released.

The backs were consistent for all the classes of card.

That is an incredible factoid on the back, about Tony's success rate in a 'two strikes' scneario, and something I wasn't aware of before reading this cardback. So that's a plus point for this set.

Card Number 511: Topps Gold Label (class 1), 2020; #81

I think all the class 1 cards in the set showed players fielding. This photo is from very early in Tony's career before he started wearing Oakley wraparound sunglasses in the outfield.

The comparisons on the back really show how Tony was in a complete class of his own in the second half of the twentieth century. There literally was nobody better at getting hits than him. 

The class 2 cards showed Tony in a batting stance. 

Card Number 512: Topps Gold Label (class 3), 2020; #81

And the class 3 cards show him on the move between bases.

Although the 'classes' is a bit gimmicky, I'm not going to complain if Topps are going to dig into their photo archive and use uncommon photos for these cards. There aren't many cards with Tony wearing the early 80s brown Padres uniform, so it's a welcome addition to the collection.

The cardback is exactly the same. I'm only showing it for the sake of completeness!

Sets like this are one of the reasons why the number of Tony Gwynn cards has proliferated over recent years. The multiple parallels of these cards are all counted as released cards on Trading Card Database, pushing the number of available cards ever-upwards. Add in some low numbered memorabilia cards as well and it's all more cards for collectors to collect!

Total: 512 cards

Modern Monday - face of the franchise

There's no doubt that Tony Gwynn is the face of the San Diego Padres franchise. He is "Mr Padre" after all. Here's a couple of recent cards that confirm his status. 

Card number 498: Topps (Franchise Feats insert), 2019; #FF-23

I have to admit, reading those "feats" feels a bit underwhelming. Although they are currently the only Major League franchise still in San Diego, the Padres used to be one of three. Both the Clippers, who drafted Tony out of college the same day he was drafted by the Padres, and the Chargers, who shared occupancy of Jack Murphy Stadium the entire duration of the Padres' 24 years located there, have both moved to LA now. (In fact, Jack Murphy Stadium is still the only stadium to host a Super Bowl and a World Series in the same year: 1998.)

The other Padre to win a batting title was Gary Sheffield. No Padre has been a batting title contender since Tony's final title in 1997. The Padres have won two divisional titles since Tony retired.

As it's a 2019 card, I suppose having Manny Machado's transfer from that year on it makes sense. It's a bit of a dull feat, though.

Trevor Hoffman has been inducted to the Hall of Fame since I visited it in 2016. But I saw Dave Winfield's plaque along with Tony's in the hall.

Card Number 499: Topps Chrome Update (Greatest Seasons insert), 2019; 150C-24

In 2019, Topps celebrated 150 years of professional baseball with this series that featured 25 legends of the game.

Even though this card is in an insert series about "Greatest Seasons", the write up on the back doesn't mention a specific season. 

It's a nice card though.

Total: 499 cards

Modern Monday: back to Allen & Ginter (and an A&G back)

One of the first posts on this blog was about two Allen & Ginter inserts, and last month I blogged about a couple of base cards from earlier in the decade. In the last couple of weeks some more up-to-date base have come through the post, so here are the base cards from the last couple of years, and a bonus.

Card Number 468: Topps Allen & Ginter, 2019; #77

The front is a nice portrait rendered like a painting, as is the Allen & Ginter style. This is obviously adapted from a photo taken in 1999 - it's easy to tell because of the prominent 30th anniversary sleeve patch.

The back is the same quirky / tiresome list of statistics with the numbers written out in full.

Card Number 469, Topps Allen & Ginter, 2020; #128

It's harder to date the source photo for this card to a particular season, but I'd guess it's around about 1988, based on the brown jacket and Tony's moustache.

The cardback design is slightly less fussy.

Card Number 470: Topps Allen & Ginter Mini, 2020; #128 (A&G back parallel)

And the bonus card! All Allen & Ginter base cards have a 'mini' parallel that's cigarette card sized. Every pack of Allen & Ginter 2020 had one of these parallels in it. And this is a parallel of a parallel because it has a different cardback - these versions were only available at a rate of one in five packs. 

The front picture is cropped slightly to fit the new card dimensions.

And this is the back with a big A&G logo on. It looks a lot better than the typical list of statistics.

I've commented before about the links with tobacco companies of yore on modern day cards. I don't need to say anything more about that. But this cardback is so much better than the standard ones, I'm not going to criticise Topps again for it. I have noticed that Topps say they are commemorating the picture cards that came out in 1887, rather than saying the tobacco or cigarette cards. If you didn't know Allen & Ginter were once one of the biggest cigarette companies in the world, then you wouldn't have a problem with it.

(And on that historical note, Allen & Ginter was a comparatively progressive company in its own way. They were the first cigarette rolling company to employ women - although that might have been because they could pay women less than men. They were also innovative, the first American company to try and develop mechanised cigarette rolling. If that had been totally successful, they wouldn't have need so many employees, so maybe that's less laudable.)

I'd like to thank Gawain and Andy M for sourcing and sending me these cards - cheers, chaps!

Total: 470 cards

Modern Monday - modern art in the Gallery

A few days ago I blogged about Topps Gallery cards from the 90s. Topps brought the range back in 2017. Today's card is the third card that Jeff, who writes Wax Pack Wonders, sent me in his blog giveaway, and it's from a more recent Topps Gallery release.

Card Number 362: Topps Gallery, 2019; #MP-21

This is from the 30-card Masterpiece insert series (one of 33 insert series in the range!)

Kevin Graham is the artist who painted these cards. (His website is currently undergoing maintenance, but he is also on Instagram.) He has also painted cards for Disney, Star Wars and Star Trek from the look of his Insta.

The card back has a short summary of Tony's career.

That summary has an unusual stat in it - about being one of only 19 players to have four 200-hit seasons before turning 30. Maybe Topps were looking for a way to shoehorn the number 19 into the card back. But if they were doing that, why didn't they allocate him the 19th card in the set? It feels like a missed opportunity.

Many, many thanks again to Jeff for sending me this. Check out his blog here.

Total: 362/394

Modern Monday - Where's Tony?

I was trawling across eBay a couple of weeks ago and ran a search for Padres Baseball Cards. I noticed a small lot of nine cards for sale, all modern stuff, but something must have pinged my "Tony Radar" because I took a second look. I've saved the photo from the listing. Can you see what I saw?

Obviously one of the first things you see is the luxuriant backdrop. I can't decide if it's a fluffy cushion or shag carpeting. Neither of which I would really recommend as a surface for photographing cards, but it's not reflective, I suppose.

Anyway on the right hand edge, which I'm sure you will have seen, there's Tony peeping around the corner of another card. 

I didn't recognise it. Turns out it was an insert card from the Topps Update series in 2019, and, in fact it was the Chrome version. 

Card Number 344: Topps Chrome Update, 2019; FBC-16

As it's a Chrome card, it's shiny! It's also a bit unusual because it shows "young Tony" from the 80s. Most recent cards seem to be using pictures of Tony towards the end of his career - for example, the recent(ish) DonRuss cards I posted last week or these cards from Topps issued this year. It's a good choice of photo. 

On the back it explains why Tony qualified for an insert card about "The Family Business", talking about how his brother and son also played Major League baseball.

That would be quite a fun baseball trivia question. What have the Padres had 3 of, the Dodgers had 2 of and the Royals and Brewers had one each of? The answer would be "Members of the Gwynn family playing for them!"

This card has also taught me a useful lesson - take the time to have a good look at photos in eBay listings!

Total: 344/394 (Fifty cards to my target!)

Saturday shout out - Hello Laura!

I want to give a shout out to Laura, who I've met through the Baseball Cards UK Facebook Group. Laura has her own YouTube channel, LJ's Clubhouse. She's also run some box breaks for group members.

Laura is a keen Yankees fan, and really likes Derek Jeter. (Who doesn't, really? When all is said and done, the man is a legend.) She is also the person who screenprinted me my .394 t-shirt, as worn on 9 May to commemorate Tony's birthday.

This photo was taken next to a park in Grangetown in Cardiff. Baseball was historically a really important game in Cardiff, as can be seen in this photo from 1953, when Grange Albion played Penylan at Roath Park Recreation Ground at the bottom of Penylan Hill.

The Roath Local History Society estimates a crowd of about 6,000 people turned up to watch the game.

Anyway, Laura is the person who made me the t-shirt as a bespoke print (See her other work here.) She is also the person who sent me the two Tony Gwynn Cards I'm going to profile today.

Card Number 98: DonRuss Diamond Kings, 2019, #37
I have a few Diamond Kings cards in my collection. I like this as a photorealistic painting, rather than a portrait.

Unlike other Diamond Kings releases, I can't see an artist's name on this. There's no information about the artist on the back, either.

There is an interesting factoid though, about how, as a kid, the Gwynn brothers practised their hitting using figs instead of a baseball.

Card Number 99: DonRuss Diamond Kings Flashback, 2019, #DKF-TG
This insert is from the same set.

It's a similar photorealistic painting with a nice border. This is a handsome card and shows that Panini era DonRuss cards can actually be very attractive.

The back is similarly clean and classy. The definition of a 'Crowning Moment' seems to be Tony's call up to the Bigs. What this misses out is that Tony wasn't the first choice call up from Hawaii that season. Alan Wiggins was called up a month before Tony because his batting average was quite a bit higher. Then Tony went on a streak and a month later, when another gap opened up in the roster because of injury, he had improved his average to .328.

So, a big shout out and thank you to Laura for these cards. Tomorrow we hit the century of cards on the blog!

Total: 99/394

The latest look is retro

Hey, remember Tony's card from 1985?

That card is 35 years old.

Topps has revived that card design for an insert series in its 2020 flagship product. Thanks to Dean in the Baseball Cards UK Facebook group, I now have one of them.

Card Number 58: Topps 1985 Series, 2020; #85-85

This card literally arrived less than a week ago, and will probably have the record for the shortest time spent between arrival and appearing on the blog, at least until I've cleared my backlog.

There is one thing about this card that irritates me. Why did they use the modern 'SD' logo instead of the awesome Swinging Friar logo from 1985? It's a retro card, Topps. Use a retro logo! I appreciate that not all logos from 1985 are useable in this day and age (Chief Wahoo the Indian from Cleveland no longer features on cards), but there really is no reason not to have the Friar on here.

Please excuse my wonky scan of the back. The only interesting thing about this card is that it's numbered 85-85. I pity anybody with red/green colour blindness who tries to read this card. But trust me, you ain't missing much.

This isn't the first Topps retro card that Tony has appeared on. Last year the card design was 1975, and Tony was on one of the cards.

Card Number 59: Topps 1975 Series, 2019; #121

Tony was 15 in 1975, so this card feels a little bit odd. Can't argue with the layout though. This is a stone cold design classic.

The card back is much better. There is even a little cartoon. Topps can get retro cards right if they actually bother (he says, grumpily).

Total: 59/394

Astrology and onomastics in Allen & Ginter

I've been dwelling in the 90s for my last few posts, so here are some more recent cards that have come my way.

Allen & Ginter (A&G) is a Topps brand of retro looking cards, which I quite like. They are a more expensive product and include a lot of retired stars in their sets every year, usually in their insert series based around a gimmick.

Card Number 35: Topps Allen & Ginter 2012; #WIN48
In 2012, the A&G gimmick was names. "What's in a Name?" they asked.

The field of studying names is called onomastics. "Anthony" derives from the Latin and could mean "Priceless". "Keith" is a Scottish name originally. There are places called Keith, one of which has a soccer team called Keith FC, and players playing for that team also called Keith. (Their current captain is Cameron Keith!) It's probably from Gaelic and could mean "wind" or "wood". "Gwynn" has a Welsh origin (Yay!) - the word 'gwyn' in Welsh means "White". (Gwin gwyn means white wine!)

A&G ignored all these possible names and focussed on his epithet, "senior". When he was playing, Tony was never known as Tony Gwynn Sr. A&G used it so they could write about his son, Anthony Keith Gwynn Jr, who has also had a respectable major league baseball career.

I admit I feel silly quibbling with what's written on the backs of baseball cards, but there is a lot that could be made out of a "priceless" wielder of "wood" when talking about a baseball player known for his batting! It's almost as if Topps had their stock of factoids pre-written and then had to somehow shoehorn them into the A&G theme.

Card Number 36: Topps Allen & Ginter 2019, #BSS42
In 2018, the gimmick was starsigns for the baseball stars. I can see the logic to that. I was sent this card recently by Allan who is part of the UK baseball collecting community on Facebook. Thanks, Allan!

This is an absolutely gorgeous card design.

The back is a lot more relevant than the 'What's in a Name?' card from 2012, although there are several attributes for Taurus that could be applied to Tony. 'Generous' - he was given the Branch Rickey Award in 1995, the Lou Gehrig Award in 1998 and the Roberto Clemente Award in 1999, all for his philanthropic work. 'Extremely focused' - his focus on hitting caused tensions with some of his team-mates. 'Prefers simplicity' - this is a common theme in the memories people share about him in He Left His Heart in San Diego. I guess you can't include everything on the back of a baseball card and loyalty was a great part of what made Tony Gwynn special.

Total: 36/394