One Card Only - Focus Pocus

This card arrived in the mail from Jeff at Wax Pack Wonders. It combines a lot of things I appreciate about baseball cards on the cusp of the new millennium. A long-forgotten set range, a name for an insert set that feels borne out of creative deaperation, and shininess! So much shininess!

Card Number 773: Fleer Focus, 2000; # FP2

Somebody was tasked with thinking up a name for a shiny insert series and really struggled. The best they could imagine up was Focus Pocus. Like the magic words Hocus Pocus but with an F. Maybe the Fleer employee in question was a fan of the film from 1993 starring Bette Midler and Sarah Jessica Parker.  

Anyway, here is the card, which got focuspocussed up on my flatbed scanner.

My flatbed scanner (a Brother DCP-L25000 for reference) really likes picking up the blue part of the spectrum in shiny cards. Because the card looks nothing like that scan.

My overhead scanner (made by Kinghun and bought off Amazon) captured it more accurately.

The back isn't shiny. It's very colourful though. And so is the write-up, which references Tony using his baseball bat like a "magic wand" and hexing opposing pitchers. (Which I'm pretty sure would contravene some rules!)

As I've collected several cards produced by Fleer towards the end of the 90s, I've noticed some very florid descriptions on cardbacks. Mainly they appear on Fleer cards released under Skybox branding, but sometimes the copywriting staff were let loose on cards in other ranges too, especially after Fleer was bought by the owners of the Rite Aid chain of pharmacies in 1999. (Fleer had a turbulent time at the end of the decade. They were owned by Marvel before being sold off when Marvel went bankrupt!)

I just want to say thanks again to Jeff for sending me this little bit of magic from the beginning of the millennium. 

Total: 773 cards (and 400 blog posts!)

Wax Pack Wanderers

Two days ago an envelope arrived all the way from North Dakota containing six Tony Gwynn cards that I didn't have before. They were sent by Jeff who blogs at Wax Pack Wonders, along with a note.

Jeff says 'Believe it or not' - well, I believe! And I'm really grateful to be able to give these wanderers a home!

One of the cards was from my favourite ever Leaf set, and in a change to normal practice I'm going to show you the back of the card first.

Card Number 742: Leaf Gold All Stars, 1993; #9

You can tell this is the cardback because it has the copyright notice up the side. On Saturday I blogged about another card from the Leaf 1993 set which had a brilliant cardback featuring a map of upstate New York. The base cards from the 1993 set also had spectacular backs with cityscapes in the background. Tony's brother, Chris, got a card in the Update series of that set too. 

This could have been a "Sharing the Spotlight" post, which is what I do when Tony features on a card with another player. These All Star cards had a National League All Star on one side and an American League All Star on the other. Tony was paired up with none other than Jose Canseco.

The vivid blue background in the photo of Jose really makes that picture look a bit special - more so than the picture of Tony. With the floaty fuzzy clouds and the sunlight striking him, he looks like a demigod. Not a bad cardfront, even if the real interest, for me, is on the cardback!

Thank you Jeff, for this great addition to my collection, and for the other cards too, which I will be blogging soon!

Total: 742 cards

Hit Machine 3000 part deux

At the very start of September I blogged about receiving some cards in a giveaway from Jeff at Wax Pack Wonders. It included a numbered card from an insert series that Pacific released to celebrate Tony achieving his 3000th hit in the game.

I recently watched Tony's speech from his induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame and he talked about how when he scored his 2000th hit his former team-mate Jerald Clark was on first base for their opponents, the Colorado Rockies. He said he remembered saying to Jerald, "I need to get another thousand hits." Six years to the day later, he snagged his 3000th.

The Pacific insert series was called Hit Machine 3000, which is such a turn-of-the-Millennium phrase it's almost comical. 

I said in my blog-post about Jeff's generosity that "It might not be easy tracking any more of these down." Then, strangely, two cards appeared from that set on eBay from a UK-based seller. I thought they were a bit over-priced at first and I watched them as they cycled through their first auction period. They got relisted at a slightly lower price and I rewatched them again. Then, 24 hours before the auction ended the seller made an offer to everyone watching, and I decided to buy them. 

Card Number 454: Pacific Omega Hit Machine 3000, 1999; #8

Pacific declared Tony an American Hero on this card. The picture would be slightly over the top, without the fireworks!

This is card number 482 in the 3000 print run. Perhaps I should have kept this for a few blog posts' time and it could have been card number 482 on this blog too!

The back shows Tony in a more natural pose - one of the back rooms in the stadium. There aren't many 'behind the scenes' photos on baseball cards. 

Card Number 455: Pacific Omega Hit Machine 3000, 1999; #9

On the 9th card in the insert series, Tony was described as a 'Fan Favorite'.

Although it a posed photo like the previous card, Tony looks much happier here than he looked when he was draped in the American flag. This card is numbered 681 / 3000.

On the back we have a photo of him signing autographs. One of my favourite kinds of photos of Tony 'in action'.

On the back it mentions Tony's humanitarian award in 1995 and also his charitable foundation. There is a moment in his Hall of Fame speech when he mentions the community service team at the Padres and just says, "We've done a lot of good work, haven't we?" That outward focus and care for others is part of Tony's lasting legacy.

Total: 455 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

Wax Pack Wonder Wow

Happy September, everyone!

I recently commented on Jeff's blog, Wax Pack Wonders, because he was running a giveaway. I then emailed him to say I understood if he didn't want to send cards overseas. He said he didn't mind, and then a couple of days ago a white envelope with an American stamp on came through my letterbox. 

There were three Tony Gwynn cards in the envelope, along with cards of Greg Vaughn and Manny Machado, and a note from Jeff. 

All three cards were brilliant and they will all get profiled on the blog eventually. But today as a thank you to Jeff, I'm going to blog about one of them.

Card Number 312: Pacific Omega Hit Machine 3000, 1999; #2

Pacific Omega Hit Machine 3000 sounds a bit like an android from a dorky science fiction series, but it was actually a 21 card insert series honouring Tony Gwynn achieving the 3,000 hit mark in 1999. Pacific Omega was the set released by Pacific towards the end of the year, a bit like Topps Update and sets like that.

The inserts were in hobby boxes of the product and all the cards were numbered to 3,000. This was the second card in the set and features an extreme close up of Tony's face.

You can just about make out the serial numbering at the bottom of the card there. This is card 1981/3000. I'm not a big fan of numerology, but some numbers are more meaningful than others. 1981 was the year Tony was drafted in the third round by the Padres. 

There's some more numbers on the back.

Another one of those numbers is coincidentally meaningful. Tony was one of 19 players who had scored 200 hits in five seasons. 19 is of course the magic number where Tony is concerned. 

This looks like it would be a lovely set to collect. Pacific remains one of my favourite card producers and they seemed to really put lots of care into their sets. It might not be easy tracking any more of these down, so I am hugely grateful to Jeff for sending it to me. 

Jeff's blog is Wax Pack Wonders - highly recommended reading!

Total: 312/394