Surprise mailday from Shane

Late last week yet another bubble mailer showed up in my mailbox. This time it was from Shane Katz—yet another trading partner who I’m behind on sending a return to (don’t worry I have a stack I need to send out).

Shane’s a wonderfully thoughtful trader who has sent me all kinds of Giants cards in the past. This time though half of the package was 1978s for my set build. This batch takes me to needing only 63 cards and completed 9 pages. Very cool and that light at the end of the tunnel is getting bigger and bigger.

Highlights here are Eckersley, Blyleven, and Seaver—all big-name cards I was missing. As I get closer to the end of my set build the big name, Hall of Famer cards take up an increasing percentage of my searchlist so it’s always great to cross a few of those off.

The ALCS card is also a great one. I really dig the Sundberg photo. I continue to wish that the photographer who shot the Mets, Yankees, and Orioles had shot the rest of this set. Mitchell Page’s card is both kind of awful and kind of amazing. And yup, that huge press box looming over George Hendrick’s shoulder makes me all kinds of wistful for Candlestick.

The rest of the package was mostly Giants with a few other things mixed in. From the junk wax period comes a bunch of fun oddballs I was missing. The Atlee rub off is great. The Mays and Ott Circle K cards complete my team set there.* That Chili Davis Fleer Sticker is a lot of fun. As is the Jeff Leonard sticker back.** I love the mini leaders cards. Swell Baseball Greats are perfect repack material cards that are perfect for trading. And it’s always a joy to get a 1991 Studio card. One of these days I’ll pursue that set and write about how it changed my understanding of what a baseball card could be.

*I’m amazed at how yellow the varnish on those cards has gotten though.

**I enjoy that the stickers and sticker backs are listed as two distinct sets even thought they’re the same piece of cardboard.

The last card is 1994 Topps Spanish Lou Whitaker. I’ve made no secret of my interest in Spanish-language baseball cards and while I have a few Giants it’s always nice to get additional exemplars from all of those sets.

Moving into more-recent cards, we’ve got a great Bumgarner Heritage rookie and a so-bad-it’s-good Heritage Sandoval. A couple Gold cards including one from this year’s Update. I’m going to have to take a good look at how Topps did the Gold effect this year.

There are also a bunch of inserts from various Topps sets. As much as everyone complains about the insert madness, they do appear to be good trade package filler. I’ve yet to come across any team or player collectors who dislike receiving them. Even the ones like me who don’t chase these cards enjoy sliding them into the binder.

And finally Shane included my first samples of 2018 Donruss. Not a set I buy though I’m always intrigued at how it references old designs. Somehow or another a sample or two eventually makes its way to me though.

Last bit of the package includes three 1984 Fun food buttons. This is a set I’m completely unaware of. I like the idea of keeping them in 2x2s as if they were coins. They show well there and I don’t have to worry about getting tetanus.

Two relics are very cool. I admit that these don’t move me that much but they’re still interesting objects.  I do find myself wondering if any of the big-time relic collectors has taken note of how the uniform fabric has changed over the years.

and the two pack of Stadium Club were a fun rip. I used to love this set and its photography and production values when I was a kid. It’s still notably good now and includes a number of photographs that I don’t usually see on cards.

These two packs weren’t super exciting but each contained a Hall of Famer so that’s cool. Kevin Maas is also some peak Dated Rookie Nostalgia and RIP Darryl Kile. Thanks so much Shane! I’ll be putting packages together soon enough.