He went on to tell me that he has a rather decent sized collection back home, but didn't have a reason to have them sent out since he didn't know anyone here would share in the hobby. He has since had his cards sent out, rifled through a couple boxes real quick, and presented me with a few cards. He said he has a long way to go, and I'm very happy so far.
Starting off is a Greg Maddux right on top. I have a small PC of him so far, 11-12 before this one, so was happy to add another to the set. The Andre Dawson is number 8. Add in a few guys from 80's/90's that I didn't have, plus a couple upgrades, and I'm pretty happy.
The 2002 Hundley had a special story behind it, as 2002 is a year that sticks out to him for sitting around the TV with family to watch baseball with an aging relative. He mentioned he had a whole bunch of cards from that time and is excited to continue digging.
Next we have some guys that will be added as the second card for that player, with the exception of the Gumpert, that's a dupe, so it's either going back to the Sox fan or to my buddy in Chitown.
Lastly, I was surprised by what I was thinking was a set of 1988 Topps Cubs... I was close.
First thought was "wow, did my '88 Topps really fade from the original orange?" [Remember, I'm just getting back into collecting, and I was 5-6 when these were new]. Part of my thinking there was because these were freshly unwrapped from their waxy bindings. I then saw the 42T, so was thinking they were from a team set. Nope, still wrong. After some research, I found out that they are from the 135 card set of 1988 Topps Traded (precurser to Topps Update?). Even better? There are 9 Cubs cards in the set, and he gave me each of them!
As I was digging through these, he was telling me how much he was enjoying digging through the cards, and how he thanks me/curses me for getting him back into it.
Sorry, not sorry!
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And if you missed it, I received a sweet PWE from The Card Chop, check it out!
Yeah, the Topps Traded sets started in 1981. That year, they were numbered consecutively as if a continuation to the main set. Then, in 1982, Topps started with the different numbering convention of adding letters -- sometimes a "T" after the number, more recently an "UH" or "US" to the front of the number.
ReplyDeleteI probably have some cards from the mid-1980s that I can dump...er, send...to you to get your collection jump started. Send me your address by email to off(dot)hiatus(dot)baseball(at)gmail(dot)com (of course, replacing the words dot and at with actual periods and the at symbol).
Awesome, thanks!! Email incoming.
DeleteVery cool to reignite that fire in a buddy!
ReplyDeleteIt's always really nice to discover that your buddies collected cards too; I inherited a small collection that way a few years back. However, it's even cooler to see their passion for cards reignited that way!
ReplyDeleteI'd love to get a fellow friend back into collecting one day. I had a few card-collecting buddies when I was a pre-teen, but that was a while ago now.
ReplyDeleteAll it took was randomly handing him a stack of his favorite team, not knowing if he collected or not, and it took off from there.
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