Marcus was nice enough to send me a large stack of Braves spanning several decades with a few Orioles thrown in as well. The stack was tall enough that it's going to take more than one post to go through them all.
First up, a nice start to a Dale Murphy collection, a player that I surprisingly had no cards of prior to this package.
Some awesome oddballs that are all new to me. First up a card from Kay-Bee Toys. It took me a minute to realize that it was in fact the toy store, as I was accustomed to seeing it as KB in my childhood. These sets were produced from 1986 to 1990. The Murphy is from 1989.
The Cap'n Crunch card is from a 1989 set as well. By this point Murphy was past the prime of his career. Interesting how the KayBee card shows a Braves logo while the Cap'n Crunch does not. Looks like they had a license from the MLBPA only.
The Quaker Chewy card is one of the few cards where I've seen the card number on the front of the card. I appreciate seeing the Quaker Man on the front of the card, as well.
Out of the three backs, I appreciate the Quaker Chewy back the most, particularly the Career Highlights section. Storing my cards in binders, I appreciate when I don't have to turn the binder to read the card backs.
More Murphy cards, the first cards from each of these sets for me. I actually quite like the O-Pee-Chee design from 1984. The card on the right has writing in both English and French. Having taken French in high school, I appreciated seeing both languages on the back to be able to refresh my memory on some French I've forgotten over the years.
Marcus also included what is likely a team set from 1990 Donruss. I chose to scan my three favorites from the group, featuring a young Glavine and Smoltz. Both had only been in the majors a few years at this point, and I appreciated seeing their minor league statistics in combination with their major league statistics on the back of these cards.
Lastly for this post, Marcus sent a card from 1989 Topps, as well as a 2014 Topps Die-Cut 89 Mini. Kinda neat to see them side by side. Acker played ten years in the majors primarily as a relief pitcher, spending time with the Blue Jays, Braves, and Mariners. He did start 32 games in his career and win 33 games with a 3.97 ERA.
Finally, the first card in my Braves collection of outfielder Justin Upton. Upton's had a solid season for Atlanta, hitting .271 with 27 home runs and a career high 97 RBIs, while primarily batting cleanup. Upton has one more year on his contract before he becomes a free-agent, it appears. I've posted about these minis before, and I while I like the full size card from the original set, I can see what Topps was thinking when they made the die-cuts. Topps essentially eliminated the while space from the original card, which I'm in favor of. I guess you can say I've changed my tune somewhat on these.
Thanks, Marcus for the great group of cards! This was only a small portion of what was sent, and I'll share more in future posts!
Awesome! Glad you liked 'em!
ReplyDeleteCereal cards are great. Always takes me back to when I was young.
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