Sports Cards Ate My Brain

Page 5 brings us in to 1983.  The Braves won the division for the first time I could remember and Dale Murphy would go on to win his second MVP award.  The city was having a ball.  I was at the peak of my teen aged collecting, taking any money I got and going to 7-11 to buy some packs of cards and a Slurpee (with a baseball coin in the bottom.)  George's batting average stayed above .300 and he was still the perennial American League All-Star Third baseman. Here are the cards for page 5: 1983 Donruss 338 This is an almost identical Donruss design from 1982 except there is a glove instead of a ball and the bat points in the opposite direction.  Not a lot of imagination here. 1983 Fleer 649 Yes, it's a checklist but it has George's name on it.  I will replace it with a regular Brett Fleer card some day and put it in my Braves collection since their checklist is on the back. 1983 Kellogg's 4 We say goodbye to Kellogg's after this set.  It's a little on th...

On page four we finish up 1981 and move into 1982.  Baseball had a short season in 1981 because of a strike.  George batted .314 in 1981, which would be good, but it is a drop off from hitting .390 in 1980. The cards: 1981 Squirt 1 These cards were sold with the Squirt soft drink.  I can't say it is one of my favorites and I don't remember seeing it in 1981.  I had to get this card on ebay.  These cards were sold in strips of 2.  George had two different combos, both of which I have.  The cards were produced by Topps. 1981 Topps 700 Usually with Topps having a card number that is a multiple of 100 means you are one of the best players in the set. 1982 Spotbilt 5 I believe Topps produced these for a sports shoe company.  I know I have seen Spotbilt ads of other players. 1982 Donruss 34 I like the bat and ball design on these cards even though they are pretty basic. 1982 K-Mart 38 Topps produced this set for K-Mart which highlighted MVP winners from...

Page 3 is all 1981 cards.  1981 was the first year for Donruss and Fleer and there were also more readily available food and oddball sets than previous years. Here are the cards:G Donruss 537 George ended up winning three batting title and Rod Carew seven so this card is pretty much spot on. Drake's 5 These came with some sort of snack cake that I don't remember us having in Georgia.  They were produced by Topps so the backs look almost identical to the regular Topps release. Fleer 28 I liked the 1981 Fleer design better than the Donruss.  One of the main reasons would be the full stats on the back.  In fact, Fleer even included minor league stats for veterans for many years. Fleer 28 What?  Didn't we just have card 28?  The first one was an error in numbering.  This is what the actual card 28 should look like. Fleer 655 This is how that first card should have been numbered.  At some point in the production Fleer corrected the issue. Fleer Star St...

Picking up where we left off from "It's All About George" here is page 2 of my George Brett card album. The Cards: 1978 Topps 100 This is the Topps version of the O-Pee-Chee cards that ended page 1.  This was the first card I remember a George Brett card from even though I know I got the 1977 out of a pack. 1979 Kellogg's 50 If you were a Major League superstar in the 1970s you were going to be in every Kellogg's set.   1979 O-Pee-Chee 167 1979 Topps 330 The only difference is the logos on the front.  I like the anticipatory fielding stance. 1980 Burger King Pitch Hit and Run 13 This is identical to the Topps issue except for the Burger King logo and "Collector's Series" in the top left corner.  I never participate in Pitch. Hit and Run.  I did do Punt, Pass and Kick one year. 1980 Kellogg's 9 I like the two diagonal yellow stripes that break up the design. 1980 Topps 450 This is my favorite card fro...

I really like non-sports cards and got into the first few releases of Donruss Americana and other sets from Topps.  I pulled many cards I liked and then ended up selling them on Ebay, much to my regret.   I was much more of a Mary Ann fan than a Ginger fan.   I'm A Believer!  (My apologies for the bad joke.) These Marilyn Monroe swatches are in different Donruss sets but have to be from the same dress.  I had about 20 of the different Movie Posters cards with swatches from various stars. Pieces of space vehicles are cool.  Should have kept them. I bought a case of 2010 A&G a box at a time.  Would like these better if Blaine wasn't shirtless. We end with these nice redemptions from Upper Deck.  I liked the fact that I didn't know what I would get when until these arrived in the mail.

To recap:  These are the cards I would take with me if I could take ten 9-card pages with me to Mars. I decided that each part of my collection cannot have more than one page.  The cards must fit into a regulation page as far as height and width but I am taking liberties with how thick some of the cards are. The third page is made up of non-Brave, non-George Brett baseball cards. 1909 T206 Rube Geyer This card has to be included because it is my oldest baseball cards and is from one of the great sets.  This one has the common Piedmont back.  I got it at a pawn shop for $3.  For those of you who may be unaware, cards of all types were packaged with cigarettes in the late 19th and early to mid 20th century. 1968 Topps Game #8 Topps Game cards were inserted in 1968 packs.  This is my favorite one because it is an all-time great plus it is a Home Run.  This is one of the sets I'm trying to complete. 1969 Topps #237 This is Bobby ...

To recap:  These are the cards I would take with me if I could take ten 9-card pages with me to Mars. I decided that each part of my collection cannot have more than one page.  The cards must fit into a regulation page as far as height and width but I am taking liberties with how thick some of the cards are. Page 2 is all about my favorite player, George Brett.  I got to see George play exactly once.  The game was on August 5, 1980 in Detroit.  We were in Michigan visiting family and my dad took me to see the Tigers.  George hit a 3-run bomb in the first inning and then was knocked down twice by inside pitches in the 6th by Detroit starter Milt Wilcox.  George flew out and, as soon as the outfielder caught the ball, George charged the mound and started a brawl.  It was sublime. 1975 Topps #228 For those of you who don't know, this is George's rookie card.  It has to be included here just because of that. 1979 Kellogg's #50 ...