What Do I Do With This?

One thing I completely failed to mention in my write-up of a package I got from dayf of Cardboard Junkie awhile back is that he sent over an unopened pack of the postcard-sized 1986 Donruss All-Stars set. As you can see, the packs come with 3 cards, one "pop-up" card and a few Hank Aaron puzzle pieces (featuring Hank Aaron.) The primary reason I was sent this, I'm sure, is that there's good ol' Osborne Earl Smith showing on the front of the pack in all of his pop-up glory. It turns out that I already have this "card", so now I'm stuck with a minor dilemma. Do I save the pack as some sort of extra Ozzie memento. Obviously, I'm not considering being like one of those creeps who sends in packs to Beckett or other companies to get them graded (what fun is that?) But I could hang onto it in its pristine shape. Keep in mind that I was one of those kids who could not even fathom leaving anything in the package. I frequently have a difficult time making it home before opening packs when I buy them.

Another motivating factor might be that I used to love these large sized cards and the mid-'80s sets are what I started in on collecting in the first place. I have fond memories of all of the 1986 sets, from Donruss and Fleer right on down to those silly Kay-Bee Toys glossy cards that they used to sell in tiny boxes at Newberry's. At one point I had a pretty healthy stack of the Donruss All-Star jumbo cards from 1984, 1985 and 1986, but they are not easy to store and they eventually were purged when I started dumping things en masse that were not in passable condition. (What was I thinking?) Anyway, besides the Ozzie pop-up card, I can see that the top card showing is a Brewers card (I was assuming Robin Yount at first, but when I look at the checklist I think it's gotta be Cecil Cooper) and the last card is most definitely Sparky Anderson. What could the middle card be? I am positive that I don't own the Ozzie Smith card itself from the set, so that possibility is always there.

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I'm going off the grid for a few days, so there won't be any posts here until Monday night at the earliest. I do want to take the opportunity to plug http://sruchris.net/. I recently completed a feature-length trade with Chris and just haven't found the time to post about it yet. He's got quite an extensive want list (and trade list), so those of you who like to do the card-swapping sort of thing should definitely check out his website and go work out a deal. I will give this its proper due next week, I promise.

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For those of you that have digital cable or one of those dishy things, now is a great time to scope out MLB Network. They've been running game 1 of the 1968 World Series in its entirety the past couple of days. I just watched Bob Gibson strike out 17 pesky Tigers, which made me feel better about the Cards dropping the final game of their 3-game series last night. I'm not sure where else I've ever seen full replays of games that old before, and it was fun to listen to Harry Caray call a Cards game before he became a permanently belligerent Cubs Fan / Bud Man.