I had a solid 5-year run collecting baseball cards beginning in 1984, but in 1989 I stopped collecting, cold turkey. You see, I was about to enter high school. What would girls and fellow students think of a 13-year-old freshman that collected baseball cards? I was no longer a boy, I was a teenager. Those cards were placed in a closet, only to be a memory of my CHILDhood.
Bowman is back? What is an Upper Deck? Ken Griffey has a son that plays baseball? Cal's brother wrote what on the bottom of his bat?
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To paraphrase Steve McCroskey from Airplane!
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"Looks like I picked the wrong year to quit collecting baseball cards."
Well, maybe not so much on those Bowman's. Those over-sized cards would have driven me crazy. The Upper Deck's would have been nice to dive into. Pulling Ken Griffey, Jr. rookie cards would have been great trade bait to obtain more Darryl Strawberry cards, I'm sure. As for the Billy Ripken card, I suppose I could have hidden that from my parents in a drawer somewhere, only to pull it out like it was some stashed away Playboy magazine whenever I wanted to look at it and laugh.
Anyway, my time away from baseball cards only lasted a year. When I became a sophomore, I guess I just didn't care what girls or fellow students would say about a 14-year-old baseball card collector. Besides, how would they find out? I certainly wasn't going to tell anyone.
Leaf packs are this much? Aren't they just Canadian Donruss cards?
Boy, a lot changed during my hiatus, and got a lot more expensive, too. I was all in, though.
I'm surprised nobody's commented yet... I've been enjoying the "Keys" so far, and I'm looking forward to more.
ReplyDeleteI've been collecting steadily since I was 9, and as soon as I realized that collecting baseball cards would open me up to more abuse, I went straight into "covert mode". Girls weren't a factor because I was too scared to talk to them anyway. I still remember the time in high school that I ran into a classmate at a flea market; we were both going up to the same box of penny cards, and as soon as we saw each other, we didn't bond over our love of cards, no, of course not. Instead, we got very awkward and tried to pretend that we weren't there for the cards.
BTW, I'm pretty sure that Billy Ripken was the subject of a prank; I can't imagine that someone would write that on the knob of his own bat.
I appreciate you being the first to comment. This blog is still just a few days old, so hopefully people will discover it soon and add comments.
DeleteI just checked out your blog and enjoyed what I've read so far. You have a new follower here.