Today the summer math program that I teach at took our annual field trip to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, which is an animal themed amusement park. Most of the students had a lot of fun eating junk food, watching shows, playing carnival games, and of course going on rides.
It took me back to my own childhood when it was known as Marine World Africa USA and located about 45 minutes closer to my house (in Redwood City). Whenever my parents asked me where I wanted to go for my birthday, I always picked either The Exploratorium, Great America, Chuck E. Cheese, or Marine World Africa USA.
Unfortunately it just wasn't as cool as I remember it being. As crazy as this sounds... it sort of reminds me of 1990 Leaf baseball cards.
Back in the day, this was one of my favorite baseball card sets. In the early 90's, I spent a decent percentage of my paychecks building this 528 card set. It had everything. A solid checklist with future hall of famers and a nice crop of rookies. A simple, yet attractive card design. And its production was limited compared to Topps, Fleer, and Donruss.
It's actually one of the few items I decided to keep after I sold off my collection at the turn of the millennium. Today the set sits in a box collecting dust in my parent's garage. Every few years, I'll pull it out and flip through it when I go down to visit them.
And each time I do... it seems like the set is slowly losing it's luster... much like Marine World has.
But a few weeks ago, I stumbled across a guy who had some Series One packs for sale at the Serramonte Mall Card Show. He offered me the entire twelve pack lot for $4. That's about how much I used to spend on one pack, let alone twelve packs. I had no choice but to purchase them.
On the drive home from work, I remembered that they were waiting for me in my office. So after I grabbed a drink and took a shower, I sat down and busted them open. Here's a look at some of the key cards I pulled...
Fifteen years ago, this card was one of the hottest cards in the hobby. Today, it's not. But I was still excited to pull the rookie card of a 600 Home Run Club member... even if he's bunting in his photo.
Is it Joey or Albert? Is it a rookie card or not? Regardless here's another card that was pretty hot in the mid 90's.
Never realized how many things these two had in common until I saw this card. Athletics. Photo backgrounds. Batting Stances. Home run power. PED's.
And finally... I'll wrap things up with Mr. Walk. Twenty years ago, this card would have been just another card thrown into another box of commons. These days, I don't think I'll see another card of him without thinking of the great baseball card blog: Bob Walk the Plank.
Okay I've fallen asleep several times while writing this post and there's less than five minutes before it's officially Saturday.. I think it's time I wrap things up and hit the sack. While I'm catching up on sleep...
Any thoughts or memories on 1990 Leaf baseball?
Happy Friday and sayonara!
18 comments:
That brings back memories. When I got back in to collecting in 1992 the second card I chased down was the 1990 Leaf Griffey (after the 89 UD Griffey) which was followed by the 1990 Leaf Frank Thomas card.
There was a dude at a local show by me that would build set after set of that stuff all through the 90's. He was convinced it was *the* set from that era that would appreciate in value. I hope he didn't bet his retirement on that one.
When I was a kid I met a dealer who had HUNDREDS of the Frank Thomas RC from this set. Just a big case with literally hundreds. He was selling them for $35 a pop, Hi Beckett value for that time. I offered him a pretty fair trade for one of them and he declined.
Looking back, screw that guy.
Brand recognition!
Always remember seeing packs of these at Hollywood Video (kind of bizzare that our video store had vintage packs of cards like Topps from the 80's and recent releases too) and they were high priced. I want to say off the top of my head it was like $12-$15 a pack..this and 91 Stadium Club were very high priced.
I love 1990 Leaf. Finally bought the set on eBay a year or two ago.. one of the very few complete sets I own.
I think of this as one of the more iconic sets of the 90's.
I remember the Griffey fetching big $$$ back in the day. I want to say the shop I worked at sold them for $15 (maybe $20) each. These days you can find them for a little over a buck on COMC. I've seen them in quarter bins at card shows.
It's such a shame. I spent a bunch of $$$ building that set too. Today they sell for around $30 on eBay. Back in the day, $30 would buy you 5 or 6 packs.
He's probably friends with the guys I knew with hundreds of 89UD Griffeys in their cases. It's a good thing he turned you down. Just checked eBay... you can pick up a PSA 8 copy for around $15... and a PSA 9 for $19.99.
Yup!
Funny you mentioned 1991 Stadium Club. I just came across the Frank Thomas from that set in a dime box a few weeks ago and was going to write a post about that card in the near future.
You were smart. Probably paid 10% of what it cost me to build my set. What are some of the other sets you own?
Me too.
I do like the simple design on these Leaf sets from the early 90s. The downside is that we could all wallpaper the inside and outside of each of our residences with these cards and still have a million left over.
Maybe it was because I was in my mid-20's at the time and not as swayed by what was hot... More likely it was because I was (and am) cheap... but I never really got into any of the Leaf sets, just picking up the occasional cards here and there. Right now I've got a grand total of 15 cards from the 1990 Leaf set in my collection. I don't even have all the players from the Mets or Orioles. Even more telling, I don't have the Bip Roberts card from this set!
This is completely off-topic, but since Blogger/Feedburner/Google/Whatever only likes my blog on alternate Sundays I wanted to make sure you knew that there's a Kurt Suzuki All-Star custom in my blog today:
http://shlabotnikreport.wordpress.com/2014/07/14/shlabotnik-report-all-stars-american-league/
True. That can be said for about 98% of the products released in the early 90's. Although... I wouldn't necessarily classify the 1990 Leaf set as junk wax. Definitely the other years though.
The Suzuki virtual card is awesome! Thanks for sharing the link. By the way... I probably have a 90L Bip Roberts for you somewhere.
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