Saturday Night Five: Wallet Game Gwynns

I'm a little late to the party... but you know what they say, "better late than never".  Last week defgav over at Baseball Card Breakdown introduced a baseball card game on his blog.

The rules are simple.  Pick a "double" from your collection that you're willing to sacrifice and carry it around with you in your wallet for a full year.  Take photos of it from time to time and share them on your blog.

And since it's a game, there's also a winner who might win "something".  How do you win?  Just be the person who submits the coolest, unedited photo.  Easy, right?

Heck the hardest part for me was choosing a card for my wallet.  I decided to follow defgav's lead and chose a Tony Gwynn for a couple of reasons:

#1 - He's my favorite athlete of all-time.
#2 - Over the years, I've accumulated an abundance of his doubles.

I immediately ran into a problem.  There were so many cool Gwynn's to choose from.  I narrowed it down to these five:

1989 Donruss #6

Donruss Diamond Kings have always been one of my favorite subsets.  Dick Perez did an amazing job capturing the top players from the 80's in his paintings.

2000 UD Ovation #38

What happens when you combine a baseball with an embossed baseball card?  You get 2000 UD Ovation.  Beautiful card with great "conversation piece" potential.

1999 Stadium Club #126

Everyone knows that Gwynn was one of the best contact hitters of his era.  But he was also a five time Gold Glove Award winner and this card did an excellent job capturing him in action.

1995 Skybox Emotion #187

I was addicted to Skybox Emotion products back in the mid 90's.  It started with their basketball release and eventually carried on to their baseball and hockey lines.  Each card was printed on thicker than usual card stock and featured a word that captured or symbolized each player's emotion.  Skybox nailed it with Gwynn's word, because #19 was well known for being a student of the game.

1987 Topps #530

And rounding out my list is his 1987 Topps card, which made the final five for a couple of reasons.  I love the photograph Topps decided to use on this card.  But more importantly... 1987 was the year I made the switch from "collector" to "investor".  Sort of a cardboard collecting rite of passage.

In case you're wondering... I have since transitioned back to "collector" status.

The decision was tough, but in the end I went with the 1995 Skybox Emotion:

A big part of my life is my job and since I spend a lot of time in front of the classroom... this "scholar" would have plenty of photo ops throughout the year.

The Scholar's first appearance...

1st Staff Meeting of 2015

It's a shame that the first time Gwynn was exposed to my school, he had to sit through one hour of "blah, blah, blah".  And to make matters worse... I discovered that he already has a major crease running down the right side.  Oh well... it's not called the "top loader" or "screw down" game.  It's the Wallet Card Game.

Well that's it for now.  Thanks defgav for inspiring so many bloggers to do something together.  I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's photos throughout the year.

Happy Saturday and sayonara!