call this a mockumentary

documentary sucks. my least favorite product of the year - at least of the ones i bought a significant amount of. as a team collector, i was really looking forward to this product. all 162 dodger games documented? 81 home whites? 81 away grays? kershaw's debut? awesome. actual product? crap.back in 1997, upper deck had text on each card giving the circumstances of the photo - including the date. here's mark lemke. the caption says "meets media before marathon game at l.a. - 6/3/96". and you can clearly see this is dodger stadium. this is what i expected from documentary.

instead, they slap pictures of any team player, regardless of their impact on that particular game, with no regard for the caption they wrote! that kent card at the top? a generic caption, but the writeup on the back is about furcal and martin. plus the game was at cincy but the photo looks like san fran to me. some other cases in point:

angels game 154picture of john lackey with a caption referring to francisco rodriguez! and it's a milestone game for k-rod! i can't tell if lackey even pitched in this game.

brewers game 36. picture of eric gagne and a caption referring to ryan braun. maybe there weren't any highlights for gagne so they put him on this card just to include him in the set.

nope. here's brewers game 39only 3 games later - with a caption related to gagne's performance. and a picture of jason kendall.

now for some dodger goodness...

game 16. at atlanta. this makes sense - a picture of andruw jones! but he's in his home whites! and the caption refers to a "speedy veteran"! the back of the card is all about juan pierre. ugh.

game 17.

still at the braves. caption refers to (of course) andruw jones and his return to atlanta. so let's put a picture of james loney at st. louis on this card. why not?

game 153.

at pittsburgh. maddux in the home whites. kind of a generic caption, but with the game going extras, i can't tell if maddux pitched in this game or not.

well, probably not. here's game 154. the very next game! and the caption is all about maddux pitching his 5000th career inning. with a picture of manny.

game 155.nomar! with a generic offense caption! this works - except that it was a home game and nomar's wearing the grays. and the writeup on the back is all about manny.

here's how the giants look for the same game.

timmy! in the grays, but not at dodger stadium. neither the caption or the write up on the back indicate whether lincecum pitched or not.

now, having a photo - especially of a key play or player - from each game would be a daunting task. i figured upper deck either planned accordingly for this product or made some sort of deal with freelance or ap photographers or something like that. yes, i am naive about how that all works.

they did manage to get some right, with the player at least. here's twins game 144.

photo of nick blackburn, caption about nick blackburn, writeup on back about nick blackburn. nice work. except he's in the away jersey and game 144 was at the metrodome.

now for the worst part. take a look at dodgers game 152.

well, the road uni fits, as this game was at pnc park, and nomar is mentioned in the writeup on the back. but, wait. it's the same picture as game 155! woo-hoo!

documentary sucks. pure fiction.