the next two sheets from the steve garvey binders mark the end of the century

sheet 28 in my first of two primary steve garvey binders picks up where we left off with sheet 27.  have a look:

those cards are:

1. 1994 upper deck all-time heroes 125th anniversary parallel
2. 1994 upper deck all-time heroes (heroes of baseball) 125th anniversary parallel
3. 1995 sonic baseball greats
4. 1994 upper deck the american epic
5. 1995 upper deck sp championship (october legends)
6. 1995 upper deck sp championship (classic performances)
7. 1995 upper deck sp championship series (october legends) die-cut parallel
8. 1995 upper deck sp championship series (classic performances) die-cut parallel
9. 1996 danbury mint

and so begins the glut of parallels.  it was great to have a couple of parallels to find back in the late 1990's, but it is quite tedious today.  i see that i have a card out of sequence on this sheet, but i'll fix that later.  lots of good stuff on this sheet, but the highlight may well be the pete rose card from the 1994 upper deck the american epic set (a companion set to ken burns' baseball documentary) that features garvey lurking in the background as rose celebrates hit number 4192.

here are the backs:

the next sheet includes the first certified garvey autograph cards, one of which is the first card i ever purchased on ebay. here's sheet 29:

those cards are:

1. 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever
2. 1999 fleer sports illustrated greats of the game
3. 1999 fleer sports illustrated greats of the game autograph
4. 1999 fleer sports illustrated greats of the game cover collection (dodgers)
5. 1999 fleer sports illustrated greats of the game cover collection (padres)
6. 1999 upper deck retro
7. 1999 upper deck retro gold parallel
8. 1999 upper deck retro inkredible auto
9. 2000 nabisco all-stars

garvey has been on the cover of sports illustrated four times, and three of those covers are represented on this sheet.  the first card features a cover from 1974 during the world series between the a's and dodgers.  that's garvey in the lower left corner of the montage.  the other two cards featuring covers showcase the 1976 and 1983 covers, respectively, with the '83 cover also being used for the autograph insert.  the only garvey si cover not used for a card is the april, 1982 baseball preview issue cover.

in other news,  the inkredible auto from 1999 ud retro was the first card i ever purchased on ebay.  i had gone onto the site to find a 1995 upper deck sp championship kirk gibson card that i had seen somewhere, and i discovered that the garv had an autographed card on the market.  the first of many, as it turns out.

here are the backs:

i appreciate fleer's bold coa on the back of the greats auto.

the 2000 nabisco all-star card was the last card of garvey in the 20th century, and it is the 36th post-playing career card in the binders.  that's an average of about 3 new garvey cards per year.  the 21st century would blow that ratio out of the water.  stay tuned.

the nl east for jackie

let's see the national league east teams wear the jackie robinson anniversary patch, shall we?

braves - 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever javy lopez

marlins - 1998 fleer sports illustrated gary sheffield

this card gives us a good look at the marlins' version of the patch.  it was modified to match the team colors.

mets - 1998 upper deck todd hundley

as a bonus, we get a little piece of the patch on luis gonzalez's jersey, too.

expos - 1998 upper deck jim bullinger

i really wanted to find a card in my collection showing the expos in their home pinstripes with the patch, but i could not find one.  the reason being that they modified the patch to translate 'breaking barriers' into french for the jerseys they wore in quebec.  here's what that patch looks like.

the marlins, expos, and dodgers were the only teams to modify the patch.

phillies - 1998 upper deck scott rolen

this card is appropriate as it notes rolen was the recipient of the jackie robinson award aka the rookie of the year award.

american league east examples up next...

the al west for jackie

back in 1997, the american league west, like the national league west, consisted of only four teams.  here are four cards that represent the jackie robinson anniversary patch very well, in my opinion.

angels - 1998 fleer sports illustrated then and now rickey henderson

a's - 1998 upper deck jason mcdonald

mariners - 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever ken griffey jr

rangers - 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever juan gonzalez

the griffey card is my favorite of the bunch.  up next, the national league central...

the dodgers and the nl west for jackie

in 1997, all of major league baseball celebrated the 50th anniversary with the universal retirement of jackie robinson's number 42.  each team also wore a 50th anniversary patch, comemmorating jackie's big league debut which occured 67 years ago today.  i plan to show a card from each team (by division as they were in 1997) that showcases the patch as my way of honoring jackie today.  first up, of course, is the nl west.

the dodgers were one of three teams to have a unique version of the patch - the text 'dodgers' was added to the top of the patch.  you can see it on hideo nomo's 1998 score card

the dodger version of the patch also notes the anniversary

while the other teams' version included the text 'breaking barriers' instead.

here's a 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever card of the rockies' larry walker displaying the patch.

and here's a 1998 upper deck tony gwynn card representing the padres

and a 1998 upper deck card of bill mueller representing the giants

the giants were one of three teams to only wear the patch at home.  on the road, they wore a patch acknowledging the 40th anniversary of their move to san francisco.

this is not a memorial patch, but i do have these cards in a binder - the only anniversary patch so honored.  stay tuned throughout the day for the rest of the teams' entries.

another double play dump

let's start another day of double play cards with 1997 topps stadium club and gary disarcina

and keith lockhart

and jody reed

here's a 1997 upper deck collector's choice fernando vina card

with tim salmon barreling in.  although, if you're vina, once you've survived an albert belle attack, i'm guessing tim salmon isn't too frightening.

here are some fleer sports illustrated double play turns - this one is from 1998 fleer si world series fever, and it features a levitating barry larkin

with a sliding steve finley in san diego.  these next two are from 1999 fleer sports illustrated, and they feature a tumbling derek jeter

and an upended tony womack

looks like ken caminiti did his job.

bret boone stares down vinny castilla on his 1999 topps chrome card

while mike caruso sails over somebody who is obscured by the text on his 2000 fleer ultra card

here are two different versions of the 2001 topps adam kennedy card - i like this card a lot, but not as much as i like kennedy's 2012 topps update card.  here's the gold version

and here's the chrome version

part of the allure of this card is that there aren't a lot of cards with fp santangelo as a dodger on them

moving on to 2001 upper deck, here's neifi perez

and eric young

too bad this one is from his cubs days - it's a nice one.

cover me

one of the best things to have come from fleer's partnership with sports illustrated in the late 1990's are the use of the magazine covers as baseball cards.  in fact, these cards are so cool and such a natural fit, that it's really too bad that there was no topps/inside sports collaboration or donruss/sport teamup.  thankfully we did get one of way too few jimmy wynn as a dodger cards as part of the 1999 fleer sports illustrated greats of the game set.

it comes from the appropriately named 'cover collection' insert set.  and it has friends.

johnny podres, the 1955 sportsman of the year

 maury wills from 1965

 and steve garvey from 1975

garvey's cover turn as a padre was also included in the set, but i'd rather show a different garvey cover.

this next one is from 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever, and was part of the base set

it features the first ever all-california world series (there have been a few others since - 1988, 1989, and 2002) which saw the dodgers face the a's.  the a's won in five games, but at least we get this card that features dodger stadium, steve yeager triumphant over sal bando thanks to joe ferguson's arm, rollie fingers' mustache, garvey breaking out of the box, and billy buckner with what might be bert campaneris toppled over on top of him.

the only disappointment i had with these cards is that fleer didn't include si cover cards for the 1977 or 1978 world series.  how cool would these covers have been to have as cards?

a 1977 double play turn by billy russell in dodger stadium

and a lee lacy sliding in night card, also from chavez ravine.

those are some cards that totally should have been!

group breakin' 2 - world series boogaloo

i recently participated in ryan's second group break (that would be ryan of 'o' no not another oriole blog) and brought home some nice dodgers.  the break included 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever, from which i scored this card of the 1988 world series mvp, orel hershiser

it's too bad they didn't have a card for the trio of mvp's from 1981.

this next card is not new to my collection, or the blog, but it needs to be shown again, for obvious reasons

a magnificent moment, to be sure.

i drew the pirates as my second team.  a few months ago, that would have been ok since there was that pirates treasure room blog.  he's gone awol (and left me hanging trade-wise), and i don't think billy suter is trading anymore and i am not sure about the real dfg either.  anyway, i got a few nice buccos, including a card of another walk-off series homer, courtesy of bill mazeroski

way to beat them yankees, bill!

i also got some cards from 1999 fleer sports illustrated, including this one of a bespectacled raul mondesi

and this one of a dazed and confused chan ho park

i do not believe either bazooka or gatorade had to pay for product placement on that card.

1999 topps stars was also featured in the break, which means i was destined to get some cards of kevin brown

and gary sheffield

and i did!

i was happy to see 2002 upper deck victory included in the break.  victory was pretty much upper deck's version of topps total.  that means that instead of a set just featuring shawn green, kevin brown, gary sheffield, and eric karros, i got cards featuring the likes of james baldwin

this is significant, because topps did not include baldwin in their 2001 traded set, and by the time 2002 rolled around, they were able to feature him as a mariner in the flagship set.  i think the only other card featuring baldwin as a dodger (in my collection, anyway) is a 2001 bowman heritage card, and it's in black and white.  baldwin spent the last half of the 2001 season in los angeles, and was 3-6 in 12 starts. welcome to the blog, mr. baldwin.  maybe in a couple of years, there will be more james baldwin dodger cards, as his son is currently in the dodgers' minor league system.

another card of note i received is this 2002 ud victory darren dreifort gold parallel

because we can't expect to have a set without some frills, can we?

thanks for hosting the break ryan!

world series fever - catch it!

i bought into thorzul's recent el cheapo group break and, in a flashback to my youth when they were battling it out in the old nl west, i was randomly assigned the reds as a companion to my dodgers.  here's some of what i received.

first up is a 2005 upper deck milton bradley 'color variation'

i had no idea what this was and why there was blue ivy instead of green.  i own the regular version of this card, so i knew something was up.  turns out that there are similar variations to every base card in the set as far as i can tell from the internets.  just another upper deck gimmick.

from blue to red - here's a 1980 topps card that was included in my bounty

the reds didn't have a nice stadium to use as a backdrop like the dodgers did, nor did they have a world class zoo to use as the padres did.  just astroturf and an outfield wall.

there were also a bunch of cards from the 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever set, including one of the few charles johnson as a dodger cards

johnson certainly had world series fever in 1997 as part of the world champion marlins.  eric karros, however, did not

karros only got as far as the nlds with the dodgers, and then was a member of the 2003 cubs that lost to the marlins in the nlcs thanks to the fact that they are the cubs.

paul konerko

who also appears in the set on andres galarraga's card, got his world series fever in 2005 with the world champion white sox.

raul mondesi

never got out of the division series - twice with the dodgers and once with the yankees.

chan ho park, on the other hand,

made it all the way to the world series with the phillies in 2009.  he pitched well, too, but the phils could not defeat the yankees.  nice shot of the visitor's bullpen, by the way.

gary sheffield

was part of the 1997 world champion marlins, but then had the misfortune to be on the yankees teams of the mid-2000's that couldn't quite make it to the world series.  misfortune, yeah that's not really the right word.

finally, there is no greater world series fever than when the dodgers are represented, as they were in 1988.

a magnificent moment indeed.

thanks thorzul.