My Hall of Mediocrity (HOM) inductee was Jim Wynn and I have a nice little player collection (PC) of him so I wanted to share a card with you.
I wanted to share my PC of Jim Wynn with you so I'm going to post a card that's in the collection every now and then. Some of these will be a little rare, some of them very common (pun intended) and some will be from the dreaded modern side of the hobby.
The first card I wanted to share was this 1967 Topps Punch Out test card. I have read that this set is one of the more rare Topps issues due to limited distribution. I think they are not that rare, but maybe scarce would be a more accurate term as they can be found fairly easily for a type card. Maybe if you're looking for a specific player it might be difficult. Although you could just get lucky like I did and have one fall in your lap.
Cleaner unpunched example without the kind of paper loss that my card has can get expensive. Especially higher graded examples.
Here is my Toy Cannon example from my PC shown to the right.
These are cool little cards. They are larger than a standard Topps card but not as big as I thought they would be before I ever saw one in person. They measure out at 2 1/2" x 4 2/3" and there are eighty six cards in the set.
There are also four variations in the set where the images of the player is different in each variation. They are Matty Alou, Roberto Clemente, Mickey Mantle and Frank Robinson. Of course it had to be Mantle, Clemente and Robinson right? Figures.
The set includes some big names too. In addition to the four variations there are names like Hank Aaron, Sandy Koufax, Pete Rose and Willie Mays to name a few.
I believe putting together a complete set would be tough. Trading Card Database (TCDb) is still missing images of both Matty Alou variations, Johnny Callison, Roberto Clemente (plain background variation), Donn Clendenon, Andy Etchebarren, Jim Fregosi, Tom Haller, Willie McCovey, Rick Reichardt, Mel Stottlemeyer, Tom Tresh and Bill White. That's a decent number of missing images for a set this size. I have to assume these players are tougher than the rest.
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The National League players came in black with red "National League" titles and the American League players came in red with black "American League" titles. Here are two of the cards side by side as a reference.
The cards themselves were packaged in a long cello pack with three cards connected top to bottom with perforations between the cards. You can see the perforations at the top of the Koufax card above. The cello pack and an unseparated trio are shown below.
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| Image courtesy Mile High Card Co. Auctions |
The cards all had the same backs which was where the instructions on how to play the game were. It has a legend at the bottom that shows what the abbreviations on the backs of the tabs that you punch off the card showed. Then you would move the runners around the bases as needed. When a runner crossed home you recorded a run for your team.
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These instructions are fairly simple and I would think the game was fairly easy to play and would actually be fun. It sounds like it would be similar to playing the 1968 Topps Game cards. You would need to set up a small baseball field and use something for runners to keep track of where your runners are on the bases during the inning. When I was a kid I was the kind of kid that wouldn't have punched out the pieces and played the game. I would have kept them in the best condition that I could.
What would you guys do? Play the game or keep the card original? At least you can play the 1968 Topps Game cards without destroying them. Do you have any of these in you collection? Are you collecting the set? Let me know your thoughts and answers in the comments below.
Enjoy the hobby all...it's a great one.
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