2010 Upper Blecch Series 1 blaster.

In Upper Deck's press release announcing 2010 Series I on Feb. 6, the joy was breathless: “Obviously we’re extremely pumped up right now,” said Gabriel Garcia, Upper Deck’s Baseball brand manager. “We really went to task to find the best shots possible of the players, combined with a terrific assortment of autographs and memorabilia cards from baseball biggest stars, past and present.”

UD didn't allude in all that 'happy happy joy joy' to the utter-lack-of-logos aspect of their fiefdom.

And my goodness, the company certainly goes go to great twisting lengths not to show logos!

This fact of logo-lessness proves rather creepy, as it pushes the pursuit of baseball cards from

a legitimate collecting pasttime into the realm of simply amassing little cardboard photos of men wearing pajama-like clothing with no discernibly named team affiliation. How long can this last for UD? Is this product selling?

Wait a minute, the letter C is visible!:

There are quite a few almost-visible helmet letters. Which enhances the awfulness of these two-headed checklist designs:

Anyhow, the 600-base card set is said to include "Signature Sensations" autograph cards, but that's only a rumor in these parts, because we can buy retail only here in Fennoscandinavia. Er, that is, here in the non-densely-populated-hinterlands.

On the upbeat front, hey Darryl Strawberry, you better watch it! Yessirree Mr. Strawbs, there's a promising hitter with the current best name in baseball, Tyler Flowers,

vying for Lucy's affection:

Isn't there something poignant about that shot? What does it bring to mind? Hmmmmm. Oh, yes:

INTERMISSION: In the video below, around 3:15 is the Lucy/Harpo mirror sequence. Why can't there be comedy like this anymore?:


Back to the massively non-logo cardboard. The inserts for this set are said to include Gold Parallels numbered to 99. Didn't see that but there was a lot of other head-scratch inducing stuff. For instance:

Here we are in 2010 still asking why card companies--especially non-logo using ones--insist on placing nonsports cards in baseball card boxes? Why why why? And what use have we for baseball cards such as this?:

All right, sure, maybe we'd be less mystified if it was David Wright surrounded by, say, orange and blue flames. Maybe, but we doubt it. By the way, there was NARY A MET in this box!

nary a met nary a met nary a met nary a met nary a met

Ok, moving on. Here are a few from the 200-card “Season Biography” collection:

One positive is that the bio backs are decent when compared to the base backs:

although UD probably should rehire the graphic design staff.

Little headshots are plunked down in several places on these cards. Sometimes that's good, and sometimes

it's troubling, as when the head in question is a little pointy:

But whatev.

Then there's the 100-gold subset:

The occasional die-cut:

And the cards that make us wonder, why is everyone wearing a red hat?:

And will Mariano survive the green machine that is about to squash him?

You know that JERSEY CARD INSIDE blaster message?

We were, once again, White-Bit-Hafnered:

Hmph.

Upper Blecch victim non-logo-ladenly twistily signing off.

Cards Where Other Things Are Going On.

The main point of this card is that Chad Durbin is pitching. However, the secondary action makes this a better-than-average card. Am I right?

Isn't that Curtis Granderson?

What's your favorite card where the main action isn't the reason why you like the card?

Reasons to cheer up.

Because Fred will hit bureacrats in the head with his bat. In a nice way.

Defiantly upbeat, Darryl will appear on a shiny, bat bit off-center card that has this back:

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!

Hoyt will be serene. There is little to like about this card, which was apparently designed by somone who had temporarily been laid off from a job designing parking lots. But we love the name Hoyt, and we love that little bit of blue stripe scrunched up into the top left corner of the jersey bit space, yearning to breathe free.

Baseball cards with pictures of more than two players, through the ages, excel. This is a factoid.

We have mixed feelings about Mike, but the point here is, what's going on in the upper right hand corner? Stare at that for a while and it actually brings your blood pressure down; medically proven. Mysterious.

We love love love the Legendary Cuts relic cards. And the old uniforms. And the chaws.

Go ahead, make his day.

Relic cards of HOF players go for relatively little on eBay. We don't understand  this, but like it.

Ah, well there. We feel better.

Captain Kirk's wisdom.

I've been having a horrible, wretched, frustrating week, the kind that makes you feel as if there's pressure building up in your head to the degree that your ears itch. So I'm going to take a few moments here to compile some pleasing cards. Because. It's a Pleasing Card Intermission. A PCI, if you will. A medical leave of sorts. I'm working on it right now, and soon James T. and I will present a post that is pleasing. A pleasing post. In the meantime, I also want to thank you all for keeping the baseball card blogularium churning in such a way that there are always some fun and informative posts to read. It's like Pandora's Box...always, there's hope.

By the way, as food for thought while we package our post, do you know what kind of lights Noah used on his ark?

Thank you to the erudite Rod for the nifty Star Trek cards.

Jim Bunning Assessment.

"Under increasing pressure from Democrats and members of his own party, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) Tuesday night abandoned his one-man filibuster of a one-month extension to unemployment benefits and other programs. In the end Bunning agreed to a deal allowing him one vote on an amendment to pay for the bill’s $10 billion cost. That proposal was offered by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last Thursday at the start of his filibuster, but Bunning rejected it because he feared his amendment would not pass....

Thousands of federal highway employees who had been furloughed as a result of Bunning’s filibuster will likely be able to return to work later this week, and unemployment insurance checks will be sent to recipients after several days of delay.

To ensure the deal is enforced, Bunning has placed a hold on all the items included in the nightly 'wrap up,' which normally entails a unanimous consent agreement to pass noncontroversial nominations and bills, a GOP aide said. Once the votes have taken place that hold would be lifted, the aide explained." Roll Call newspaper

So, Republicans are thrifty when out of power and wildly lavish when in power (tax cuts for the wealthy, plenty of war financing, use of reconciliation to push through favorite programs, and so on). On this rare occasion when baseball and politics cross over, what is your assessment of Baseball Hall of Famer Jim Bunning?

Genius? Hypocrite?

And, most importantly, how will this affect the value of his baseball cards?

Fuzzy Mets. Testing our Met-tle. Wrightful place. You get the idea.

We received some outstanding Mets cards from Pack War Corky. You know, this fellow:

Fierce avatar.

Among the cards in the packet he sent were some major attention-getters. We may not be the brightest baseball card collectors on the planet, but we thought we knew most of the cool Mets cards out there. Well, Corky proved us wrong. These 2001 Upper Deck cards are fantastic.

They exist in a shady region of strange graphics that are somehow metsmerizing.

And as if this wasn't enough, these cards are fuzzy.

To clarify, the "Mets" and "NY" logos on these cards are FUZZY.

Now, Paul's Random Stuff first introduced us to these cards, but in that strong silent type way, he never revealed the Fuzz Factor! Go figure. So, being shallow, we forgot about the design. But trust us when we say that in person, they deserve attention. They undoubtedly exist with relics in some of them...but a person doesn't necessarily need relics when the card comes fuzzed. There is such a thing as Swank Overload.

Furthering our Metscard karma was the perfect gentleman many know as White Sox Cards. His is one of the first card blogs we ever discovered, and one of the first people we ever traded with. He's a mensch. He glides under the radar sometimes but is a force to be reckoned with. We know this became of the enormous number of referral hits we get from his site.

Steve sent along some 2010s of David Wright:

These are code cards, too. So Lucy will "unlock" them.

Steve also included this 2007 M&M 29/29, which we love:

And a spine-tingling (we're trying not to use the word 'awesome') Zito Effect:

Wait a minute, how did BZ appear in a Metszealous post? It's Steve's fault. We'll let it slip through this time. Deep philosophical thought: I wonder what would happen to our sanity (let alone the Mets payroll) if Barry ever joined the lovable losers?

Thank you, Corky and Steve!

What is the best baseball* card in the world?

As we ease back into baseball card blogging and, dare we say, collecting, we also return to wrestle with The Big Questions: how can we be anti-corporatist but pro-Met? Or any pro-any-MLB team, for that matter? How can we support a hobby that kills lots of trees? How can we reconcile a growing mistrust of materialism with cardboard acquisitiveness? Here's how.

By focusing on inherent baseball card collecting dangers, such as The B-p.

Yes, The B-p happened to us again recently. Sure, there were distractions in the package, too. Suffice to say that when we opened a packet of cards from dayf, Lucy was highly amused by various little drawings and comments from Mr. C. Junkie, and I was all happy about Zito effect cards and stuff. Before we got distracted by the b--ping, before I had to explain the dangers of opening a packet of baseball cards from bloggers these days to Lucy, she was lulled into complacency because right after some good Zitos we saw something underneath.

What lies beneath, you ask? See for yourself. This part, even a 9-year-old can bear: 

Guess what card went into "the most special back page" of the smile/happy binder? Correctomundo, my peeps. Puppies!

And this is why it is so much fun collecting cards with Lucy. This card, you will note, is not signed; there are no bits of clothing attached it; there are no bat shavings. It is not an Xfractor. Yet that triple-dalmatian is now Lucy's favorite card of all time. (Along with many other "favorite cards of all time" sent by bloggers; kids haven't yet refined their elitism abilities.) By collecting cards with her, I remain in direct contact with the pure old days of bike-spoked, rubber-band-gathered, wall-flipped cards that you like, well, just because you like them. Thank you for that, along with all the other thousands of joys you reveal on a daily basis, little one.

Okay, so dayf also tried to distract us with little comments like this one. Mr. CJ has a way of educating us in the most inobtrusive way. I'm sorry to say that it wasn't until I typed "Al Downing 715" into Google that I learned he was the pitcher who threw the spheroid that helped put Hank Aaron into the record books. That's what happens when you are made busy by other topics for months. Your brain gets all dusty. But now we know! And we have another card for our 1972 collection.

Then, as soon as we got feeling safe, we found this. Lucy loved it perhaps because she didn't understand the implications.

And then she got wow-ed by this green DW beauty, and I got caught up in major Zito Effect* (*that is, when you get lots and lots a card of a player, and yet no doubles. It just dawned on me that Zito Effect IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF B--PING!). I won't even show the shocking results of the B-p here. It involved Craig Biggio and will only encourage the perpetrator. We are renting a forklift to remove the results from the premises.

Massive Zito Effect! Ok, that brought down the blood pressure. 

Then, we came to realize that dayf was only joshin'! He was only letting the b-p happen to prepare us for the greatness! It was all a ruse to delay the surprise...this beauty:

Wow. [sniff] We love this guy.

And right now, for the proper finish, I'd rescan the puppy card all by its lonely self so you could see its full glory, but I can't, because the moment that thing came out of the scanner the first time, Lucy ran off with it.

Because it's the best baseball* card in the world.
(*Even though, upon close inspection per a question from BA Benny, it's actually a football card. Funny, because we don't associate football players and dogs in a good way. But you get the spirit, if not the letter, of the happy. Stop making sense.)

Thank you very much, dayf.