This first year of SP Authentic must have been wild for those first few box breakers. A radically under-designed base set, an autographed card in (almost) every box, and the most prolific exchange card program ever seen up to that point. The potential for a jersey exchange card was a lot better, too, than in the previous year when they were first introduced, not to mention the potential for other unique prizes like signed gloves, balls, jerseys, and standees. It was all pretty ambitious.

But there is one aspect of 1998 SP Authentic that I don’t see mentioned on the blogsphere or on any of my usual online cardboard haunts. And it’s a pretty big deal, especially given the state of the hobby which has become more and more hit-focused, even in the few years since I picked it back up. I’m not sure if it’s a really well-kept secret or if just nobody cares – I’m leaning towards the former – but we are going to talk about it today.

But let’s start as we always do – with the base cards:

1998 SP Authentic #180

The base design, like most of the designs from the 12-year SP Authentic timeline, is ultra-simple and modern with a clean, business card quality. While the image appears dark in this scan, in person it is shadowy and dramatic, backed by a colorfully-lit evening skyline. It is among my favorite base cards across all the SP brands.


I don’t think you could possible get more succinct in summing up Junior’s ’97 season than that one-sentence blurb. And please note not just the super-complete stat box, but also how much extra space they had left over. They could have fit stats through 2002 if they wanted with zero changes in card design. Why did they do it like that? I would expect this kind of thing from a sample, but not the final version.

Which brings us to the sample:

1998 SP Authentic Sample (#123)

The sample design is no different from the official release, but the base running photo they chose is a bit generic. The biggest surprise here is the fact that the back of the sample card is way better-looking than the final version with its centered stat box, great backwards-cap photo, and smidgen of extra blurbage mentioning Junior’s Gold Glove win. Every change they made to the back for the final version was a downgrade; thus, in my humble opinion the ideal 1998 SP Authentic base card would have been the regular card front and the sample back. I'm super nit-picky.

1998 SP Authentic #198 Checklist

Here is one of my favorite checklist designs of all time – no color, no problem. This card makes me wish SP Authentic had a wacky, super-rare base parallel just so I could see this checklist with some crazy holo-effects. This is the one and only checklist card in 1998 SP Authentic which means that is the entire 198-card checklist on the back. Not a lot of sets can claim such a feat. Well done. As checklists go, this is a 10.

1998 SP Authentic Sheer Dominance #SD1 Silver

As smitten as I am with most of the aesthetic of this set, Sheer Dominance is one insert I could take or leave. The front is a lot of papery foil filled with text describing what level of the insert you were looking at (which is weird in itself) with the single bright spot being (ironically) the darkest thing on the card: that glossy, jet-black, embossed Mariners logo. They could slap that thing on every card they make as far as I’m concerned.


The back is more comparable with the rest of the set with a beautifully grayscale (as in not-quite-silver but approaching it) image of the front and succinct blurb. Again, I like the back a lot better than the front here.

1998 SP Authentic Sheer Dominance #SD1 Gold #/2000

Not much difference on the gold parallel which says “GOLD GOLD GOLD GOLD” where the Silver other one said “SILVER SILVER…” and so on. The papery foil doesn’t scan well, so you can’t really see the slight gold tint to the background here, but trust me – it’s there. It’s also serial-numbered on the back out of 2000, a reasonably scarce run for the time, backed with a gold-toned representation of the front.

There is a Titanium version numbered out of only 100 that sells for a massive premium as most #/100 inserts from the late-90’s do, but I have no desire to chase it. The real prize (and secret) of 1998 SP Authentic is still to come…

So trade cards – we can’t have a conversation about this set without discussing them. SP Authentic has a buttload of trade cards. Trade cards akimbo. Trade cards out the wazoo. There are a whopping SIX different trade cards you could exchange for various Griffey items, and here’s a list of all of them:

Trade Card for 5x7 300th HR Card
Trade Card for 5x7 Game Jersey Relic Card /125
Trade Card for Chirography Autograph Card /400
Trade Card for Autographed Fielding Glove /30
Trade Card for Autographed Seattle Mariners Jersey /30
Trade Card for Life-Size Cardboard Standee /200

No other player got more than three trade cards, and only Griffey had cards that could be traded for non-card items (I want that glove!). I only have one of these trade cards, and it’s the most common one:

1998 SP Authentic Trade Card (for 300th Home Run Commemorative 5x7 Jumbo)

This card could be exchanged for a 5x7 jumbo card commemorating Junior’s 300th home run. While we have a print run for the commemorative card these could be exchanged for, we do not have one on the trade cards themselves. There could have been hundreds that never made it out of packs before the trade-in deadline of August 1st, 1999. Suffice it to say there are at least 1300 as that is how many 300th HR Commemorative jumbos were printed. I have no way of telling whether the card I own was ever exchanged for said jumbo, but I do have the jumbo:

1998 SP Authentic 300th Home Run Commemorative 5x7 Jumbo #KG300 #/1300

Look familiar? That’s because it’s practically the same design as the Upper Deck’s 11-card Ken Griffey, Jr. Most Memorable Home Runs jumbo set from this same year, only with white where the other set is gold. A bit of a design cop-out, sure, but not a bad-looking card.

It should be noted that most places I look online show the final print run to be 1000 – that is wrong. As you can see this card is numbered out of 1300. I know 1000 is a nice, round, tempting number, but it isn’t accurate here.

Now, I have no idea whether Upper Deck returned exchanged cards to their finders, so I have no way of telling whether there are exactly 1300 trade cards and the number of jumbos was already decided, or if they were printed to meet demand. Also, if UD didn’t return exchanged trade cards to the collector (which I suspect is the case to prevent multiple exchanges), that would leave far fewer trade cards out in the wild. The exact production figure of the jumbo is known – 1300 – but the exact production figure of this particular trade card and its scarcity compared with the jumbo remains up for debate. Neither is extraordinarily scarce.

1998 SP Authentic Chirography Autograph #KG /400

Despite the blurry scans (slabbed cards don't scan well), this is still hands-down one of the most beautiful autograph issues of all time. That’s a bit unexpected so early in the autograph game, but look at it. There is no element here you could add or take away that could improve this card. The photo is perfect, the design is perfect, and that bright blue on-card masterpiece of an autograph is nerfect. I mean, perfect.

From what I’ve read, all the cards from the Chirography insert were packed out EXCEPT for the Griffey. His card was the sole redemption. One of my favorite aspects of this autograph is the relative ease of acquiring one. They had a run of 400 which is kind of a lot for what (and when) it is. The high availability has kept the prices relatively low on these. If you’re a Griffey collector, it’s a must-get.

Okay, I promised you a juicy secret, and the time has come to deliver. Let’s talk about this card for a hot minute:

1998 SP Authentic Jersey Swatch 5x7 Jumbo Patch Relic /125

While I consider myself more knowledgeable than your average Joe Card Collector when it comes to Griffeys, I am no expert. I don’t claim to have the most enviable collection or to have all the answers. Most of my Griffey card knowledge comes from other sources – I just enjoy gathering it and putting it all together in one place on this blog in part for my own reference.

But this is different. I came across this card while casually shopping Griffeys on eBay, and I spent a full minute just staring at it, trying to figure out what I was looking at. I also took to a few spots in the online Griffey-collecting community to confirm what I was thinking, and it appears my suspicions were right.

Guys, this is not just a patch – it is the FIRST Griffey patch. Like, ever. Seriously.

What you are looking at is a patch relic before it was called a “patch” relic. The disparity among types of jersey relics wouldn’t be official – that is noted on the card itself, addressed directly by the manufacturer, or described as being in any way different from a standard plain jersey swatch – until 2000 Upper Deck introduced them via the Game Jersey Patch insert (cards of which sell for a small fortune). Patches in general didn’t start showing up on cards in any meaningful way until that same year, although since first posting this I was informed Leaf released a Frank Thomas patch set in 1997. However, the patches of 1998 SP Authentic, which came out a full two years earlier than Game Jersey Patch, appear to have slipped under the radar as the first-ever non-Frank Thomas patch cards.

At a stated print run of only 125 copies, they’re also far scarcer than the famed (and extremely expensive) Upper Deck Game Jersey relics from just a year before. And peep that swatch - they even appear to have been cut from the very same teal jersey as their exponentially more famous and valuable predecessor. I have no proof of this, but the back of the card says the jersey was worn "in the 1996 baseball season." That certainly checks out.

So how did I, a self-proclaimed Griffey cardboardologist, not already know about this? Or the seller? Or any one of the Griffey guys I’ve discussed it with online? And how was I able to get this /125 FIRST EVER GRIFFEY PATCH RELIC for less than $100 when the non-patch, non-autographed, non-anything cool Sheer Dominance Titanium #/100 (only 25 fewer AND seriously lame) would almost certainly break the bank? Is it something to do with the fact that these are exchange cards and were not packed-out? Or are people concerned with the validity of this set?

To address the latter point, I have seen limited forum discussion about this card, and a few people appear to think these are altered, non-genuine cards; but I’ve spent a lot of time examining this baby and there doesn’t appear to be any sign of alteration in any form. It looks perfect. On top of that, I’ve also come across images of these same cards with different bits of patch in them. I’ve seen no fewer than five different specimens in total, one of which was just a large swatch of teal jersey with no visible patch at all.

That’s right: the patches and plain jersey swatches were both included as relics in this same set, and the difference was not even addressed by Upper Deck, nor did they address the potential difference in value among jersey pieces when cutting up that teal jersey. It was simple luck-of-the-draw for the exchangers.

Nowadays they’d have set aside the patch cuts for more high-end or scarce insert cards, possibly with sticker autos and unbelievably low serial-numbering; but they didn’t do either of those things in 1998, just like they didn’t use sticker autos – nobody had thought of it yet. The results are the beautiful on-card autos of Chirography, and this little-known insert with the first-ever honest-to-goodness patch relics.

The best part about all this is that these cards are hardly ever properly listed on eBay because they’re not terribly well-known nor is their significance in the hobby. It doesn’t say “patch” anywhere on the card – it says “Jersey Swatch,” so it is listed as a jersey relic in your standard eBay listings even though it is clearly a patch. For now they’re the deal of the century – hurry up and grab one before people read this blog post, realize what this card really is, and drive the prices up (LOL no one reads this you’re fine take your time).

There are six players in the Game Jersey jumbo checklist (three of whom are Mariners), all of them with 125 relic cards to be had except for Tony Gwynn who had 415. Yes, THAT Tony Gwynn. The one for whom Upper Deck already had a bunch of leftover jersey from when he appeared in the 1997 Game Jersey insert. Unfortunately Rey Ordonez does not appear in the insert here, but if he did it would all but confirm my suspicion that the Griffey relic here is from the same jersey as the infamous 1997 Game Jersey. Even with no real proof that this is the case, I stand by it.

So let's pretend I'm right about all this: We have the second ever patch relic from ANY sport ( the Frank Thomas set from 1997 still holds the honor of being the first), a super-low print run for the '90's, the most heavily-collected player of the last 30 years who was just recently inducted into the Hall of Fame and whose cards command top dollar, and a relic that is most likely from the same jersey as 1997 Game Jersey (an extremely famous and expensive card) only much bigger and far more scarce and a patch. If any one of these perfectly reasonable theories of mine are true, how is this not an $800 card?

I’d love some input on this. I’ve consulted with a few Griffey scholars I know, and they all seem to agree with me. Until someone is able to present evidence of an earlier non-Big-Hurt patch card, the “secret” is out.

This is the part where I list the Griffeys I still need from the set in question, but that is kind of hard with 1998 SP Authentic because of all those trade cards. I decided to include all trade cards and the cards they could be traded for, but not the non-card items. That makes my want list look like this:

Sheer Dominance #SD1 Titanium #/100
Trade Card for 5x7 Game Jersey Relic Card /125
Trade Card for Chirography Autographed Card /400
Trade Card for Autographed Fielding Glove /30
Trade Card for Autographed Seattle Mariners Jersey /30
Trade Card for Life-Size Cardboard Standee /200

I don’t hold out much hope on all those trade cards, so if I land a Sheer Dominance Titanium someday I will happy mark this set as complete and count any of the trade cards I acquire thereafter as lagniappe.

Hi! Miss me? I missed you! But regardless of how far-removed from card blogging I get, I will always, ALWAYS make my Top 30 post because I am still always getting new Griffeys.

This year was weird. It was the first year I didn’t try to build any sets; instead I focused pretty exclusively on Griffeys. At the same time I’ve also reigned in my spending on cardboard for two reasons: first, I’m a super-responsible Dad now (LOLZ), and second I already have most of the Holy Grails/White Whales I want.

Don’t get me wrong - there are a handful of spendy cards I would drop reasonably shiny dimes on given the chance, but for the most part I am pretty satisfied with the state of my Griffey collection (though I do still chase the cool new cards that come out). For now I’m mostly after cards of some significance in the hobby.

All this has added up to one bizarre Top 30 list. I’m still extremely proud of my Griffey acquisitions this year, but it’s a very non-standard list as these lists tend to go. There are a couple of spots where you’ll probably think I’ve lost my damn mind (and one spot in particular where you’ll be 100% right).

Enjoy!


30. 2000 Stadium Club Beam Team #BT9 #/500

Not terribly expensive but relatively tough to come by, this is an amazing example of an over-the-top, techy-for-the-sake-of-techy Stadium Club insert. It would have been right at home among the out-the-box inserts of the mid-to-late-90’s, but it came out fairly late for such wackiness. Check out the helix of holofoil along the left border and internal die-cutting. Just plain naughty.


29. 2017 Topps Chrome MLB Award Winners #MAW-9

Again, this one is not expensive by any stretch, but I’ll be damned if it’s not one of the best-designed cards of last year. When I first came across it online, in the split second between when I first laid eyes on it and when I saw how much one would cost me, I was fully expecting a minimum $50 price tag. It just looks like it cost a fortune, and it keeps me (somewhat begrudgingly) coming back to the new product.


28. 1994 Upper Deck All-Star 125th Anniversary Jumbo Gold

There was a time when I genuinely doubted this card’s very existence (this has been the case for several of the remaining cards from the 1996 Beckett Tribute checklist). I was flabbergasted when one popped up on my saved searches and chomping at the bit right up until that auction’s end. In the end I got it for a very reasonable price because NOBODY ELSE ON THE PLANET IS LOOKING FOR THIS OBSCURE FRIGGIN CARD.


27. The Rest of the Collector’s Choice Gold Signatures

This is also the year I completed the checklist of Collector’s Choice Gold Signatures. Yes, ALL OF THEM. Gold sigs may as well have been unicorns when I was ripping packs at 15 (I only ever saw a handful in person), so this feat in itself is a kind of childhood dream come true. That 1996 base card was a real bugger, and I had all but given up on that Up Close and Personal subset.


26. 2009 Upper Deck A Piece of History 600 HR #600-KG

Upper Deck made history in the late 90’s when they released the first cards of their legendary A Piece of History 500 Home Run Club relic insert. Then in 2009 they tried to recapture that old Upper Deck magic with a similar multi-year/multi-product insert with slightly higher minimum credentials to make the checklist. Unfortunately it wasn’t enough to save Upper Deck’s place in the baseball card market. The design is a bit unspectacular – far from the timeless sepia of its predecessor which seems a little bass-ackwards to me. You would think having to hit another 100 dingers to get a spot in the checklist would call for a fancier card. Ho-hum.

The most interesting thing about this insert is that this Griffey is the only card in it that got made. You are looking at the first and last A Piece of History 600 HR insert card. More were meant to be produced, obviously, but Upper Deck would never get the chance as only a year later they were out of the baseball card business completely. Given the popularity (and resulting prices) of the original 500 Club insert combined with the fact that Junior was the only player represented in this checklist, I’m surprised this card isn’t more (in)famous in Griffey-collecting circles. A weird little piece of cardboard history from the end times of Upper Deck baseball.


25. 2017 Donruss Whammy #W-2

Man, these things were hotter than Tamagotchis when they hit the streets. As soon as I laid eyes on one I (and just about everyone else with the Griffey itch, I suspect) knew right away that I just had to have one. Prices for this thing shot up well over $30 per card and have never regressed. It’s just so damn cool, and design-wise that comic book caricature angle plays perfectly even without logos. I have no doubt that this is the most universally-loved Griffey card Panini has ever produced.


24. 1996 SP Holoview Special F/X #10 Die-Cut Red

Regardless of what happens with me in other areas of card collecting, my love of 90’s inserts is forever. For a few years this die-cut beauty has eluded me with solid gray whale price-points. Then in late December, someone slapped one up on COMC for a third of what they usually go for, and I pounced. These are quite famous as the die-cutting on each card is accurate to the shape of the outfield wall of each player’s heritage stadium, meaning this card is the exact shape of the Kingdome. Pardon my French but that’s fudging amazing. Fun fact: there are no fewer than three Red Sox in the checklist and any one of their cards will show you just how weird Fenway really is.


23. 1996 Ultra HR King #6 Gold Medallion and Exchange Card

The Gold Medallions of 1996 Ultra are NOTORIOUSLY scarce, and in addition to being one of my favorite wood-grain cards of all time, this is also one of the scarcest GM’s. I was able to acquire the exchange card too which is cool. Of course rumor has it those exchange cards also had their own Gold Medallion parallels, which would put me still one card away from completing the 1996 Ultra Gold Medallions. Grrrr….


22. 2000 Pacific Aurora #133 Pinstripes Premiere Date #/52

OK LOOK – I’m usually the first guy to call out crappy parallels of which this is certainly one. A significant design difference such as fun die-cutting or crazy foil would be one thing, but this is just a stamp, and an ugly one. But this card has a few saving graces. First, it's Pacific, and if you don't love Pacific I don't want to know you. Second, the Reds version of this card is also Griffey’s FIRST EVER (like, literally) Reds card, thus making this his last Mariners card. And at an ultra-low run of only 52 cards I considered it irresistible.


21. 1998 Pinnacle Mint #7 Gold and Silver Coins

I’m a sucker for card/coin crossovers, but these examples from Pinnacle have been grey whales for a few years now. No more! A fellow Griffey collector was having a fire sale via a Griffey-collecting Facebook group, and I couldn’t pass the gold coin up. After that the silver was just a few easily-justified clicks away. It’s amazing how much easier it is to overpay for a card just to complete a set. Anyway, at long last they’re all mine! Mwah-ha-ha.

Thanks for reading! Tune in for #11-20...someday...

That last post was the first time in five months I’ve gotten to hit the Submit button, and it felt good. I’ll have to try and keep up with posting again. Not making any promises, of course. Have I mentioned that this kid poops like 11 times a day?

Back to it:


20. 2015 Tacoma Rainiers 20th Anniversary card

I’ll be honest: I’m not sure whether this is a 2014 or 2015 card. 20 years would technically be 2014 as the team adopted the name “Rainiers” in 1995; but I’ve also seen a lot of business/organizational anniversaries celebrated in a year ending in the same digit as the first year. The team is currently managed by Pat Listach who had an absolute buttload of awesome cards in the ‘90’s. ‘Member him?


19. Three of the Four Toughest 1998 Ultra Griffeys

I got all excited while putting together the Gold Medallions of 1996 Ultra, and I expounded on that by setting my collecting crosshairs on the other insane inserts of the savagely 90’s Ultra brand. These bad boys are 1:144, 1:144, and 1:288, respectively, and they are just frickin’ out there, man. God, I miss ‘90’s inserts. There’s still one whale left to get in this set before the rest fall into place…


18. Every Pinnacle Brand Artist’s Proofs made before 1997

Pinnacle AP’s are some of the toughest parallels of the 90’s because in addition to being scarce there are just so many different ones, especially for a prolific guy like Junior. This was the year I picked off the rest – the final five I needed to complete my Pinnacle Artist’s Proof game through 1996. Again you can thank the 1996 Beckett Tribute checklist for forcing my foot down on the gas here. Still, it’s nice to be done with them.


17. 1999 SPx Winning Materials Jersey/Bat Dual Relic #JR

A very tough, super early double-relic. And I may be mistaken here so don’t quote me, but I believe I saw somewhere that these were the first dual-relic baseball cards? Like, ever? Someone correct me if that’s not the case.

So how did I get one? And why is such a card so low on the list? You may not have noticed in the scan, but this thing is in extremely rough condition. I dare say it may be the roughest specimen of this card in existence. Not only are there numerous dings and some seriously soft corners, but someone took it upon themselves to sharpie out the white bits in the upper left corner. What kind of lunatic does that?

Anyway, thanks to that sharpie-happy nutcase I was able to nab this card for way below market value. Sure I’ve spouted a lot of “condition doesn’t matter much to me” rhetoric through the years, but the fact is that were this in better condition it would probably be much higher on this list. Then again I wouldn’t own it then because it would have sold for WAY more than it did. Some mixed feelings here, but you can’t fault the card. Great design, too.


16. 1997 Pinnacle Passport to the Majors #2 Sample

You are looking at one of the most difficult “sample” cards of the ‘90’s, and that is saying something. I’ve only ever seen one in my collecting career, and it’s the one you’re looking at here. By the way, this is also a great example of the weird, requires-an-explanation kind of stuff you’re going to see all over this year’s list. Like I said before – it was a weird year.


15. 2000 Upper Deck Ionix Warp Zone #WZ3

I spent significantly less money on Griffeys this year, so it was easy to justify picking off a few of the higher-priced, more desirable gray whales. This eye-melter from UD Ionix is a prime example of such a card, and there are a few more to come.


14. 1993 Colla Collection Diamond Marks Art Insert #3

Not everybody recognizes the scarcity here, but trust me – this thing is a tough get. It’s hard to label it an oddball as Colla was actually pretty prolific in the early 90’s, and bookmark cards like these hardly ever command top dollar; but this one consistently approaches three figures or better even in not-so-great condition (I suspect a few kids may have actually used them for their intended purpose, driving the prices up, the little savages).


13. 1999 Metal Universe Linchpins #4

Another highly-desirable, high-dollar gray whale of 90’s-ness. As a lover of the Metal Universe brand, I’ve actively chased this thing for years; but it’s always been priced just a little higher than I’ve wanted to pay. This was the year I finally made it happen. The die-cutting here is incredible. How did more of these cards not have hanging chads (you younger folks might have to Google that last thing)?


12. 1989 Fleer #548 (on top of sealed cello pack) & 1989 Bowman sealed magazine pack

I became addicted to sealed packs with visible Griffeys in them a couple of years ago, and this year I was able to add a pair of really cool ones to the collection, both of them rookies. The 1989 Fleer cello pack is great because the Griffey is right on top, but I’m more enamored with the ’89 Bowman magazine pack because not only do we get a bonus visible Mickey Mantle Bowman reprint, but the Ken Griffey, Sr. television card (with Junior’s rookie cameo) is also visible on the back. That’s BOTH Griffey rookies in the set visible in the SAME pack. What are the odds?


11. 1997 Pinnacle X-Press Melting Pot #6 #/500

There are only 500 of these floating around which is pretty darn scarce for a card from an unsuccessful set from way back in 1997. The wild/frustrating thing about this particular one is that Pinnacle made about 10,000 samples of it and sent them to EVERYONE IN THE WORLD APPARENTLY. Since I needed one I did that thing of when you tell eBay to e-mail you when an auction is listed that uses certain key words, namely “1997 Pinnacle X-Press Melting Pot Griffey,” and since everyone in the world had the sample and didn’t want it (it’s not a very attractive card), I would get e-mails that new Griffey Melting Pot cards were listed what felt like EVERY SINGLE DAY. Then I would have to click on them and check to see whether the picture had “SAMPLE” written across the front (thank God it’s on the front). I probably did this 300-400 times over the last couple of years until the day a real one was finally listed, and I put it to bed with a massive overbid just so I wouldn’t have to deal with it anymore. I’m not even all that crazy about this insert, but turning off that eBay saved search was one of the greatest moments of my collecting career.

Welcome to the list, Melting Pot. You kind of suck.

Alright – one post left in the Top 30. No purple Crusades or Mantle autos in the Top 10 this year, but there will be ink. And cookies! Thanks for reading.

Seriously – COOKIES.

Three posts in a row! Don't worry - I didn't get fired or anything...

Just about every year when I make this list there is a magic number of cards that could all have been number one; but as it’s a countdown decisions had to be made and cards ranked all the way to the top. Last year the number was five – as in any one of the Top 5 would have made a perfectly reasonable #1. The year before (2015 – my phattest Griffey-collecting year to date), that number was 3. In 2013, my first year of real hard-core “adult” collecting, it was 1 (the 1993 Finest Refractor).

This year the number is three; so for those final three cards at the top of the list the order is more or less completely arbitrary. This isn’t really important information, but a fair amount of juggling happens when putting this list together, and in fairness to all the awesome Griffey cards at the top, I want you to know about it.

One of my favorite aspects of this year’s list is that there are only four autographs in the Top 10 this year, only one of which cracked the Top 5. Anyone can sprinkle their Top 10 with autographs (I’ve done it), but those non-auto cards are what really round out a collection.

Here’s the Top 10:


10. 1997 Pinnacle Inside #19 Diamond Edition and 1998 Pinnacle Inside #24 Diamond Edition

As you can see I also picked up the 1998 version of this same parallel, but WHO CARES? The 1997 version (on the left) is one of the true bastards of the uber-scarce ‘90’s parallel game. These are not parallels one thinks of when thinking about rare ‘90’s parallels, but they should be. It’s an unsung true white whale among player collectors. The seeding was tough enough, but add to that the relatively low availability of the cans (packs) compounded by the fact that a huge quantity of the product was eventually destroyed due to poor sales, and you have a real butthole of a card to find. So even if you are prepared to overpay dearly for it (like I did), you need a solid gold horseshoe up your patootie to even find one in the first place. And brother, those things make walking a real chore.


9. 1994 Signature Rookies Autographs

Signature Rookies are some of the less-desirable pre-2000 autograph issues, but pre-2000 autographs they are. The full Griffey portion of the checklist is six cards with each Griffey getting a card with one other Griffey. Then there are two autographed versions per Griffey. It’s a bit confusing, but it makes total sense – trust me. And this is the year I finally nabbed all the toughest Juniors.


8. 1997 Pinnacle X-Press Metal Works Ingots #1 Gold #/200

Behold! The most expensive doorstop I’ve ever bought. I picked up the bronze last year and was so smitten with its ability to drive in a nail that I decided to go for the set. I still need the silver so somebody hit me up! Oh, and I accidentally picked up TWO of the gold version (don’t ask), but it’s cool because now I have one for the collection and one for the toolbox.


7. 2014 Panini Classics Membership Materials Signatures Prime Game-Used Batting Glove/Bat/Patch Triple Relic Autograph #22 #/5

Check out that card description. It’s a mouthful, right? This thing has one of the longest card descriptions on the Beast and for good reason – it’s a lot. A sexy, sexy lot. I continue to have mixed feelings about sticker autos in general especially on cards like this, but you can’t deny this thing is a looker and a half. Logos shmogos.

A quick confession: I had completely forgotten I acquired this card when putting this Top 30 list together because I got it through a private sale (those seem to be the ones I always forget). Then I came across it literally while scanning cards for this very post and immediately had to find a place for it in the Top 10 and bump all the other Top 30 selections back one. In the end I decided it was better than the gold ingot but just a little less cool than this next relic:


6. 2017 Panini National Treasures #136 Jersey Button Relic #/5

I have been drooling over unique relics like buttons and laundry tags for ages, then one cold night in November while sitting in the Emergency Room with my wife, I finally nabbed one! It was definitely the most newsworthy thing to happen on that particular day. Peep that sweet BUTTON y’all!


5. 1999 Upper Deck Century Legends Epic Signatures Autograph

Pre-2000 autos nearly always get a pass to the upper portion of the list, and I have no reason to break that rule here. And that is one lovely, early, on-card, true Mariners autograph. There is also an arbitrarily super-expensive “Century” parallel that is hand-numbered to 100 (and which I have a lot of problems with that I’ll go over in a future post), but I am beyond content with this here lowly regular version.


4. 1991 Donruss Advertising Sheet

I’ve been on the hunt for one of these incredibly rare sheets for several years because I just love alternate versions that slay the original. This particular one is so scarce that most Griffey collectors, even those several steps above “casual,” aren’t even aware of them. The sheets themselves were printed on thin paper so this is nothing like card stock, but we get a fresh look at what the uggo 1991 Griffey base card may have looked like had Donruss been more proficient at choosing base card photos. I actually landed a handful of these sheets and painstakingly cut out the Griffey from one of them so I could put it in a more standard case. I often wonder how many other collectors out there would wince at all the things I cut up for the sake of a neat collection.


3. 1996 Ultra Thunder Clap #11 Gold Medallion

I was so proud of this acquisition that I ACTUALLY WROTE A BLOG POST which is a pretty big deal for me lately. In that post I did some fuzzy math and figured out that this Gold Medallion parallel is more than likely scarcer than the famously scarce and intricately die-cut Hitting Machines Gold Medallion from the same set. The Gold Medallions of 1996 Ultra are an intimidating bunch, but I’m happy to report that with the acquisition of this card I am officially their daddy.


2. 1989 Mother’s Cookies Sealed Bag

I told you there would be cookies.

This may be the weirdest item in all my collections combined let alone on this list, but it’s also one of the most easily appreciable by non-collector folk. Simply put, it’s a thirty year-old bag of cookies. The fact that it has a Griffey card in it, and a rookie no less, is the only thing keeping these cookies out of the garbage at this point. Sure, it’s a card of which I already have many copies including an uncut sheet, but how many of these sealed bags do you think are still around? The fact that there’s even one is a surprise. And it’s MINE!!! [Update – there are at least two. Insert sad emoji here.]

Gotta be honest – I almost gave that bag of cookies the top slot on this list, but eventually thought better. Ladies and gentlemen, the first patch relic:


1. 1998 SP Authentic Jersey Swatch 5x7 Jumbo Patch Relic /125

Okay, technically Leaf/Donruss released a small insert set of Frank Thomas patches in 1997, so it’s not the VERY first patch relic card, but it’s the first patch card of anyone not named Frank Thomas. It’s also incredibly scarce at only 125 copies each, certainly fewer than the iconic 1997 UD Game Jersey card, and I’m convinced that patch is cut from the very same jersey.

The crazy thing about this card is that it’s not well-known by collectors, so I was able to scoop it up for way less than I should have. I want to believe that if I were to list it today with the secret being out and all, it might fetch a few hundred dollars more than I paid for it. Of course we may never know because I ain’t selling anytime soon, but you already knew that.

So there it is – the spoils of my weirdest year yet. It’s true that I blogged almost never, but I also completed a few checklists and picked off some cool, unique Griffey items. I like to think my collection is becoming a real collector’s collection – not just a bunch of autos or 1/1’s, but one full of unique and special cards that someone hard into the Griffey game can appreciate. Or lovers of coconut cookies. I can’t afford to be picky.

Fun fact: I officially began my Top 30 Griffey Acquisitions of 2018 list, and it’s already up to 17 cards. In February! Things are looking up.

Thanks for reading. And for not deleting me from your blog roll after 5 months of silence. That was dope of you.

1996 Pinnacle Zenith #1

The base cards are still largely black and gold but with a toned-down nameplate and bat wave graphic instead of the gold brick walls of the previous design. I prefer this year’s gold foil nameplate but can’t help feeling like the overall effect is a little dark, even in person. Also black cards are great for exposing how dusty your scanner has gotten.



The backs maintain the hit location chart of the previous set but replace the kaiju-Griffey with a full-size action shot. That photo looks like Junior is both swinging away and blowing a kiss at the pitcher at the same time. Now that’s multi-tool talent.

1996 Pinnacle Zenith #135 Honor Roll

The Honor Roll subset is attractive enough especially compared with that hella-dark base card. My only issue with it is on the back:




Great photo, nice layout, no complaints with the design or choice of photo – it’s the content here that boggles my mind. Now I understand the concept of an Honor Roll despite never having appeared on one, but I can’t help feeling it’s a bit of a cop out to simply list twenty guys that sell baseball cards. There are no credentials or descriptions of what makes one an “Honor Roll” player – you’re simply on it or you’re not. Griffey had just had his worst year ever in ’95 due to injury. How did he even get on there?

One of the two parallels introduced this year is Artist’s Proofs which feature a bold stamp and gold holofoil in the place of regular gold foil on the base cards. That is simply not enough difference for me to shell out the $30-or-so people are asking for them, so I have zero to show you here. But I’m going to make up for that later on in this very post. Stand by…

Let’s get to the good stuff:

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Z-Team #1

Z-team appeared in every Pinnacle Zenith set, and being that it’s such a characteristically Pinnacle insert, it is my opinion any non-Dufex Z-team insert shouldn’t even count. However, this guy gets a pass for being on acetate, Lord of the ‘90’s insert materials.



I think they were running out of things to talk about near the end of that blurb - or trying way too hard to side-step mentioning the dreaded wrist injury. 

Design-wise, the giant Z has pretty much never done it for me, and this is the biggest there ever was on a card. It’s a clunky eyesore. The green ball field in the background with its perfect lawnmower lines helps a lot, but let’s be honest: never again was Z-Team as cool as it was in 1995:

1995 Pinnacle Zenith Z-Team

I mean, how do you follow this big ol' piece of candy? The answer is: you don't. You slap a big Z on some acetate and distract your customers with diamonds is what you do.

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Z-Team #1 Sample

At 1:72 or one in every three boxes Z-Team was an extremely difficult pull, and the prices reflect that even today. Lucky for us Pinnacle did that thing of when a card company makes ten billion samples of an otherwise rare card. This means that as long as you don’t mind a big white “SAMPLE” printed diagonally across your card (only on the front no less), you can save a few bucks here.

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Mozaics #5 (w/ Alex Rodriguez & Randy Johnson)

Say hello to the coolest insert of 1996 Zenith and arguably one of the coolest of 1996. This is Pinnacle making the best possible use of their proprietary Dufex printing technology, and I am just flippin’ crazy about it. Mosaic cards are nothing new and they’ve been done before, but Pinnacle absolutely nailed the design here. Randy Johnson had just come off a Cy Young award and A-Rod was, well let’s be honest, selling baseball cards like nobody’s business. I’d like to have seen Edgar or Tino or even Dan Wilson get that third spot, but whatever. Griffey is huge and dead-center. Works for me.

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Diamond Club #3

The Diamond Club insert was the big selling point for Zenith in ’96. The regular cards are cool, sure, but there is also a parallel of this insert in which Pinnacle placed diamonds. Like, real diamonds, guys. You can tell immediately where the diamonds went – that conspicuous black circle in the bottom-center of the card. 

The dastardly dent - hard to capture in a photo, BTW.

Without the diamond (which is the case for the vast, vast majority of these cards) the whole effect is incomplete, and not only did Pinnacle know this – they wanted you to know it too. That’s why they pushed this sense of incompleteness even further first by placing on the card a little dent where the diamond would otherwise go and second by including in every single pack a whole separate card with a hole in it specifically designed to protect the almost-always non-existent diamond and the other cards around it.

I must have busted a pack or two in my day because I still have one of those Diamond Club protector cards:

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Diamond Club Protector Card

Now I understand the purpose of including the protector cards in every pack – they protect the cards, thwart pack searchers, and remind the pack-buster of the awesome diamond card they didn’t pull – but those little dents are especially biting because they don’t really have to be there. But we are going to get more into this later.

Will you marry me??

1996 Pinnacle Zenith Diamond Club #3 Real Diamond Parallel

Since I haven’t been around the blogsphere in a while you might suspect your old pal has gone soft when it comes to acquisition. Well nothing could be further, my friends. I have a small arsenal of very specific Griffey-hunting methods in place, and when this unbelievably rare real diamond parallel popped up I sprang like gold-medal winning Olympic speed skater Carlijn Achtereekte (sorry – the Winter Olympics were on when I first typed this paragraph - THAT's how long this post has gone un-posted).

I’ll even break one of my own rules and tell you what I paid: it was $149.25. Seems like a lot for most cards, but within moments of posting a photo of it on the Facebook Griffey collecting group (for boasting purposes), I suddenly had PM’s hitting every few seconds with requests for more photos and offers of up to quadruple what I had just paid for it. It wasn’t skill or know-how that won this card - I was simply in the right place at the right time. I can chalk that up to a little vigilance, a lot of luck, and a sweet pre-2008 credit card limit. Ahem.

See the smudge on Junior's face? The diamond did that. Somebody did not store this thing right...

Let’s talk about the card itself. These puppies fell 1:350 packs or one per 15 boxes. The regular Diamond Club cards (the ones without the diamond) fell 1:24 or one per box. Considering this is a super-premium set, that, folks, is rare as butt.

Let’s do some fuzzy math based on the following year's distribution numbers. 1997 Pinnacle Zenith’s Z-Team insert is numbered to 1000 and fell 1:99 packs. With 9 cards in the checklist, that puts the total pack production that year at 891,000. If we apply that same figure to the 1996 set (it probably wasn’t far off), we can figure out the approximate number of Real Diamond parallel cards: 891000/350 = 2545 total real diamonds. 2545/20 = 127 real diamond parallels per player in the checklist. That’s potentially more available specimens per player than some of the Ultra Gold Medallions from this same year. Of course those don’t have diamonds in them. Also I think my math is a little too fuzzy here.

Since I've never even seen one before I had the chance to buy this one, I suspect there are actually far fewer. 127 is a big run for a card so difficult to track down. I know hard-core Griffey-collecting experts who PM me on Facebook every time I mention this thing. I've seen more Red Crusade Griffey's and there are only 25 of those. The 1996 production numbers must have been significantly lower than 1997 which would mean there are significantly fewer Real Diamond parallels.




One funny thing about this insert is that the regular, non-diamond version is what Topps would call a refractor (Pinnacle called it “Spectrotech”), but the exponentially scarcer and more valuable real diamond version is not. It’s just shiny foilboard stuff that scans much darker than it should. I’ve done some research on this and have yet to find an image of a Spectrotech version of this insert with the diamond embedded. It appears they either added that effect to the non-diamond cards after having already made the diamond parallel cards or they did it on purpose to keep people from faking it. 

Which they did:

FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAKE

This difference in the foil has no bearing on value – it’s just a funny quirk and an easy way to spot forgeries.

But wait - remember those dents they put in the regular, non-diamond versions? With this Spectrotech info, we can deduce that Pinnacle put those dents in the regular Diamond Club cards KNOWING FULL WELL that they would never have a diamond placed in them. They are a strictly a taunt. Were the cards identical apart from the diamond, the dents would make sense; but they’re not! They were trolling us! Pinnacle really knew how to get to us collectors, didn’t they?

Branded oddballs were everywhere in the early 90’s, and certain companies (Pepsi, Post, King B, Coca-Cola, etc.) were well-known for their oddballs. Then right in the middle of everything and for no good reason that I’m aware of, Dairy Queen up and decided to make an extremely solid 10-card insert with a full-set parallel and then no more cards ever again. GAH!

They had made baseball cards before, but those were hardly a precedent for what they gave to Griffey collectors in ‘94. Two years prior they had issued a 33-card set for the USA Olympic Baseball Team that included the likes of Will Clark, Barry Larkin, and Robin Ventura. Sixteen years before that they made a small set of cards for a minor league team in Washington state. That appears to be it.

So you can imagine my surprise when I first took a close look at what Dairy Queen had concocted with 1994 Ken Griffey Jr. Golden Moments. Frankly it’s astounding. It’s like they skipped years of card-making evolution and experience and went straight to creating one of the greatest sets to happen to branded oddballs since Kellogg’s 3-D Superstars. These things were as good as if not better than some of the big-brand sets of the same year.

Here’s the full list of why this set is bigger than its britches: it is licensed, full-color, has its own awesome logo and font, team colored borders, glossy front, full-color back with a different photo from the front, a solid write-up on every card, above-average photography (including a cool close-up of the famous “Spiderman catch”), high print quality, and a line of text that guarantees these cards are “personally authorized by Ken Griffey, Jr.”

And a parallel! My God, a full parallel! With genuine scarcity!

I want to know more about these things. I can only assume that whoever this TMG company is that has its logo on the card back held DQ’s hand in the creation of this set of cards and just went way above and beyond on production value. Maybe grab a few extra napkins for this one, folks.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #1

This photo made it onto a few different cards (and numerous newspaper Sports sections) when it happened, so it’s no surprise seeing it here. Personally, I’m a bigger fan of that photo on the back. It matches the blurb beautifully, and what a card front it would have made. Dairy Queen is just SCHOOLING the major brands right out of the gate.

I have all the gold parallels for this set, but I’ll be saving those for the end of this post. Let’s go to #2…

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #2

Are you kidding me? Two SOLID GOLD card fronts in a row? GET OUT OF HERE, DQ. I swear this is like going to a Tone-Loc concert and him playing “Wild Thing” and “Funky Cold Medina” both right off the bat, and it’s like, “Bro, what else could you possibly have for me?”

Get a load of that fabulous Father-Son shot complete with flipped-up Oakleys and a stadium full of fans in the background. And the fun-loving cell phone shot on the back? In two cards Dairy Queen – yes, the ice cream and corndog place – has given us more photo quality than most whole major-brand, multi-player inserts with more cards in them.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #3

A post-dinger shot on the front, nice portrait on the back, and a blurb chock-full of information that any other brand would try and spread out among multiple different cards. Someone at DQ said, “What should we put on this one card? Oh, I don’t know. How about EVERYTHING?”

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #4

Run-of-the-mill batting shot? Hardly. The blurb is the key here. It fills us in on the fact that Junior hit a home run off of Greg Maddux in the 1992 All-Star Game, and this “photo was taken just seconds after Griffey hit the home run.” It’s like they were tricking you into thinking they were basic and them BOOM, they dropped some photo context on you like an atomic bomb of in-your-face cardboard excellence. Oh, and lest we forget that delightful use of photo context would show up again in 1997 from a little brand called Upper Deck. That's right - UPPER DECK STOLE AND IDEA FROM DAIRY QUEEN.

The blurb goes on to mention that the Griffeys were the first father-son duo to both hit home runs AND win MVP honors in All-Star Games. Man, I didn’t even know that shit. Even I’m getting schooled here. Oh, and that’s the classic Junior All-Star Game MVP trophy shot also used by the likes of Topps and Upper Deck, just for good measure.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #5

Man, I need a breather from all this tightness. But no, it’s another All-Star Game card – the one where he hit the warehouse at Camden. I’m not 100% sold that this is a photo from that moment.

Okay, so this card is the weakest yet, but have they mentioned yet that these cards are personally authorized by Ken Griffey, Jr.? Oh, yeah. It’s on EVERY CARD.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #6

There are approximately jillions of cards referencing Junior’s eight consecutive game home run streak, but how many take the time to list them in the blurb? One: Dairy Queen. Frickin Dairy Queen, man.

By the way I never realized those eight games happened in nine days. That must have been one anxious day off.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #7

I’ll be the first to admit it – this photo is from Blur-town which is a suburb of Farawaysville. But how great is it!? And consider this: with that level of blur there is no major brand that would have put this photo on a card, not even Donruss. Thank goodness DQ got a hold of it or we may never have seen the thing.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #8

This was before all the roided-out insanity of the late-90’s when every other slugger and his momma were putting up 40- and 50-home run seasons with such regularity that they didn’t seem as impressive as the one Junior put up “way” back in 1993. 45 dingers was and is a big deal, folks. Dairy Queen knows the score.

Oh, and they still manage to squeeze in a little photo context for good measure. I heart U, DQ.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #9

Ol’ number nine lets the numbers do the talking. That’s right – DQ gave us eight quality blurbs before falling on the old standby stat box to fill space. I know a handful of other brands that wouldn’t have even bothered with the stellar blurb quality here, so one stat box I can forgive. Heck, I might have been a little disappointed if we didn’t get one.

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #10

This ain't no spelling bee - DQ is too busy dropping knowledge to catch every single vowel, y'all.

The front is beautiful, and that back picture is simply one of my favorite photos ever to grace a Griffey card, and I have THOUSANDS of them. And they stuck it on the back. Of the last card. The audacity…

As promised, here are the gold parallel cards for the entire set. It wasn’t a complicated parallel, but why should be? This was 1994. I will mention here that the DQ golds are actually pretty tough finds for less than a few bucks a pop, and I see them go for between three and six bucks each pretty regularly. That’s kind of a lot for a branded oddball. Also the backs are identical to the regulars, so I’m only showing the fronts here. Enjoy!

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #1 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #2 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #3 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #4 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #5 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #6 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #7 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #8 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #9 Gold

1994 Dairy Queen Ken Griffey, Jr Golden Moments #10 Gold

Ahhh….delightful.

Whoever produced this set of cards is definitely a Griffey fan, plain and simple. It is shockingly good for what it is. All of us need to get down on our knees and thank our lucky stars that we get to live in a world with 1994 Dairy Queen Griffey Golden Moments.

Hail to the Queen, baby.

Have you ever seen this logo? I bet you have…

As I get more into autographs I’ve had to learn what to look for in terms of authenticity, value, and exactly what constitutes a “good deal.” Obviously I stick with cards issued by brands I trust, and the vast majority are Upper Deck cards because of their exclusivity contract with Griffey. But somehow they weren’t the only company with an exclusivity contract.

The Score Board, Inc. sold untold thousands of autographs in their short time, and the deeper you go into their history and products, the more questions you seem to come away with. So after many hours of clicking and reading, here is everything I’ve learned about this company and their wacky, roller-coaster history. Keep in mind I will keep the lens of a Griffey collector, and there will be lots of quotes.


The Score Board Inc. was a sports memorabilia company founded in 1987 by Paul and Ken Goldin, a father and son pair who were super into baseball card collecting. The company began life as a penny stock selling at 3 ½ cents per share. By the end of 1992 that same stock was up to $45 per share. So if you bought $100 worth of The Score Board Inc. at its IPO, within five years your investment was worth over $128,000. That’s right – a penny stock made serious money.



TSB, as I will call them for brevity’s sake, did a LOT for the hobby in their short time. They were the biggest baseball card distributor in the country at one point, and they had deals with every major card company. They purchased the Best brand in 1991 so they could produce minor league cards as well as the Classic brand of cards and most of those funky phone cards you may have seen in the mid-to-late-90’s.


Most importantly, TSB had autograph contracts with various superstars across multiple sports and would sell signed items via home shopping channels like HSN and QVC. This is where TSB’s revenue really started rolling in, and for a while business was good.



But the good times wouldn’t last. Paul Goldin, the father in the father-son duo that started the company, passed away suddenly in 1994 at which point his son Ken took the reins. Unfortunately the timing was bad for Ken. The card market was getting more and more saturated with brands and products (remember all those ‘90’s oddballs?). On top of that was the MLB strike which ended up being the first nail in the coffin for lots of companies that had only recently entered the market; and TSB was heavily invested in baseball.

There were other problems, too, including a lot of lawsuits and countersuits with competing brands and even players, some of which set precedents that are used to this day to teach law classes (really, look it up). While those are outside of the focus of this blog, they are interesting to read about. You can find these with a quick Googling. I’m going to be focusing on the products here.


While most memorabilia companies had moved to holograms and matching stickers for authentication, TSB used only a very sorry-looking COA that any geek off the street could duplicate. TSB was one of the strongest names in sports collecting, and any products sold direct by them and via home shopping were as good as gold(in), but there is no denying that the COA’s did leave a lot to be desired.



In 1998 TSB declared chapter 11 bankruptcy. When this happened and there were still orders left to fill, at least one card shop took matters into their own hands. A dealer in Las Vegas called Smokey’s was found by the FBI during “Operation Bullpen” (come on, that’s a cool name) to have the template and a stamp for creating TSB COA’s, and they were allegedly using them to fill orders for Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle autographs. Griffey autographs were not mentioned in this case.

While it’s not Griffey-related, here’s a quick word of advice from an autograph enthusiast I ran into online: “Mickey Mantle never signed any bats or jerseys for Score Board, only flats and balls. If you see a Score Board COA with either of these, keep on walking.”

On top of that scandal - which actually happened - were unsubstantiated rumors of employees taking boxes of authentic items, forging a bunch of fakes, replacing the originals, and returning them to stock for shipment. There were more rumors of employees stealing large quantities of blank COA’s which they later used to sell forgeries. On top of all of this a lot of independent dealers and the guys running tables at shows simply had no love for the company which also happened to be one of their major competitors.


So, while they sold quality products for years, due to the controversy and rumors surrounding the company, there are some folks who label any and all autographed items from The Score Board as fakes. While I understand wanting to steer clear of a company that had forgeries manufactured in their name, I think these guys are throwing the baby out with the bath water.


I’d like to mention here that I realize the folly of quoting Internet forum hearsay in what I want to be a fact-based blog post, but nearly everything I’ve been able to find about The Score Board is unsubstantiated rumor. There doesn’t appear to be a credible list anywhere online of what items were faked and what weren’t apart from suspicion and innuendo in Internet forums posted 15 years or more after all this went down. Whatever’s word is as good a source as any.

Now that we are talking about credible lists, this is a good time to take a look at eBay’s “not allowed” page for autographs:

“Autographed items with COAs and LOAs, or references to COAs and LOAs from the following people or organizations:

ACE Authentic
Coach's Corner Sports Auctions LLC
Christopher L. Morales
CSC Collectibles
Donald Frangipani
Forensic Document Services
Hollywood Dreams
J. DiMaggio Co. / J. DiMaggio Company
Legends Sports Memorabilia
Nathan's Autographs / N.E. Autographs
Nicholas Burczyk
Pro Sports / Pro Sports Memorabilia
Rare and Signed.com
Robert Prouty
R.R.'s Sports Cards & Collectibles
SCAA / Front Page Art / Angelo Marino
Slamdunk Sportscards & Memorabilia
Sports Alley Memorabilia
Sports Management Group
Stan's Sports / Stans Sports Memorabilia
TTA Authentic (formerly STAT Authentic)
Universal Memorabilia
XMI Authentications
USA Authentics
Blank COAs and LOAs
COAs and LOAs as stand-alone items
COAs and LOAs from anyone listed on the FBI's Operation Bullpen website”

And here is everyone listed on the FBI's Operation Bullpen website:

“Catch a Star/JMC Distributors/J&M Sports Cards/Mike Bowler (all of Oceanside, Calif.)
Classic Memorabilia/Hollywood Dreams/Hollywood Collectibles/David Tabb (of Santa Ana, Calif.; not to be confused with any other firms)
Del Mar Sports Cards/Jon Hall (San Diego)
Framed Images/Richard Laughlin (San Juan Capistrano, Calif.)
Front Page Art/John Marino, Gloria Marino, Kathleen Marino, Greg Marino, Angelo Marino
Frosty’s/Frosty Golembeske
Home Field Advantage/Carmen “Chip” Lombardo (Del Mar, Calif.)
International Sports Marketing/Mike Lopez (Rosemead, Calif.)
La Jolla Sports Cards/Bruce Gaston (La Jolla, Calif.)
Prime Time Sports Cards/Michael Tapales (Buena Park, Calif.)
Pro Sport Memorabilia/Anthony Marino
Rick’s Collectibles/Ricky Weimer (Escondido, Calif.)
Ricky Mitchell
Shelly’s Cards/Sheldon Jaffe (Tustin, Calif.)
Sports and Celebrity Authentic Autographs/WW Sports Cards/Wayne Bray (San Marcos, Calif.)
Sports Management Group (Aliso Viejo, Calif.)/Universal Authentic Memorabilia (San Clemente, Calif.)/Sports Alley (Laguna Niguel, Calif.)/Mike Moses/Robyn Moses
The Beautiful and the Unusual/Lowell Katz (Long Beach, Calif.)
Universal Authentic Memorabilia/Reno Ruberti/Karen Ruberti (San Clemente, Calif.)/Scott Harris/Mary Lou Harris.”

As you can see, neither The Score Board Inc. nor either of the Goldins is on either list. This is not a surprise as they sold thousands of legit autographs for years, and they do not deserve to be on either list.


Now you already knew this deep down so don’t get upset, but it’s important to keep in mind that if you didn’t get it yourself, there is no way you can guarantee with 100% certainty that any autograph ever signed is genuine. This is the nature of the beast. It simply cannot be done. You can trust a company to have taken steps to assure the item is legit and the seller you are buying from to not be a con man or simply misinformed, but that’s about the best you can do. You will never really know for sure. Never.


If you really want to scare yourself, go read the horror stories about fakes and counterfeits being authenticated even by the likes of reputable firms like PSA DNA and BGS. There are far more than I’m comfortable with, especially since I own several slabbed autos and consider some of them to be cornerstones of the collection.

Having read through dozens and dozens of stories of the dark side of autograph authentication, I cannot understand how anyone can tell me how everything one company releases as legitimate is 100% real, but they never touch anything from another one. It simply does not compute, especially when the latter company was the most reputable source of autographed cards and memorabilia in the market for nearly a decade.


Now that all that stuff is out of the way, we can finally settle in to our comfort zone and talk about Griffey cards. While there are probably more to be had out there, I have exactly two autographed Griffey cards with COA’s from The Score Board, and here they are:

1992 Upper Deck Bloodlines Triple Autograph

First is one of my favorite Griffeys of all time, the 1992 Upper Deck Bloodlines card signed by Junior, Senior, and brother Craig. These were hand-numbered out of 1,992, the year they were all members of the Mariners program. On a personal note, this card got the (coveted?) #1 spot in my Top Griffey Acquisitions of 2016 list (which just a year before a card signed by both Griffey and Mickey Mantle didn’t even get). You can read my lovey-dovey description of it here.


These cards were sold through QVC in a lucite case complete with an engraved plaque and COA, whatever that’s worth.

Why do I think it’s authentic? Well, it’s is a 1992 card, so it’s possible it was sold before all the nonsense allegedly started over at The Score Board. I’ve seen a specimen of this exact card that was PSA DNA slabbed authentic. In this case not one but THREE autographs had to pass muster to earn that designation. Also I’ve seen numerous examples in the very same case that mine arrived in that have sold on memorabilia sites outside of eBay. And finally, I’ve seen a lot of Griffey autos in my time, and this one just looks right.


When I bought this card I thought the price seemed suspiciously low. At the time I figured it was the large production run that was the reason; but having spent a little time looking into the company behind the COA, I suspect some collectors have written off The Score Board. Whether they are justified in doing so I cannot say for sure one way or the other. I can say that I believe this card is authentic, and I couldn’t be happier that the price was low enough for me to own one.

1991 Score Jumbo Autograph w/ COA

I also have this warlock which I acquired on a whim for ultra-cheap, having already done a bit of research into TSB. Plus it's a Paul COA which is considered more likely to be genuine than a Ken one.

I even have one of those phone cards:

1997 The Score Board Prepaid Phone Card Promo

I don't know what possessed me to buy it, but I did. Looks cool.

So anyway…

Please understand that this post is not to say that everything with a Score Board COA is legit; but I’ve done so much research into this company, and it appears that the damage done was by just a small handful of counterfeiters and limited to a few specific categories. You can’t write off the entire brand, especially since they did sell millions of dollars in authentic signed merchandise, and they did it legitimately and in the most American way possible.

So, what would I NOT buy that comes with a COA from TSB? From my online research into the company and its products, the items that would scare me the most are signed balls, bats, jerseys, photos, and anything with a Joe DiMaggio or Mickey Mantle autograph. COAs with Ken Goldin’s name on them instead of Paul’s would also cause me concern. While I should reiterate that NO AUTOGRAPH can possibly be authenticated with any real certainty, those particular items seem to have gotten the most attention from counterfeiters.

In closing I’m just going to go ahead and tell you that I hate just about everything about the sports memorabilia/autograph market. The people are shady, practically nothing is verifiable, and every year there seem to be more horror stories. And somehow the whole thing seems to be centered around mini-helmets? What is that all about? Mini-helmets are stupid...JUST COLLECT CARDS FOR GOODNESS SAKE.

Okay, that’s it.

I’ve been wanting to write this post for over three years (or almost 22 years, depending on how you look at it).

You may have read a few years ago when I decided to complete the 1996 Beckett Ken Griffey, Jr. Tribute checklist, a list of Griffey cards that made me quit collecting altogether when I was 15 and all those triple- and quadruple-figure card values broke my spirit.

Then in 2016 a few years after having re-entered the hobby later in life as so many of us have done, I took another look at said checklist and realized that I could actually complete it, given enough time, money, and patience. I already had all the real monsters, and I had a jump on his Hall of Fame induction which I assumed would spike prices something fierce (I was right, too). I’d only dreamed of such a thing when I was a teenager. Could it really be done?

So, on June 18th of 2015 I announced my intention to complete the dream of my youth and set a deadline of December 31st, 2016, a full 20 years after the Beckett Tribute issue came out. Over the following weeks I added a healthy chunk of those cards to the collection and started ticking boxes.

The months came and went, and it was feast or famine for a while with what seemed like long periods of nothing to show with bursts of five or six new cards in between - salad days compared with what was to come.

In August of 2016 with 3 months and a measly 28 cards to go, I hit a wall. I was 96% of the way to my goal, the closest I’d been yet, and even pretty far ahead of schedule by the numbers; but I was less hopeful than ever I could get it done in time. I even took some time to write a blog post about it.

The deadline came and went – no surprise there. I don’t even know exactly where I stood with this project on the last day of 2016. Those final 28 were harder to find than all the other cards I needed at the start combined. Most of the checklist you could simply throw money at and they were yours. The difference is they were AROUND. You could actually FIND them. That was not the case for those final 28.

Luckily there were a lot of little victories throughout 2017 when I ticked 26 of the final 28 boxes. I was battling for every single card at this point – scouring card sites, auction sites, and even Facebook groups to track each card down one at a time. It was slow-moving, but it was moving. By the end of the year I had a measly 2 cards left to find, and one of those popped up rather quickly in January of this year.

The biggest hurdle was that final card, the 1994 Upper Deck All-Star Jumbo #1 Gold. I set up numerous eBay saved searches with every possible configuration of words someone might use to describe the card, I bought dozens of the sealed sets in the hopes that one of them would contain the elusive gold cards (none did, and I have a ton of them available now if anyone out there needs one), and I even took to begging on the Griffey-collecting Facebook groups and forums for someone to sell me the darn thing.

I did that thing so many collectors do (in all hobbies) where I developed a sense of entitlement – that I was DESTINED to own this card. It was, after all, the only card holding me back from accomplishing my childhood fantasy. How dare anyone try to stand in my way? Unfortunately that entitlement thing happens a lot, and usually not with me. Eventually I cooled out and just decided it would happen when it happens, and not to force it. I played it easy-breezy. And thank goodness I did because it took a long time.

Every few weeks for the past two years I have jumped on eBay and done a very generic search, something like “1994 Upper Deck Griffey Gold,” and this time – for the first time ever – there it was, just a few auctions down from the top, hidden among a larger group of gold jumbos. The auction included BOTH gold Griffeys (the other which I already had) from the set for $38.00 with a Best Offer option that I completely ignored. A few clicks and the deed was done. Years of work, hours of searching, and thousands of dollars invested all finally paid off with a final 38 bucks.

768/768 – 100%

Let’s take another look at that checklist now:





I dreamed of this day. I guess my appreciation for girls simply hadn’t caught on yet because all I wanted back then was exactly what you’re looking at here: row after row of filled-in boxes and the Griffeys to back them up - nothing else. Being finished is pretty surreal.

Now what?

Wanna see some stats?? You know I do!

The total number of days elapsed from Jan 1st, 1996 to October 22nd, 2018 is 8331. Subtract the number of days in 1996 before this checklist was published (I still don't know exactly when it came out that year), and you still have well over 8000 days, hence the post title.

When I first announced my quest I needed 198 cards out of the total 768 cards on the checklist (the numbers in the original post were off by a few dozen which I realized after a few months of getting real intimate with that list). To complete the challenge I had to acquire one new Griffey every 4 1/2 days. By the time I got the final card I had averaged one per 6.14 days.

But that’s just half the story. In August of 2016, just three months from my self-imposed time limit, I still needed 28 cards, the 28 hardest gets of all. Since then I averaged one new card every (strangely enough) 28 days, a massive drop-off and a testament to how scarce that last chunk of the checklist was. In fact I acquired JUST THE FINAL THREE in the last 461 days, or one card every 154 days. The longest stretch of time between acquisitions was for that final card: 281 days.


I did not, but damn that took a long time...


If you plan on building the 1996 Beckett yada yada checklist, I have plenty of information to share with you.

First, several cards stand out as having been particularly difficult gets, some due to high expense and some simply because there aren’t any around to be had, regardless of expense. Keep in mind that price had little to do with most these – it was all about SCARCITY. Here are the real toughies you’ll face if you go after this thing yourself:


1988 Best San Bernardino Spirit Team Set Platinum

The Beckett checklist tells us that there are 34 cards in the team set at large, and it even appears to include the full set as part of the checklist despite the fact that 33 of those are NOT Ken Griffey, Jr. If you can land just his card which is 99.999% of the set’s value anyway, you can go ahead and check that box, big guy. You have my blessing.

But if you want to get hard-core, you’re going to have to land the full sets. That’s BOTH full sets, regular AND platinum. Sorry – they didn’t put the little “(34)” on the checklist for their health.


1989 Bowman Tiffany

The toughest of the Tiffany Rookies, and there are TWO of them if you include the TV-style cameo on his Dad’s card, which this checklist does. Just be thankful the Topps Heads-up prototype wasn’t included.


1989 Topps Traded #41T Tiffany

One of the more beloved Griffey rookies, I recommend just picking up a sealed set for all the other great rookies here, not to mention a shot at a PSA or BGS 10. Gem mint graded specimens are expensive but not too uncommon since these were never packed out.


1990 Bowman #481 Tiffany

Lower production numbers compared with nearly every other Tiffany set keep this one just out of reach for most – stay alert.


1990 Donruss Super Diamond Kings #6

“Super” just means “jumbo,” but finding one is a real chore. You’re better off just looking for the full sealed set – that’s what I did. Mine is still sealed, in fact, but I assume the Griffey is in there. I mean, it freakin’ better be.


1990 Leaf Previews

This is Lord of the Previews, guys. I lucked into mine for $40 from a fellow collector ages ago. Prices have increased significantly since then. Very tough card.


1991 Donruss Previews #4

You’re going to see a lot of previews in this list. By the mid-90’s they were a dime a dozen, but early on they were still pretty special. Just be prepared to flex your bidding muscle for this (and any other preview listed here, really), and be thankful they didn’t include the 1991 Donruss advertising sheet promo. THAT thing is a real pain to find.


1991 Topps Desert Shield (#392, #790)

You’ve probably heard of these – they are famously scarce and extremely hard to find in above-average condition. If condition is not a big issue for you, though, there are deals to be had…


1992 Donruss Previews #7

These are a bit pricey (for 1992 Donruss cards, I mean) if the seller knows what they have; but just keep your eyes peeled for skinnier-than-normal lettering in the nameplate and you just might find one among a bunch of common cards. Odds are against this, but it’s possible. I’ve seen it.


1992 Triple Play Previews #1

Okay – last preview. Like the ’90 Leaf previews the bit that makes it a preview is on the BACK, so this is another one you could find among common base cards. Happy hunting.


1993 Colla Diamond Marks Art Card #3

These have held their value noticeably well over the years, probably because a lot of mid-90’s kids actually used them as bookmarks (savages). That black border combined with the fact that they are condition sensitive means undamaged ones sell for a nice premium, usually in the triple figures. For a bookmark, y’all.


1993 Finest Refractor

Yeah, it’s expensive, and it seems to be getting MORE expensive every day. But that was always part of the deal. You collect Griffey – you knew what you were getting into. Here you get the frustration of these being available for more than you may want to spend in place of the frustration of not being able to find them in the first place. Call that a win.


1993 O-Pee-Chee Premier Star Performers #9 Foil

These are the ones without the gold borders. While cheap, they hardly ever come up for sale; and when they eventually do it’s easy to resent how little they end up costing you. Just snap it up if you ever come across one, and be done with it. [Fun fact: I just checked eBay and there are TWO of these for sale. Suddenly it’s a buyer’s market, I guess. Sheesh.]


1993 Pinnacle Cooperstown #22 Dufex

One of the first Dufex cards ever, and owning one is a bona fide rite of passage among Griffey collectors. Don’t expect to get it cheap.


1993 Upper Deck Fifth Anniversary Jumbo #A1

Okay, when they say “Jumbo” here, they mean JUMBO. This is one of the biggest cards in my collection by surface area. It even came with its own special case which it absolutely needs. It’s so big they couldn’t even stretch the front image big enough so it has these white strips on either side. And it’s pretty rare, too, so there’s that.


1993 Upper Deck Iooss Collection #WI13 Jumbo

The second-to-last card I was able to track down. It was dirt cheap when I did, too. Vigilance and a little help from the eagle-eyed Magicpapa got me this card. Fun fact: when I finally found the last card and put this whole project to bed, Magicpapa is the very first person I told. I haven’t even told my wife yet.


1994 Collector’s Choice #117 Gold Signature

I got mine early on, but I’ve watched the prices steadily rise over the years. I think this one is a bit rarer than people originally thought.


1994 Collector’s Choice #634 Up Close & Personal Gold Signature

There was a long time when I thought this one simply didn’t exist. Seriously – I almost crossed it off the list as an error. I’d all but given up when it popped up on eBay (I think it was around $30 or so), and I snapped it up. There are probably enough that a fair-minded fellow Griffey collector could hook you up, though. It just won’t be me – I only have the one.


1994 Bowman’s Best #R40 Refractor

Those first few years of Topps’ iconic refractors were something special. Someone figured out that there are approximately 241 copies of the infamous 1993 Finest refractor, and based on how many I’ve seen and the prices they command, I believe there are a similar quantity for all refractors from around that time, including this one. This card cost me $100 in late 2016, and even at that price (which is crazy low compared with today’s prices) I was pretty hesitant about pulling the trigger. Looking back now I’m glad I did…


1994 Finest #232 Refractor

See: 1994 Bowman’s Best #R40 Refractor


1994 O-Pee-Chee All-Star Redemptions #8 Jumbo

Believe it or not these jumbos are, like, just frickin’ NOWHERE. I messaged SO MANY auction sellers asking if it was a jumbo they were selling and it NEVER WAS. I don’t even like the card. Frankly my blood pressure is going up just thinking about it. In the end it cost me ten bucks shipped, and I was glad to be done with it.


1994 SP Holoview #12 Red

I’m guessing there are only a handful of these because they don’t come up often and they go for a LOT when they do, even moreso now than when I got mine from a friendly fellow collector via the Griffey Facebook group. This one may require calling in a favor.


1994 Topps Superstar Samplers Cello Pack #19

These can be identified by the little stamp on the reverse-bottom of each of the three cards inside. I have the sealed cello pack, but even unsealed I suppose they might count for the purposes of this checklist, assuming you can find all three.

HOWEVER the checklist does say “cello pack,” doesn’t it? So if you want to go full-literal when interpreting this checklist, I guess you need it. Unfortunately the sealed cello pack is a true, tier-one, grade-A spirit-crusher, and you will never own it. Never ever ever.

Compromise is the name of the game with this thing. Just get the loose ones and save yourself some trouble here. <COUGH wimp COUGH>


1994 Upper Deck Griffey/Mantle Dual Auto

I’m not including the Griffey solo autograph on this list because A) you can find it pretty easily, B) they tend to go for less than $200, C) they are an amazing value at that price, and D) they are all but GUARANTEED to be genuine as is either solo auto from this insert.

The dual autograph is significantly more expensive and usually commands even more than the usually-inflated values from 1996. And some claim there are people bought the Griffey solo on the cheap and wrote in their own Mantle autos. If that’s a genuine concern of yours, simply spend many hundreds of dollars more and get one with a COA (still not a guarantee, of course). I’m content with mine being PSA DNA slabbed authentic as the COA is not on the checklist.


1994 Upper Deck All-Star Jumbos Gold (#1, # 125th Anniversary)

You are looking two of the final three cards I acquired in my quest to complete the checklist.
When I finally got my grubby mitts on the 125th Anniversary Jumbo Gold, the third-to-last card I needed, it was auction-style; and in the final few seconds I dropped a massive over-bid so I wouldn’t miss out. I ended up winning it for about 15 bucks instead of the…sigh…many, many dollars I actually bid. Phew.

Old #1 was the final card on this checklist. Even with my Griffey-collecting crosshairs on it and it alone, this card still eluded me for 281 days of actively looking for NOTHING ELSE. I even went a little crazy for a few weeks there. But I’m much better BURN EVERYTHING. Er, I mean now. Much better now.


1995 Bowman’s Best #R49 Refractors/Diffraction Foil

See: 1994 Bowman’s Best #R40 Refractor


Ron Kittle Coffee Mug

This one is not on the checklist, but if you have one we are probably secret best friends and also let's hang out. What are you doing Friday?


1995 Collector’s Choice You Crash the Game #CG8A 7/2 Gold, #CG8B 8/24 Gold, #CG8C 9/15 Gold

Back in August of 2016 when I was stalled on the final 28 cards, these were my pick for what would be the final few cards needed to complete the list. Then they started popping up one after the other, and within a few weeks I suddenly had all of them. The worst part is I bought them all before realizing I’d already had one of them ALL ALONG. Whoops.


1995 Collector's Choice SE #261 Checklist Gold Signature

Here’s another card I started to doubt ever got the gold signature treatment, but I was wrong. Look hard and keep the faith, brother.


1995 Finest #118 Refractor

See: 1994 Bowman’s Best #R40 Refractor


1995 Pinnacle Artist's Proofs (#128, #304, #447, #450)

Pinnacle made their Artist’s Proof parallels super tough this year across all their sub-brands. Whatever I paid for them (I know one was in the three figures), it was probably worth it. Not an easy parallel by any stretch, especially that Bagwell/Piazza/Thomas checklist – prepare to battle numerous other player collectors for that one. And bring money.


1995 Score Rules #SR1 Jumbo

Apparently everyone had one of these but me. The fact is no one likes selling jumbos because they’re a pain to ship, usually necessitating a proper box instead of a simple bubble mailer or PWE. I believe that’s the reason there are so many jumbos on this list to begin with. Also this is another one of those more-jumbo-than-jumbo jumbos. Here it is with a Dunston Checks In lunch box for reference. It’s bloody HUGE.


1995 Select Artist’s Proofs (#89, #243, #250)

See: 1995 Pinnacle Artist’s Proofs (the part about the Bagwell/Piazza/Thomas checklist applies here, too)


1995 Sportflix Artist's Proofs (#1, #168)

See: 1995 Pinnacle Artist’s Proofs


1995 Stadium Club #521 Extreme Corps First Day Issue

You have to be careful with this one. It's a tricky card - very tricky.


1996 Collector's Choice #310 Gold Signature

This was the toughest Gold Signature parallel in the entire checklist by far. The one I bought was the first one I’d ever come across, and it wasn’t cheap. I’ve only seen one since then, but at least they are out there.


1995 UC3 #124 In Depth Artist's Proof

See: 1995 Pinnacle Artist’s Proofs


1995 Upper Deck Electric Diamond Gold

I am a huge ’95 Upper Deck fanboy having bought numerous packs and boxes in both series and even built the base set, so I know exactly how tough those golds are and how easy it is to misidentify them as the much more common silvers. That may explain why there are not many to be found in the wild. But they are totally worth it because 1995 Upper Deck is AWESOME.

The toughest cards for me were all some variation of Upper Deck’s various jumbos. If you have any of these (and I suppose that near-impossible 1994 Topps Superstar Samplers Cello Pack) consider yourself lucky. You are practically halfway there according to my timeline - everything else is just money.

Also keep in mind that these were just the cards that sprung to mind when I started thinking about which ones gave me the most trouble. There are plenty of others that are more challenging than most that I didn’t even show here. The list is not easy.

But it could have been a lot harder. If this thing had come out just a few weeks later in the year it would have included some real monsters. Think reasonably-nice used car money. In no particular order, here are a few cards you should be thankful are NOT on this list but very nearly were:

Pinnacle Skylines Insert
A Couple of Bowman's Best Atomic Refractors
SPx Ken Griffey, Jr. Commemorative Autograph
Studio Gold and Silver Press Proofs
Circa Rave
Pacific Cramer's Choice
Several Finest Refractors
Donruss Power Alley Die-Cut - There are supposed to be 500 but they don't act like it in the market.
Ultra Hitting Machines and Thunder Clap Gold Medallion - The former is famously rare and the latter is even rarer.
Zenith Diamond Club Real Diamond Parallel - I've never met another collector who has one.
Select Certified Mirror Anything - Red and blue go for thousands, and the #/30 gold is basically ungettable.

With these in the mix I probably would not have even tried this thing. Those Select Certified parallels alone could ruin your collecting career. Thank you, Beckett, for leaving these off of the list.

Moving on, there are three spots on the checklist that could have used some revision, and you should absolutely know about them before you start throwing money around.

1) Colla Collection Diamond Marks

The same group of three cards is listed twice in succession as both “Diamond Marks” and “Colla Diamond Marks.” The two groups are one and the same. I think these simply got double-listed by accident.

2) Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards Signatures

The autographs of this set are complicated, and they sound even more complicated when you try to explain them. I won’t try and do that here; instead, here is how I would have written that part of the checklist:

1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards /15000 (w/ Ken, Sr.)
1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards /15000 (w/ Craig Griffey)
1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards Signature Ken, Sr. and Craig Griffey (Craig Autograph only) #/1050
1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards Signature Ken, Sr. and Craig Griffey (Ken, Sr. Autograph) #/1050
1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards Signature Autograph #/1000 (w/ Ken, Sr.; Ken, Jr. Autograph)
1994 Signature Rookies Draft Picks Flip Cards Signature Autograph #/1000 (w/ Craig; Ken, Jr. Autograph)

Simply put, that’s two base cards and four autographs, two of which are Junior autos. None of the cards are signed by more than one Griffey, so there are no multiple autos here.

Signature Rookies also made a real mess of things by including stickers or COA’s or BOTH with the various autographs, depending on which one you get. Very confusing. Also Beckett assigned them card numbers which, while they may be sourced from the manufacturer and correct, aren’t on the actual cards. You have to go strictly by description here. The good news is that these autographs are plentiful and relatively inexpensive, especially the Craig and Senior autos.

This bit is up for debate, too, as you could, if you want, just get those cards that feature Junior and not the ones that feature only Ken, Sr. and Craig. But guess what? THEY ARE ON THE CHECKLIST. Better get them just to be safe.

3) 1995 Stadium Club #521 Extreme Corps 1st Day Issue

These don't even exist. Seriously. The one I showed a scan of up there I made in MS Paint just to mess with people. I like to think there might be someone out there trying for this list and getting stuck on the 1995 Stadium Club #521 Extreme Corps First Day Issue, then happening across this very post and seeing a "scan" of it (without reading the post, of course), and fuming that they still haven't been able to find one. If anyone ever reaches out asking me to sell that card, I'm going to post the whole e-mail here so we can all have a laugh.

OK, this has been a long post, but I have one last thing to talk about that is several months overdue.

It takes a pretty sizable push to get me to publish a post nowadays. That is not to say I don’t have a dozen complete posts waiting in the wings I simply haven’t gotten around to finishing with card scans and the cutest post titles you’ve ever heard – there are, in fact, at least a dozen such posts ready to go.

For a very long time I was putting off – well, dreading might be a better word – updating you fine folks on my progress with the 1996 Beckett Tribute checklist since I failed so miserably at meeting my deadline. Add to that my constant daddy duty (doody) and the 9pm bedtime more or less demanded by my new lifestyle, and you have one woefully inactive blogger.

Then a few months ago when I was down to just one last card to finally put my adolescent dream to bed (a lot of my dreams back then involved a bed) (also Yasmine Bleeth), I received…well, let’s call it a nudge. A friendly, heartwarming nudge that took the form of one unique card:


A few days before this arrived I’d received an e-mail from one of the great Griffey collectors of our time requesting my address because “somebody” wanted it. I obliged as I consider said collector a friend. A few weeks later this little beauty arrived in the mail.

With it was a note from its creator who told me they were commissioned to make this custom job just for me, and to avoid removing it from its case as it was very fragile. That was all the information I had.

That scan does not do this card justice. Here's a real photo.

When I first laid eyes on it, it took me a few moments before I realized what I was looking at. Obviously it was the cover of the Beckett Tribute issue to which I’ve devoted thousands of dollars, many hours, and countless fevered mouse clicks. That alone is plenty deserving of a card. And a refractor, no less. It’s even got the little bar code! Wow – someone after my own heart.

I’ve looked at that magazine a thousand times, but it still took a minute before I realized that one of my blog post titles was there, followed by the subtitle. This is not just a custom – it’s a personalized custom. Somebody put my words on this thing.


Flipping the card around and seeing the back, the feels really started to hit. That’s the entire checklist – MY checklist. Those are the very dots I put on these pages with when I was 15 (and again when I was 33). And it quotes me. It quotes me talking about my mother and my childhood.

The culprit has not officially stepped forward (I have guesses), but one thing is clear: whoever it may be was rooting for me to knock this thing out. To you, sir, or madam (Yasmine?), thank you for the much-needed nudge. This card is amazing.

So I ask again: Now what? If you ever followed this blog you know how many posts I used to regularly crank out. Obviously things have changed. In fact if you look only at my number of posts per month over the life of this blog you can probably tell exactly what month I became a dad and my blogging time went by the wayside. But I’m working to correct that now that the boy is a bit more independent.

I think this checklist will be the last major collecting project for a while. I deserve a break. I’m going to try to catch up on blogging, something I’d already started to do even before I completed the Beckett checklist.

Although I am open to new collecting challenges if anyone has any ideas…

Thanks for reading.

In the late 90’s everybody was trying to re-invent base sets and infuriate set builders. Personally I think Donruss probably failed the most miserably at it, but Upper Deck was guilty, too. Just take a look at 1998 SPx Finite.

[On a personal note, I should have made this post years ago for my own good. This set has boggled my mind for ages, but after a little research now I finally loosely understand it a little bit of sorts kind of. Progress!]

There are three characteristics that make this set unique:

#1: Technically, 1998 SPx Finite is one big base set. The catch here is that in lieu of regular inserts there are eight subsets (and to make things interesting, there really is one regular insert, but you can forget it because you're never going to find one). However, if you removed all the card numbers this brand would look more like a small base set with eight inserts which is nothing out of the ordinary. And let’s be honest: if you have eight short-printed subsets plus a tiny base set, you basically have eight inserts and…well, a tiny base set. The number on the card is kind of arbitrary.

#2: There are two parallels, Radiance and SPectrum, that are along for the ride. Parallels that apply to both base cards and inserts (I still consider these inserts) are nothing new - they’ve been around since Fleer’s 1995 Ultra Gold Medallions – but this is the first time Upper Deck did anything like it on this scale.

#3: Every card is serial-numbered, hence the name. Individually-numbered cards were still pretty exciting in 1998.

The end result is a single base set with six “base” Griffeys and two parallels for each. That makes 18 Griffeys in the base set which, combined with five sample variations and one legitimate insert, gives us an overall total of 24 Griffeys of which I have 19. This is exactly the kind of off-the-wall Griffey checklist one should expect from an Upper Deck brand in 1998.

One more thing about this set: it contains a few cards that would fetch several hundred dollars and three in particular that would easily surpass four figures at auction – and that is with no autographs and no relics, just cardboard. All Upper Deck had to do was print them differently and serial-number them. While we may be touching on something outside of the scope of this post, does that feel weird to anyone el$e?

Let’s get started:

1998 SPx Finite #130 #/9000

We are starting in the middle of the base set because, not having a subset name attributed to it, card #130 is Griffey’s de-facto base card. At 9000 produced this is also his least rare card in the set.

The base version of each card looks pretty much like this: papery foil, dark green accents, and a raised-print, copper-colored badge heralding the subset. It’s an attractive, tactile card that just begs you to run your fingers over that raised badge.


The back is pretty standard: a tiny blurb, portrait, and stat box. Griffey’s portrait is a good one - him in flipped-up-shades with “a Taylor on the earlobe” and an all-business RGF (resting Griff face). Probably best to steer clear of this fella.

While I like the overall (albeit busy) look of the regular cards, the designs really start to pop in the parallels; and they only get better with scarcity.

1998 SPx Finite #130 Radiance #/4500

The Radiance parallel keeps the papery foil; but they are all done up in blue accents in lieu of green, and the badges are gold instead of copper. Looks nice.

1998 SPx Finite #130 SPectrum #/2250

SPectrum is the rarest of the two base parallels. While I am frequently guilty of holding down the shift key a split-second too long and accidentally capitalizing the first two letters of words as I type, that is not what happened here. SPectrum is correct (starts with SP – get it?!). Both MS Word and Blogger are super pissed I won’t let them correct it.


SPectrum cards are foil board instead of the papery foil of the more common versions. Also the accents are red and the badge is holofoil. It’s an absolute monster and forces your eyes to recognize its scarcity.

“Bling!” – SPectrum card
“Ugh - I get it, you’re rare.” – your eyes
“Damn right.” – SPectrum card

One weird thing about this parallel is that because papery foil scans so dark, the SPectrum parallel looks like a completely different card here. Suddenly you can clearly see the photos, and the badge practically leaps off the card. I assure you, in person they look more like three versions of the same card.

Now that you’ve seen the three versions of each card, here is a short key to differentiate them:

Regular: paper foil, green accents, copper badge
Radiance (parallel): paper foil, blue accents, gold badge
SPectrum (rarest parallel): foil board, red accents, holofoil badge

The checklist is not in order by scarcity – it kind of jumps around. In this post we are going to take the five subsets in order by scarcity starting with the two most common:

1998 SPx Finite #165 Star Focus #/7000

As you can see the general design is the same as the regular base card only with a subset title in the badge that is vaguely reflected by its shape – here the shape is pointed like a star...kinda? Instead of a stat box on the back we get a top ten list of total runs scored the previous season on which Junior is #3.

We’ve covered all the major differences among the parallels, so we should be able to move pretty fast from here on out. Here are the Radiance and SPectrum versions:

1998 SPx Finite #165 Star Focus Radiance #/3500

1998 SPx Finite #165 Star Focus SPectrum #/1750

Sorry to use the blurry COMC image here - this really is my copy.

I owe you guys some better scans.

This next subset is the same level of scarcity as Star Focus, so all the serial numbering is the same:

1998 SPx Finite #240 Power Passion #/7000

Power Passion is weird in nearly every way. The text on the badge can be a bit hard to read, so seeing that giant P on there and not having a magnifying glass to read the subset title may have been confusing for some. There is also gigantic text on the front of the card that reads “105 Home Runs,” a string of words that makes no sense to anyone who hasn’t read the blurb in its entirety, again, with a magnifying glass (the text is super tiny). No, he did not hit 105 home runs in 1997. And that’s just the beginning of the weirdness here.


Where most card backs in this set are quite busy, have photos, include unique stats in lieu of a standard stat box, and also show a non-foil version of the front badge, this subset has none of that. Frankly the back here looks like it came from a completely different set. Even the serial numbering is printed differently here. Why?? Were these printed before all the subsets were designed? I don’t trust you, Power Passion.

Here are the parallels:

1998 SPx Finite #240 Power Passion Radiance #/3500

1998 SPx Finite #240 Power Passion Spectrum #/1750

The last one!

I dig the purp on this one.

From here we take big leap in scarcity and, sadly, start building the list of 1998 SPx Finite Griffeys that I don’t have. There will be plenty more of those before this post is done.

1998 SPx Finite #50 Power Explosion #/4000

The Power Explosion subset badge is baseball field/kaboom-shaped. Fun! All but two of the Griffey-having subsets are horizontally-oriented – this is one of the two vertical ones. The colorful back gives us a lovely chart outlining Junior’s home run distribution over the past season. Despite the blurb being kind of pointless, I like the look here a lot.

1998 SPx Finite #50 Power Explosion Radiance #/1000

I am very sad to report that this is the rarest card I own from 1998 SPx Finite. There are five (well, six with the lone insert) cards rarer than this one, all numbered 100 or less with two 1/1’s. The SPectrum parallel of this card is #/50. Abandon all hope, ye who set-build here.

But I have seen one:


Pretty killer, right?

These last two subsets are the rarest in 1998 SPx Finite, and they are identical in scarcity. Their respective Radiance parallels are #/100 – an incredibly tough get for 1998. Their SPectrum parallels are the two 1/1’s I was talking about. I have none of the parallels for these last two subsets. Got the base cards, though. Let’s take a look:

1998 SPx Finite #178 Heroes of the Game #/2000

Welcome to Heroes of the Game, my favorite subset in 1998 SPx Finite.

First, it’s got a lovely round badge that domes out in the middle and feels delightful against the fingertips. I’m glad I didn’t acquire a card like this when I was six – I’d have smashed that badge in like so many fast-food soda cup lid buttons (that nobody ever uses for their intended purpose). The swing shot on the front works beautifully with the layout. A few of the cards in this set have multiple photos on the front, but this card with its one measly photo is better than all of them.


And the back – THE BACK, my friends – is spectacular. Warm and inviting like a hot hearth in a cozy log cabin on a dark, snowy night; yet informative like a kindly bearded baseball sage replete with Griffey knowledge who will fill you in on interesting baseball factoids, then smile and send you on your way with a Mariner pennant and a lollipop. If this card back were a subset in 1998 SPx Finite, it would be Heroes of the Game.

I’m not a wealthy man, but I legitimately want the Radiance and SPectrum parallels of this beauty. I mean, just look at these things (not mine):

1998 SPx Finite #178 Heroes of the Game Radiance #/100

1998 SPx Finite #178 Heroes of the Game Spectrum (backdoored, unnumbered)

Neither of these are mine, and that unnumbered SPectrum is clearly a beauty of the backdoor variety, but damn if those parallels don't pop on this one.

One subset left. How can it possibly follow that? Well, frankly, I’m afraid it can’t. This last one is not all that good:

1998 SPx Finite #360 Cornerstones of the Game #/2000

Cornerstones of the Game, with a badge featuring plenty of sweet corner action, is one of the weakest designs in the whole set. It’s the other vertical design in the base set, and it’s got the same weirdo card back as Power Passion complete with the differently-printed numbering and one seriously weak little stat box. I’m not even sure I’d want one of the incredibly scarce parallels of this one. Of course I’d still totally over-pay if given the opportunity. I’m a card nerd – sue me!

Speaking of which, here's the Radiance (still not mine):

1998 SPx Finite #360 Cornerstones of the Game Radiance #/100

I've never even seen the SPectrum of this one, but THERE'S ONLY ONE SO.....

That’s it for the base set, but guess what? This set has five sample cards. FIVE. We’re going to group those accordingly because this post has enough scans in it as it is.

1998 SPx Finite Sample #1

1998 SPx Finite Sample #2 (Power Passion)

The blurbs are different (maybe even a little better?) and – wait a minute. The Power Passion sample got a full stat box? What the hell? Who decided that was too much information for a card back and opted for the abbreviated stat box and negative space on the official release? That subset just keeps on giving me reasons to throw it into the Mississippi River. Notice how specific I got there – got the body of water all picked out and everything. I have legitimately given this thought.

Here's a three-fer of colored and NUMBERED Finite samples:



That would be 1998 SPx Finite Sample Green #/10000, Blue #/10000, and Red #/2500.

Okay, so I don’t actually know exactly what the story is here. I assume this was a proposed direction for the parallels being that the colors are the same as the accents on the final releases, complete with red being the rarest. It would seem they opted to use different effects for the rest of the card in terms of the colors and on top of that add the three different foils in the badge ordered by scarcity. These are some very cool sample cards in that it kind of gives us a look into the evolution of the design. It also makes me appreciate the final product more because these would have been incredibly boring, especially given the scarcity of some of these parallels.

Oh, and I defy you to find one of these – any color – in good condition. Seriously – I DEFY YOU. 22,500 of these colored sample cards were produced, and all 22,500 have soft, dinged-up edges. It's a fact.

There’s one last card here that we need to talk about: the Home Run Hysteria insert, the only legitimate insert in this shindig. Each card was numbered to 62, and I’ve never seen one in person or on eBay. This insert is on a very short list of ultra-scarce 90’s inserts that most collectors haven’t even heard of let alone had the chance to own. Goobmcnasty from the fabled Freedom Cardboard Griffey Collector's Thread was nice enough to lend us scans of his (I assume you're a dude?) copy. Isn’t that nice?

1998 SPx Finite Homerun Hysteria #HR1 #/62

Soak it in. A white whale if ever there was one. Thanks, Goob.

Here are the remaining Griffeys I need from 1998 SPx Finite:

1998 SPx Finite #50 Power Explosion SPectrum #/50
1998 SPx Finite #178 Heroes of the Game Radiance #/100
1998 SPx Finite #178 Heroes of the Game SPectrum 1/1
1998 SPx Finite #360 Cornerstones of the Game Radiance #/100
1998 SPx Finite #360 Cornerstones of the Game SPectrum 1/1
1998 SPx Finite Homerun Hysteria #/62

With the way Griffeys have been selling since the HOF induction, I predict it would cost somewhere well into four figures to complete this set, and that’s not counting the 1/1’s (I usually don't for my purposes). And none of these cards are autos or relics or anything like that – not one in the whole set, in fact. It’s all about the serial numbering. Let’s face it – this set was basically Upper Deck printing money. At least give me a snippet of uniform, a used napkin, a booger – something. There are more worthy Griffeys to chase than these.

Except for that Heroes of the Game card. That thing is tight.

Remember this thing? Here's a link to the original post if you don't. Several members of the blogsphere have gotten a hold of this box and made posts about it. I’m happy to announce that the box has finally made it back home where it is being repaired, restocked, and rearranged for another trip around the country.

For the past 18 months I’ve watched this box zip back and forth across the U.S., bouncing from one collector to another, shedding Griffeys here, picking up new ones there. It’s been very exciting to see it continue for so long. Recently one of my Griffey buddies let me know he had finally gotten ahold of it, and I requested he send it on to me so I could take a closer look at just how much this box has changed in the last year and a half (and, you know, to take out some Griffeys).

I had some fun with the stats, too.

The box was started with 500 Griffeys. When I received it a few weeks ago, it had 529 Juniors, one Senior, a mini-poster, and a team sticker.

The actual route taken by the box over the past 18 months

The box spent an average of 1.5 months in the possession of each collector. No fewer than 570 Griffeys were added to the box in its journeys, or roughly one Griffey every 28 miles.

Old vs New

The box has traveled over 13,868 miles (as the crow flies) in 541 days, which means it has been zipping around the country at an average speed of 1.06mph (the approximate speed of the unnamed evil from “It Follows.”) In that time the box added no fewer than 546 Griffeys to 13 collections which gives us a complete box turnover of a whopping 109%! That sounds great, but let’s be honest: I’m sure a few of the very same 1990 Donruss and 1991 Fleer cards I started the box with are still hanging out in there.



Far and away the most prolific set in the box is 1991 Score, the greatest junk wax set for Griffey collectors because of the numerous insert and subset appearances.

I tried to not change too much about the box spiritually speaking, but I did make some tweaks here and there. First, I moved the whole thing into a brand new box. The old one was getting rough and weighs more than twice what an empty version of the same exact box does because of all the tape and stickers. The corners are also getting awfully soft and the walls bendy. It was time for a new one.

Old vs New

The cards I took for the team

Something I was pleasantly surprised by is that the organization of the box was even better than it was when I first sent it out into the world. Someone had even arranged the cards by year and made paper separators to keep them organized. I took this a step further by creating more permanent plastic separators.

When I received the box there were some pretty nice cards in it, including some sweet customs (you can guess who made those) and a pretty valuable #/500 ‘90’s insert. Some generous folks had handled this thing. Some of the better cards were sealed in thick one-touch cases and top loaders. I re-did all these by confiscating the one-touch cases (they’re just too big for this little box!) and transferring all the cards into the classic penny sleeve/top loader combo and putting those into team bags so they don’t slip out or rattle around in the box too much in transit.


I will mention that there were way too many duplicates in the box and some room needed to be made, so I imposed a hard limit of three (does not include parallels or customizations) copies of each card. This limit is not really enforceable once it is out in the world again, but I think it’s a reasonable suggestion. I removed all instances of any card of which there more than three copies, removing about 73 cards from the total (apart from the ones I took). I then replaced those with other Griffeys that were underrepresented with a focus on post-2000 Reds cards (more than half the box was cards from 1990-1994!). It’s a lot more evenly-distributed now.



I’m about to mail this thing out again, and I’ve just gotta say how pleased I am with the results. Here’s to another 18 months of Griffey generosity! And for the next guy who gets a crack at it, that #/500 ‘90’s insert is still in there. Have at it.



Also, I'm working on making it so the words DON'T look like that. I blame the Mac.

1997 Pinnacle Inside Can #8

Pinnacle in 1997 was all about that metallic quirk. You had X-Press with their crazy Metal Works ingots, Mint with its coins including redemptions for legit solid gold coins, and Inside – the first cards to be sold in a can.

Cans – the cards came in cans, guys. They were ten cards per can, 24 cans per case. You literally needed a can opener to get at them. The wisest of us opened the cans from the bottom so we could display the cans on our bedroom shelves between the collection of empty beer bottles and the Yasmine Bleeth poster. I assume we all had pretty much the same setup in 1997, right?

I’m kind of shocked this product got made in the first place. Consider the size of a pack vs. a can, then consider the shipping and storage implications of this product. One 24-can case was a little larger than an 8-box CASE of standard product, and for the same price per pack. And it’s not like the cans protected the product against damage very well – the cards came in cellophane packs that rattled around inside the cans and damaged the edges, especially on those cards on the top and bottom of the pack. Oh, and on top of everything Pinnacle had to provide a can opener to every hobby shop that ordered a case. It’s cliché to ask “what were they thinking?” about stupid ideas like this one (especially when you love Pinnacle as much as I do), but it’s hard not to here.


Speaking of can opener, Pinnacle provided a promotional kit to hobby shops that included a Ryan Klesko Sample can, card, and an official Pinnacle can opener.


The ultimate 90's cardboard marketing oddity.

Okay, Griffey time:

1997 Pinnacle Inside #19

It’s not a bad-looking card, but there’s nothing especially memorable or unique about it, either. It’s designed around that left-justified split not unlike 1994 Upper Deck, but with team-shading in the inset and bits of text floating around within. Highlights are the giant gold foil name plate, and that Pinnacle logo with the baseball comet flying through it that I’ve never seen anywhere else.


The back is another story. It’s got that same inset as on the front, only expanded with an added bit about Junior’s Gold Glove streak. The weirdest part is not the total lack of a stat box, but the odd factoid section in its place. The factoid categories are different for each player, depending on what interesting things Pinnacle found to mention about them. For example, Cal Ripken, Jr. also has a “Father” category, but no “Charities” category. Instead, Ripken has a “Highlight” category (breaking Gehrig’s record) and a “Hobby” category (basketball). A little “inside” information, I guess.

1997 Pinnacle Inside #19 Club Edition

Don't mind my use of COMC images lately - just be glad I'm posting at all.

The Club parallel is a shiny version of the regular base card, and at 1:7 packs cans, it wasn’t all that rare. You can almost certainly tell from the scan what this card is made of: the dreaded unscannable papery foil. Pinnacle was also kind enough to fill you in on the card back with what parallel you had pulled, something we started seeing a lot more of in the late 90’s.

1997 Pinnacle Inside #19 Diamond Edition

Believe it or not, you are looking at one of the toughest gets among all ‘90’s parallels – scarcer even than the refractoriest of Finest refractors that came before it. It is an unsung Holy Grail among not just Griffey collectors, but also player collectors of any guy in the Pinnacle Inside checklist.

This 1:63 die-cut parallel fell roughly one in every two-and-a-half 24-can cases. There is no way to know for sure how many of these there are for each player, but you know I like to guess.

If the same number of cans of Pinnacle Inside were made as the number of packs of Pinnacle Mint, about 1,398,000, there are approximately 140 Diamond Edition cards for each card in the base set. That's pretty low, generally speaking, but I am pretty certain this number is actually too high.

First, in addition to these cans being difficult to find even when they were available, the product itself was not terribly popular, and it took up a lot of space. All that added up to a lot of it being recalled and destroyed, including hundreds of Diamond Edition cards that never saw the light of day. In addition to that, the nature of the product, all big and bulky and difficult to store, suggest to me that Pinnacle didn’t produce as much of this product as a nice, compact product like…well, any other product not sold in cans, including Pinnacle Mint. Finally, the best indicator of how scarce these are is market price, and the prices these command when they do come up are RIDICULOUS.

I’ll put it this way: I’ve seen five times as many #/25 Red Crusade Griffeys sell as I have this parallel. If you don’t know about the Red Crusade, you can get a whiff of just how scarce those things are here.

Based on all this I suspect there are fewer than 100 specimens to be had, and it seems to sell more like a card with a production run of 50 or less. In fact, the only specimen of the Griffey I’ve ever come across is the one you’re looking at, and it remains one of my eBay saved searches to this day out of pure curiosity.

So this card is a white whale, but it has all the makings of what I call a “quest card,” that being a very rare card that isn’t generally desirable except to niche collectors. It’s not exactly a Finest refractor or an E-X Essential Credentials, both far more popular 90’s parallels. In fact, most collectors probably haven’t even heard of it. The only reason this one is a white whale and not a quest card is that it’s a Griffey and he is not a niche PC guy – he’s an extremely popular one. For those niche PC guys it’s not terribly expensive – just hard to pin down. Very hard.

A good example is a guy I’ve seen on multiple card forums who is a Brett Butler supercollector. Last I saw he is less than ten cards short of 100% completion for all Brett Butler cards ever produced. One of those last few cards is this Diamond Edition parallel. When it does come up for sale, you better believe that this guy will not let this one get away. For him, this is a true quest card.

So to all the player collectors out there who focus on one off-the-beaten-path '90's guy, I suggest you focus on that guy's Diamond Collection card first and worry about the piece-of-cake 90's Finest refractors later.

Moving on, insert-wise I’d like to have seen Pinnacle take this can thing to another level, maybe with some Andy Warhol-inspired soup can art but in team colors. Or a rookie insert called “Can-Do!” Or a pitcher-only insert called “Canned Heat.” Something punny and kind of stupid, ya know? I like that stuff. Instead we got a handful of inserts that are woefully devoid of can humor. I consider it a missed opportunity. Pacific would have gotten it right – they had zero shame with the dad jokes.

1997 Pinnacle Inside Dueling Dugouts #6 (w/ Andruw Jones)

The closest Pinnacle would come to a can reference is this card which has a circular stat element you could use to compare the players on either side. It gives little insight into the matchup apart from what you can glean from the stats, but it’s a pretty neat concept, and the cards themselves seem to hold their value more than most 1:23 inserts from that time.

Pro tip: that rivet in the center of the ring makes this card a major liability in terms of card-stacking. As in this card could dent the living daylights out of any card you stack beside it. At least a top-loader, please.

1997 Pinnacle Inside 40-Something #12

A who’s who of ‘90’s power hitters, this insert focuses on current players who hit more than 40 home runs in a season, even if it was only once.

You know my feelings toward papery foil, but I’ve got to say I love this card. The design is balanced and classy with just the right amount of shiny gold to offset the abundant silver and team-colored shading. The back is pretty much perfect with a great backwards-cap portrait, and it's a very rare example of a vertical card front with a horizontal back. A good-looking card all around, and a favorite from both years of 1997 Pinnacle Inside.

You heard that right: BOTH years – Inside would go for one more year before Pinnacle would go under and the concept of the card in a can would (almost - thanks, Upper Deck) disappear from the market forever. Probably for the best.

I have all the Griffeys of 1997 Pinnacle Inside except the actual can. The one pictured above belongs to fellow collector Nicholas. So, here is my very short list of needs from this set:

1997 Pinnacle Inside Cans #8

I'm not in a rush, though, as yet another clunky, three-dimensional Griffey thing is the last thing I need to find a place to store right now.

How have I not done a post about 1995 Pinnacle?

There is no more characteristically 90’s a brand than Pinnacle, and their 1995 offering is about as ‘90’s as hella-ugly pants, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoons, and Zima (oh, wait – all of those are back now).

While I’m a huge fan of the 1994 design and an admitted 1996 Pinnacle apologist, I think 1995 is the high-water mark of this brand as a whole. This is the year the card design was perfected, the photography was popping, and the inserts were just starting to get really cool. The inserts did get cooler in coming sets, but 1995 had plenty enough textured foil and Dufex to go around. Don’t even stress, dog.

Gonna just jump right in here:

1995 Pinnacle #128

Photography was popping? Get it?

When I pulled this card from a pack in 1995 it booked for $3.00 in the Beckett, but you’d have thought I pulled a $100 card because LOOK AT IT. This is on the short list of the greatest Griffey base cards of all time. It’s certainly among the greatest Griffeys and even cards in general that you can get for under a dollar (Nick, our resident Dime Box expert could recommend more than a few such cards, I’m sure).

And yeah, the giant Frank Thomas climbing into the stadium was great, too, as were the numerous triple-exposures and that amazing Ozzie Smith-doing-a-flip card; but look at The Kid, doing Kid things, winning all our hearts. This is the kind of photo brands needed to put out there to overcome that pesky baseball strike and get everyone loving their favorite players again.

I know what you’re thinking – Kurt Bevacqua did it better. Oh, did he? DID HE??


Okay, that’s pretty close – I admit it. Junior’s bubble is perfect – like, too perfect. Maybe a bit…balloonish? Let’s stop here lest we ruin this card forever.

You know what’s just as good as that photo? That background. That is straight-up Junior’s locker, folks. Finally an inside look into the Kid’s day-to-day. Now, I for one like to ponder the logistical side of baseball cards. For example, with this card I have to wonder whether they just up and took this photo or if there was a little set dressing involved. Those Nike Air and Bazooka logos seem a little too perfectly placed. And who takes the time to completely wrap their spray deodorant in tape lest a single logo be visible? And the massive quantity of signed balls, the perfect placement of the wristband with the 24 visible, and is that Junior’s Sports Illusrated for Kids card? And in a case, no less? No cologne, no underwear, no ear medicine or antifungal cream. It all just seems a little perfect. Whatever - I’ll take perfect.

So generally speaking we have a set with stunning photography and a shiny gold baseball seam nameplate that translates beautifully to a horizontal layout. So far I’m sold, but what can you show me in a card back, ‘95 Pinnacle?


The card back is gorgeously 90’s, too – all busy and brimming with personality. Card backs nowadays are all clean and orderly, but this mess with its full-bleed design, TWO excellent photos, shamelessly pro-Griffey blurb, and abbreviated but highly informative stat box is EVERYTHING. Also that portrait on the back makes two backwards caps on one card. Recognize.

1995 Pinnacle #128 Museum Collection

1995 Pinnacle has two parallels, and this is the one that makes sense. It’s the same exact card but in Dufex, and it is mind-bogglingly beautiful. The following year Museum Collection would morph into Starburst, an insert with most of the attributes of a parallel. Lucky for us, in both 1994 and 1995 it was still a true parallel – every base card got one, including a PC of mine, Mariners catcher Dan Wilson, who would probably otherwise never have gotten a Dufex card. And they look killer. I think Pinnacle’s Museum Collection is on the short list of the greatest parallels of all time.

1995 Pinnacle #128 Artist's Proof

I’m just going to come right out and say it: the one-per-box Artist’s Proof parallel is weird. It was weird in 1994 and it’s weird again this year. First off it’s rare – nine times rarer than its far more attractive counterpart Museum Collection. The only differences between the AP’s and the regular base cards are the little foil “Artist’s Proof” stamp and the color of the foil which is a light pewter rather than gold. That’s it.

The Griffey base cards in this parallel consistently break the $40-$50 mark (and there’s one that tends to break three figures), but in no way do they look the part. It can be hard to justify the extra expense to acquire these. Trust me – I know. All of these AP cards appear on the 1996 Beckett Tribute Checklist, so I had to get them. Every. One.

The following year the Artist’s Proof parallel would only apply to the cards of the Starburst insert (again, which was more like a parallel). In lieu of a simple foil stamp and no Dufex, Pinnacle used the Dufex already on the Starburst cards and stamped “Artist’s Proof” right into it repeatedly on diagonals. Pinnacle fixed the value-added aspect of the parallel, but your options were limited to only those players who got Starburst cards (and Junior got like four), so your lesser-known PC players didn’t have one. I’m not sure Pinnacle ever got Artist’s Proof 100% right.

It should be noted that there have been “backdoored” 1995 Artist’s Proof prototypes that have made it out into the market following Pinnacle’s bankruptcy. Instead of pewter foil, these rare prototypes have gold holofoil; and yes, they really do look like the rare, expensive parallel that they’re supposed to be. I have a handful for other players but none of the Griffeys. I do plan on acquiring one someday. Whoever made the call to go with the pewter over the holofoil can kiss my grits.

1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men

YES. Here is one of my favorite subsets of the ‘90’s. All gold and blue and swirly – these could have been a moderately rare insert, and I would have been all over ‘em. The shape of the swirl itself is more suggestive of a golf swing (to which Junior is no stranger), but I love the effect here. It’s almost like this is a surfing card and he’s shooting the curl. The logo and foil shadow are also excellent touches.

And to those of you who think it looks like they’re flushing him down the toilet I say LOL and GTFO.


The back is pretty solid as well with a curved pattern formed by real photographed bats framing a large portrait. The blurb is clunky and reads like it was written by a 15-year-old; but it also gushes Griffey-love, so you better believe I’m hella ‘bout it.

But wait – this card was absolutely made for the Museum Collection parallel:

1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men Museum Collection

Okay, look – I don’t want to sound like a cliquey, Griffey-snob exclusionist, but real talk: your Griffey collection is incomplete without 1995 Pinnacle Swing Men Museum Collection. Thing is TWO BUCKS on COMC right now. You have no excuse. Write it down.

1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men Artist's Proof

Yeah, yeah, boring parallel, yada yada yada. Swing Men is still the BEST.

1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist

I think this is actually the back of the AP version, but it doesn't really matter unless you know what to look for.

Pinnacle (the Score brands in general, really) were masters of padding their checklists with superstars by featuring them on checklists. Not that I’m complaining, but I absolutely would if they hadn’t done such a great job at it. The photo is very similar to the one on the back of his base card, but come on. Check out this smiley, backwards-capped, 25-year-old millionaire. Man, what am I even doing with my life?

1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist Museum Collection

That’s the shiny version.

1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist Artist's Proof

And that’s the overpriced version. Yes, even this, a checklist, will still set you back somewhere in the $20-$40 range if you want the Griffey. Sounds like a lot, but there’s still one AP left in this set, and it’s way more expensive than this one.

1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist

The last card numerically in 1995 Pinnacle’s base set is this checklist which has officially gone a whopping four-for-four on Hall of Famers. The photos are those from each player’s respective checklist so they’re not new; and this base card is anything but scarce, so it’s not a tough get until you start stacking parallels.

1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist Museum Collection

This card tends to command more than the same parallel of Junior’s amazing base card all thanks to the additional HOF’ers. And it does look better, as a parallel should. This next one on the other hand…

1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist Artist's Proof

This checklist is far and away the most expensive and difficult Griffey card in 1995 Pinnacle. Let me repeat that: this CHECKLIST is the Griffey grail of 1995 Pinnacle. If you want one at auction, don’t be surprised if you surpass the $100 mark and, depending on the competition, battle player collectors of those other three guys up into the realm of heavy overspending. I suspect most of these already have homes in various collections, so they don’t come up a lot. I had to wait two years just for an opportunity on this one.

Again, it’s totally not worth it at all because this parallel is lame; but dammit, I had a checklist to complete. So here it is.

That’s all the regular Griffey base cards and their parallels. It took me a long time to amass all these, so forgive me a moment as I gaze at the wonderfully complete base checklist from THE BEAST:

1995 Pinnacle #128
1995 Pinnacle #128 Museum Collection
1995 Pinnacle #128 Artist's Proof
1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men
1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men Museum Collection
1995 Pinnacle #304 Swing Men Artist's Proof
1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist
1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist Museum Collection
1995 Pinnacle #447 Checklist Artist’s Proof
1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist (w/ Piazza, Thomas, Bagwell)
1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist Museum Collection (w/ Piazza, Thomas, Bagwell)
1995 Pinnacle #450 Checklist (w/ Piazza, Thomas, Bagwell) Artist’s Proof

Oh, man. That feels nice. In the next post we’ll tackle the inserts and Griffey cameos of 1995 Pinnacle.

Thanks for reading!

Welcome back – let’s get to it.

You’ve seen 12 Griffey base cards, but you know your boy totally counts cameos, right?

1995 Pinnacle Sandy Alomar #39 (cameo)

This is one of the first cameos of the Kid I can say I discovered myself completely by accident. It’s not the best cameo, but it is 100% unmistakable. What a photo. Nice stop, Sandy!

Okay, it’s precedent time. If I show the back of this cameo card I will have to continue to show the backs of cameo cards in perpetuity. There’s no Griffey-centric reason to do it. So should I?


Screw it. Here’s the damn back.

1995 Pinnacle Sandy Alomar #39 Museum Collection (cameo)

And the super-shiny version, of course. I do not yet have the AP of this one, but I don’t expect it to command much coin when it does pop up. Hoping to land one soon. Cameos count!

On to the inserts:

1995 Pinnacle Gate Attraction #GA01

There’s nothing particularly special about this insert. It’s flat foil, not Dufex; the blurb is a bit innocuous, and there’s no unique stat boxes or anything fun like that. They gave it its own logo, and I really like the photo and simple layout on the back, but I’ve seen better from Pinnacle in the 90’s. Let’s keep looking.

1995 Pinnacle Red Hot #RH2

Well damn – that is a pretty sweet-ass card right there. At a casual 1:8 packs, even I was able to pull a few of these in my time. I don’t know exactly how I landed a Griffey, but I know I’ve had it a long time. I probably traded a Frank Thomas to my cousin for it. It was amazing how often I would pull his favorite player and he would pull mine.

Ok, so it’s not Dufex, but this is what Pinnacle inserts are supposed to look like. Plenty of bold, primary colors on the front and a big, gaudy, full-bleed design on the back. Junior’s jersey appears even greener than normal against that fiery red. Another innocuous blurb, yes, but a much cooler (hotter?) card than that last one. And it gets better:

1995 Pinnacle White Hot #WH2

I went 20 years before I learned that these things even existed. It’s a blue DUFEX version of the Red Hot insert, and it is freakin’ beautiful. I am positively obsessed with the way Dufex interacts with the flame designs here. Definitely much hotter (cooler?) than the common red version. What a stunner.

There are no stated odds given for this insert parallel, but it is certainly far rarer than the regular old 1:8 Red Hot insert. I suspect it has roughly the same scarcity as the Artist’s Proof parallels based on how many I’ve seen in the wild (very few), and the price tends to follow this theory. They’re not quite expensive enough to classify as white whales – these tend to fall into the gray whale category compared with similar Griffeys, especially for rare inserts from this era. Despite high retail and Buy It Now prices, I see these sell around $50 or less. I think they’re a bargain.

1995 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle #TP7 Griffey Dufex (w/ Barry Bonds)

At 1:90 packs, this insert has the toughest stated odds of all the Griffeys in 1995 Pinnacle (although when you factor in the total number of cards in the set, any single Artist’s Proof card is significantly rarer), and there are TWO VERSIONS, both of which you need if you wanna be a cool cat Griffey completionist like your truly. The card has two sides, one with Griffey and the other…um, without.

As for the two versions, there is one with a Dufex Griffey side and foil on the other side, and the other with those same effects reversed. The two versions appear to be equally scarce:

1995 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle #TP7 Bonds Dufex (w/ Barry Bonds)

For how rare it is, I’m not 100% sold on the design here. I like the insert logo, and the Dufex side is great with the flames and large team logo, but the foil side always comes across as dark. Usually scanning is the culprit when it comes to dark foil but not here. Even in person those foil sides are too damn dark. Also I’d probably appreciate this one more if they’d have put something worthwhile on the flip side of the card. Too bad.

1995 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle Collector Pin Redemption Card #14

The second-rarest Griffey insert by insertion ratio, these were meant to be mailed in exchange for a pin of the player on the front. This offer ended back in November 1995, and according to the rules Pinnacle would not send you back your exchange card – you would receive the pin only. Personally I would have preferred to keep the card (which is a good thing because I have the card and not the pin), but a lot of folks went ahead with the exchange; and as a result there are plenty of pins available on eBay and at card shows and such. Plus you have to admit – that is one good-looking exchange card, am I right? Pretty neat, Pinnacle.

While we’re rolling through 1995 Pinnacle, I have one more card to show:

1995 Pinnacle All-Star Fan Fest #11

I’m just going to pull straight from Baseballcardpedia for this one: “1995 Pinnacle FanFest is a 30-card set, distributed in two-card cello packs at the 1995 FanFest in Arlington, Texas. This was the first year Pinnacle Brands was the presenting sponsor on FanFest.”

This is far and away the simplest design Pinnacle would use on their Fan Fest cards during their three-year sponsorship run. The biggest design element here is that gold foil ball field in the bottom corner beside the Fan Fest logo. The front has a run-of-the-mill batting pose and little else.


The back, though – the back is a masterpiece. Look at that great portrait, the beautiful widescreen stadium shot, the score board, the beer signs! To hell with stats and blurbs – they nailed this card back. These are ridiculously cheap – go grab one.

So technically I have completed the Griffey checklist for 1995 Pinnacle, but if you want to get strict (and I like to get strict), there is still one card I need because I count cameos and their parallels. The Artist’s Proof of Sandy Alomar #39 is the last card I need to truly finish this one off. In addition to that, while it’s a non-official “backdoor” item, I would like to own one of those holofoil Artist’s Proof prototypes as they’re not as rare as some other backdoored Griffeys I’ve seen. I don’t consider it part of the Griffey checklist in any way – I just want one. And yes, the stupid pin. Here are my remaining needs (and wants) for 1995 Pinnacle:

1995 Pinnacle #39 Sandy Alomar, Jr. (cameo) Artist’s Proof
1995 Pinnacle Prototype Artist’s Proof (backdoored) (any)
1995 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle Collector Pin #14

That about wraps it up. While the inserts did get a lot better for the 1996 set and they added a new dimension to help bolster the rare Artist’s Proof parallel, the availability of Dufex cards of your favorite non-superstar players was greatly diminished and Pinnacle’s base designs began to decline year-after-year from here on out. There are no really big chase cards from this set, but it remains one of my favorites from the mid-90’s.

You've got to admit that first Tim Burton Batman movie was pretty solid. A couple years later Batman Returns (also Burton) came out, and despite being considerably sillier than its predecessor, I can remember thinking, "Yeah - they've still got it." Batman Forever after that is where the franchise really started pushing that silliness envelope, but I still enjoyed it. I mean, it was watchable, and that soundtrack was poppin'.

Then Batman & Robin comes along with the suit nipples and cheesy....well, you name it, and RUINS EVERYTHING. We didn't see another Batman movie for a long time, and when we did it was all serious and real-world and.....totally amazing. Lessons had been learned, and like it or not, we can thank Batman & Robin for that.

And we can thank 1991 Donruss for being bad enough that it actually saved Donruss designs for years to come.

We have to look at certain sets (especially the bad ones) in the context of their respective timelines, and in that sense 1991 Donruss came at the end of an era. By 1992 a switch had been flipped and Donruss cards got really nice. High-quality white paper stock, neatly-assembled card backs, great photography, and an overall “adultier” aesthetic. We also started seeing inserts for the first time including ramped-up Diamond Kings and the legendary serial numbered Elite Series insert. 1992 was the year Donruss’ voice changed and its armpits started crying stinky tears.

Back in 1991, however, Donruss was still playing with Micro Machines, throwing mud at girls, and sneaking Transformers into church. It’s that time in everyone’s life just before they stop liking Animaniacs and start pretending to not like Animaniacs. We are at the tail end of Donruss’ innocence.

Bright colors, full-bleed printing, and garish design defined the closing years of adolescent Donruss. The late 80’s saw a lot of monochromatic designs from the brand (with the exception of the ’89 set with its excellent rainbow effect), culminating in the blue borders of 1991. This devotion to one color stuck around somewhat in the form of light blue top and bottom borders in the ’92 set, but let’s face it: there’s the “oh, that’s a nice tasteful touch of blue, isn’t it?” type of blue as in the ’92 set, and then there’s a color of sufficient wavelength that your eyes boil in their sockets a la that Nazi guy in Raiders of the Lost Ark that can only be classified as BBBLLLLUUUEEEEEEE. That would be ’91.

I’ve tip-toed around this long enough, so here goes: 1991 Donruss is ugly. I don’t want it to be ugly - I love Donruss – but it is. Even the 1990 set has found a soft spot in my heart that my eyes have been fighting against for years, but the ’91 set is hopeless. It’s that thing of putting bright primary colors on something normally boring or tedious for kids so they will like it. In that sense 1991 Donruss has a lot in common with a Paw Patrol toothbrush or a Phineas and Ferb alarm clock.

On top of that there’s just not a lot of redeeming qualities here. It’s the same old card back (which is actually my favorite part) and photography that is mediocre at best. I honestly believe this set is the reason so many people hate ’92 Donruss. They’re back-to-back in the timeline so everyone lumps them together when in fact a huge culture change occurred somewhere in between, and ’92 is the far superior set of cards.

We’ve been over the ’92 set, of course. For now let us wallow, and slum, and bum around the house in our PJ’s. It’s 1991 Donruss time:

1991 Donruss #77

As you can see it looks like it should have a Hot Wheels car attached to it. The nameplate is a slightly-angled stripe of fire engine red with a yellow bit showing the position. They broke up the stark blueness of the borders with multi-colored stripes and stippling that follow the angle of the nameplate. It’s the cardboard equivalent of a carnival ride. Not a fun one – one of those safe, one-ticket kiddie ones that just goes in a circle.

I’d like to say the photos make up for everything, but overall they really don’t. They are just vanilla pictures of baseball happening. There are a few exceptions, but not enough to make this a tantalizing set build.


The back is the same one we’ve gotten from Donruss for a decade: stat box, career highlights, and the full legal name of the player. I can’t really complain about this design because they obviously heard whoever did and gave us a streamlined, modern card back the very next year. Plus I don’t really mind the old Donruss card backs because I am aging and things from my childhood, regardless of how terrible and inferior they actually are by today’s standards, still seem better in my stubborn, embittered old man mind. For example I can still totally jam out to the Dumb & Dumber soundtrack. I'm in too deep.

1991 Donruss #77 Lines Variation

Like the 1990 set before it, 1991 Donruss has slight factory set variations of all its base cards. In the 1990 set the difference was in the speckles around the red border - this year it's all bout those wacky border lines. Because the world needs more versions 1991 Donruss cards.

1991 Donruss #49 All-Star

Griffey was an all-star in 1990 which Donruss celebrated with just the shadiest card there ever was. Not shady as in sketchy – shady as in, like, shade. As in an area of low light relative to one’s surroundings. You can’t even tell who’s actually at the plate here which would be OK if the photo was cool in any way, but it isn’t. Those arms are locked, my friend. He's lookin'. It might be the worst Griffey of 1991, and this was a year with reams of sub-par oddballs.

1991 Donruss #49 All-Star Lines Variation

Peep those different-ass LINEZZZZZZ tho, homie!

1991 Donruss #392 MVP

The MVP’s are green in this set which actually helps this design out a bit. The photos in this subset are portraits with a standard green background, so they were impossible to screw up. They’re not bad-looking cards, relatively speaking. I love that rainbow effect on the "MVP."

1991 Donruss #392 MVP Lines Variation

Please enjoy our fine local line variations for your carding pleasure.

Despite the complete and utter lack of inserts, parallels, or anything remarkable in general, there are two Griffeys from this set that are actually somewhat desirable:

1991 Donruss Preview #4

The 1991 Donruss Preview shows Junior a few feet off the bag, watching the pitcher like a hawk. It’s actually a damn good photo, and it could have changed completely my feelings towards the set. Unfortunately they ended up going with a run-of-the-mill batting photo in the end, and we’re left with this reminder of what might have been.

1991 Donruss Advertising Sheet

The rarest of all 1991 Donruss Griffeys (and the one most likely to give you rage headaches if you try to track one down) is this, the dreaded 1991 Donruss advertising sheet. It's printed on thin paper stock and has a blank back so it's decidedly sheety (as opposed to cardy), but just look HOW AWESOME IT IS. That photo is so much more appealing to me than any photo that made it into the final set, even the passable MVP portrait. LOOK HOW YOUNG HE IS!

1991 Donruss Advertising Sheet (cutout)

It took me years to finally track one down, and when I finally did I ended up a couple so I could keep one and trim another. Would PSA grade this thing, you think? Seriously, I want to know.

So the two best Griffeys in 1991 Donruss didn't even appear in packs - technically you couldn't even buy them. How frustrating is that?? And on top of that, if the preview and the sample are both superior to the final product, is that not the definition of false advertising?

Willie Stargell would be ashamed

The best part of 1991 Donruss is that if you bought the factory set, you got preview cards for 1991 Studio, one of my favorite sets of baseball cards ever made. I imagine finding those puppies in your factory set was like finding an onion ring in your French fries. Wait, no, that’s not a good analogy. French fries are good. It was probably more like finding an onion ring in your box of turds. Yep, that feels right.

Remember tobacco cards? Yeah, neither do I. They were way before my time and, more than likely, yours as well. But we’ve all seen them, and pretty much everybody loves them. The color, tasteful design, and beautiful painted images along with the feeling of physically holding a little piece of history is enough to win over even the most modern collector.


So when the vintage-nouveau movement took over in the early 2000’s, Topps took it upon themselves to push the envelope as far back into history as it could by re-launching the long-defunct Turkey Red brand. Some of the first collector cards ever made were Turkey Red tobacco cards, and Topps did a heck of a job creating new cards faithful to the originals right down to the feel of the paper.


Personally I’m not a big Turkey Red guy, but I like the thought and effort that went into these. Design-wise I prefer the embellished frame of the 2007 set, but I do love the thickness and matte finish of the ’05 and ’06 sets (they are basically identical). While lacking that tangible history quality, the cards feel great.

2005 Topps Turkey Red #89

Something you can say about the ’05 set and no other one is that the image looks to be a direct transfer from a run-of-the-mill action shot. In subsequent sets we got images of Junior in front of large, sweeping stadium backgrounds all far away and bathed in sunlight. These were obviously painted (or at the very least, photoshopped) that way, but that extra step was not taken for the Kid this year. There are plenty of base card images in this set that are far more attractive than the Griffey.

That being said, this card back is damn near perfect. There is a slight patina to the paper color, almost a tea-stained quality that only adds to the vintage feel and appearance of these cards. And that blurb is one of the best accounts of Junior’s amazing career one could possibly fit into five sentences (up to 2005, that is). Bravo.

2005 Topps Turkey Red #89 Red

The parallels featured colored borders and not much else. Topps included a handy border color indicator on the back for the colorblind. The fact that Junior was with the Reds when these were made is a happy coincidence for this parallel. I like this version the best of the ’05 TR Griffeys I've seen.

Junior was still an Upper Deck guy when this set same out, so there are no autos or relics for him. Harumpf. Here are the Griffeys I still need from 2005 Topps Turkey Red:

#89 White
#89 Black #/142
#89 Gold #/50
#89 Suede 1/1 

As a set in and of itself, I’m not really a huge fan of these; but as a reboot of an ancient brand, the cards are pretty cool. And I love the backs. I give the Griffeys of 2005 Turkey Red a yawn-plus.

In 1991 Topps gave us the first Stadium Club set and Fleer the first Ultra set. In 2000, amid bankruptcies and acquisitions and a whole lot of scaling back in general for many brands lucky enough to still operate, both sets were miraculously still around. The vast, VAST majority of sub brands didn’t last five years let alone ten, but somehow Stadium Club and Ultra were still as good as ever.

I don’t believe Ultra’s photography was quite as good as Stadium Club’s, but it was damn close. There’s also no denying Ultra’s insert game was on point, and their various medallions absolutely blew away Stadium Club in terms of parallels (Matrix was the shit, tho). I’m making all these comparisons with Stadium Club because I will admit before God and the world that I am a pathetic Stadium Club fanboy through and through; and any given year Stadium Club is usually my favorite set of that year, but not in 2000. In 2000, Ultra is better.

2000 Ultra #100

Most sets were already on the Reds trolley by the time their cards were printed and released, and Ultra may have been as well; they had a ton of sub-brands at this point and most of them, Mystique, Focus, Gamers, Showcase, all got it right. I like to think someone at Ultra found out about the trade, but then said, “Screw that. This picture is PERFECT. Junior is a Mariner for one more set.”

The nameplate font looks familiar, and I’ve been trying to pin down where I’ve seen it before. Back to the Future credits? A J-Pop album cover? Whatever it is it’s AWESOME, and Fleer should have trademarked and sold it. It makes every player’s name looks like its own brand; and with that field of unobtrusive green behind it, it really stands out on Junior’s card. The only semblance of clunk in the whole design is the black bar behind the team name that is probably only there to keep the lettering legible, but it doesn’t really bother me here. This is a near-perfect base card.


The back is basically flawless, too. Ultra used to fill the back with photos, avoid blurbs, and abbreviate stat boxes. This year they gave us a single massive, card-high stunner of a photo with a face-melting purple and blue background that I want painted on every wall in my house, a mind-bogglingly complete 11-year stat box that is super-legible thanks to a little creative shading behind it, and a blurb in the same font as the nameplate that fills us in on Junior’s sick Grand Salami game.

Maybe the card number could be a little further in the corner? I don’t know - I’m seriously stretching to find a problem with this card back. There’s no way they were all this good. Wait…I think I have another 2000 Ultra base card laying around here somewhere…


Damn – that's pretty cool. It’s official – 2000 Ultra is on my list of favorite card backs. Well done, guys. Let’s check out the front of that Palmeiro just to be sure.


Uh, yeah. We’re good here.

2000 Ultra #100G Gold Medallion

This is one of my favorite years of the Medallion parallels. There’s no medallion proper anywhere on the card, but there is some nice arched die-cutting across the top, a line of text heralding the type of medallion you just pulled, gold holofoil where there was silver before, and a slight gold tint to the entire photo background. This last thing is barely noticeable on the Griffey as he is surrounded by grass, but trust me – that right there’s a gold tint.


There are two other medallion types in this set: a Platinum Medallion #/50 and a Masterpiece Medallion that is a 1/1. I have neither of these.


Let’s peep some insert swag:

2000 Ultra Diamond Mine #3

At 1:6, these cards were everywhere. And why not? Design-wise this is the most essentially Ultra insert in the lot: a large, simple theme that uses little to no photo background at all. Not much to talk about, though.


That photo of winded batting practice Junior is great, but it’s all about the blurb here. Second person voice? Yep – that is definitely a trademark of Skybox. Use of multiple consecutive exclamation marks usually freaks me out, as does adding an “s” to the idiom “the stuff of legend,” but the blurb itself is frickin’ awesome. I’m also a pretty prolific user of the mid-sentence parenthetic aside (see?) which they did twice here. Include this blurb in my obituary.

2000 Ultra Swing Kings #5

In 1996 Ultra had a really cool clear acetate insert called Season Crowns that I was always bummed about because Junior didn’t get a card there (he was injured for most of the ’95 season but still deserved a crown, dammit!). Swing Kings is kind of lacking in the design department because it’s mostly clear, negative space with a little text where Season Crowns had full, colorful designs that still took advantage of the acetate. 

One of the best acetate inserts evaaaaa

The photo on Griffey's Swing Kings card is sick as hell, and again I’m totally smitten with that 2nd person Skybox blurb. There’s enough good here to save the card, but design-wise it's only mildly cool and maybe even a smidge disappointing.

At least we can breathe a sigh of relief that the medallions didn’t apply to the inserts this year.

2000 Ultra Crunch Time #2

This is the rarest non-auto/relic/serial # pull in the set this year, and as you can probably tell it is a matte paper card with a bit of gold foil. The background is a large, weathered ball and bat with Junior playing the field in front, a little weird because the card seems to focus on his offensive performance.


I cannot stress enough how much I love these ridiculous Skybox blurbs. Do we have room for another J-pop reference? Good. These blurbs are like J-pop, guys. I know what I’m listening to is wrongwrongwrong and I resent the hell out of it, but why am I not skipping the song? WHY? Don’t even look at me.

2000 Ultra also had some auto and game-used stuff, but nothing with Griffey in it. Here are the Griffeys I still need, all of them numbered to 99 or less:

#100P Platinum Medallion #/50
#100M Masterpiece 1/1
Ultra Talented #5 #/99

I'm crazy about the base card here and would really love a shot at the platinum someday at a reasonable price. And to whoever has the Masterpiece, please know that I hella-covet your shit.

Now I invite you to plug in your headphones, turn your volume up, and release your inhibitions:

It's that time again! Well, it was probably that time a few weeks ago, but I'm pretty used to running behind schedule nowadays.

Anyhoo, it's time for my annual Top 30 Griffey Acquisitions list. This is always my favorite post to make, and I make it a point to never miss it. These Top 30 lists are important for me because they are a timeline of my collecting career. I find myself referring back to previous lists all the time to see when I got a hold of certain cards, more so lately as prices seem to be climbing higher almost by the month. I'm sure glad I rediscovered the hobby when I did.

We'll start this year's list with an unrankable card:



Honorable Mention: 2018 Junior Junkie 20-Year Checklist Custom

I put this here because I have no idea where it would have gone otherwise. If this list was based purely on the emotion the card inspired in yours truly, this would probably be at the top. I already gave a pretty thorough description of what this little custom job is all about, so I'll just say another "Thank you" to the mystery benefactor. Some of the greatest cards I own were gifts, and this is among the greatest of those. You did good!


30. 2007 Upper Deck Scott Hatteberg #289 Predictor

Just when you think you have all the cameos there are to get, another one comes along out of left field (well, first base) with a sweet backwards cap no less. This is the Predictor edition which is just slightly cooler than the regular base card (though I am clueless as to how Predictor worked in 2007 - I should look it up). Scott features prominently in the book Moneyball which I had read only a few weeks before someone brought this puppy to my attention, so I was just that little extra bit excited.


29. 1996 Bowman’s Best Cuts #1 Atomic Refractor (slabbed PSA 8)

The words “Atomic Refractor” give collectors goosebumps (which is why it is also the name of my card-themed thrash-metal band), and for good reason. They are not only scarce and valuable, they look goooood. This was the first year you could pull an Atomic Refractor, making this one of the first Atomic Refractor Griffeys (they also exist for his base card and Mirror Image insert – maybe in 2019?).


28. 1998 Pacific Crown Royale Home Run Fever #7 #/387

Just when I think I’ve seen all the Pacific inserts, another one pops up and forces me to up my COMC credits. A unique and low-numbered '90's insert.

27. 1994 Upper Deck All-Star #1 Gold Jumbo (96 Beckett Tribute Checklist)

As you may or may not know, this was the final card I needed to complete the 1996 Beckett Ken Griffey, Jr. Tribute checklist. On a card-by-card basis, this isn’t really that big a deal which is why it sits way down the list at #27. However, if I had to make a list of my most important Griffey acquisitions in terms of my collecting career as a whole, this thing would be Top-5.

26. 2001 E-X Wall of Fame Wall Relic (Milwaukee County Stadium) #9

I was under the impression that Pacific owned all the walls what with all their net-fusions inserts and such, but it turns out Fleer repped the wall as well. And as much as Junior intercepted major-league hits at the wall, odds are he made contact with this one in Milwaukee. Whether he ever made contact with this specific little sliver of vinyl remains up for debate (he totally did - I can feel the Griffey energy emanating from this thing).


25. 2001 Donruss Classics Benchmarks Three Rivers Stadium Bench Relic (1994 ASG) #BM-6

Just a cool relic, and the only one I’ve ever had that is more or less guaranteed to have touched some major league ass.

24. 2002 Upper Deck Authentics #162 Reverse Negative

A Griffey-centric tribute to the famous reverse-negative Dale Murphy error card of Upper Deck's inaugural set. Fun idea, and perfectly executed. How often do you get to see our boy batting righty? Weird.


23. 2017 Panini Flawless #14 #/20 (diamond-embedded base card)

This is the second-nicest card I own with a diamond on it. They’re everywhere now thanks to Panini Flawless, but back in the 90’s when this was first done it was more of a gimmick than a gettable card. More on that later…

22. 2017 Panini National Treasures Legends Materials Booklets Duals Stats Jersey/Bat Dual Relic #LBMD-KG2 #/99

It’s a little book! I don’t know why that excited me so much, but here we are. Great-looking card.


21. 1997 Pinnacle Xpress Metal Works Ingots #1 Silver #/400

[Forgive the COMC image - mine is in a vault at the bank and I didn't want to postpone this post any longer.] The bronze was my first of these followed by the gold just a few months later. Since then I chased the silver for ages and even accidentally bought ANOTHER gold thinking it was the silver at one point. There are twice as many silvers as there are gold, but apparently the market doesn’t know that.

Thanks for reading, and look out for Part 2 of this list tomorrow!

20. 2000 Upper Deck Game-Used Ball Relic #B-KG

For some reason it was a few years after the success of the jersey relic before brands started showing us their balls. There should be more of these - balls as relics, I mean. They are way more exciting to me than pants. This particular one is from what is still pretty early in the relic game, but not so early as to cost you an arm and a leg. It was a case hit and only appeared in Series 2, so while it's not exactly common, it is still surprisingly gettable. It’s also the first ball relic which would be a bigger deal if there weren’t so many produced.


19. 1998 Metal Universe All-Galactic Team #1

I cannot imagine a 1:192 insert from the 90’s not making this list. Not to mention that as a shameless sci-fi nerd I just can’t get enough spacey cards, and this is one of the best ever. Personally I find it more appealing visually than the legendary Precious Metal Gems parallels from this same set, but there might be a little resentment mixed in there, too. Plenty of holofoil here not evident in the scan.


18. 1994 Stadium Club Members Only Finest Bronze

This “card” is literally a slab of solid bronze with a card image glued to the top and four very sharp corners. It’s pretty impressive when it’s in your hand, but let's all just be thankful Ricky Jay never got a hold of one.


17. 2004 Fleer Classic Clippings Box Score Relic #20 #/750

Even if you’re a stickler for relics being relics in the absolute strictest sense, this is still a relic. It’s not equipment or uniform or chewing gum or earwax, but darn it, it is a legitimate artifact from an earlier time glued to a card. It’s not manufactured by the card company like so many pins and decorative patches you might pull from a blaster. Someone in Fleer’s employ got a hold of thousands of newspapers, cut out all the applicable box scores for the players in this checklist, and glued them onto the cards. This is literally the definition of a relic, and it’s pretty darn unique, too.-

16. 1997 Bowman's Best Best Cuts #BC6 Atomic Refractor & 2017 Bowman's Best 1997 Best Cuts #97BC-KGJ Atomic Refractor

I grouped these together because dammit, they belong together. I’m loving all the look-back designs Topps has been giving us in the last few years. This is both the original card and the significantly-less-scarce throwback card from 20 years later. That’s right, Topps. Give the 90’s kids what they want. We are the greatest generation!


15. 1998 Topps Finest Power Zone #P1

Hey, card designers - you want to make the Top 30 list? Here’s an in-depth instruction manual on how to do it. Get your pencils ready in case you need to take notes:

Step 1: Make a purple refractor
Step 2: Put Griffey on it

Oh, wait. That’s actually it. Hold on – it’s got to be more complicated than this. Did I forget a step?

Step 3: Make me aware of your purple refractor Griffey

Welp, there you go.

14. 1998 Donruss Studio Freeze Frame #1 #/4500 Die-Cut /500

This is one of those numbered inserts WITHIN a numbered insert, as in the first 500 were die-cut and the other 90% were not. The Leaf brands did this more than anybody (1996 Donruss Power Alley is a favorite). I actually really like the idea here, but so does everyone else. Hence, these "nested" inserts will cost ya.

13. 1996 Flair Hot Gloves #4

Tough little nugget. While attractive, it’s not even the best Hot Gloves design; but at 1:90 these were also the toughest pulls from this particular set. I’m still not sold on the prices these command today, though. Glad to have gotten this one out of the way. I feel like I just made acquiring this card sound like a chore, but there you go.


12. 2018 Donruss Optic Out of This World #13 Green #/5

I looooove spacey cards. I have most of them, so I’m strongly considering giving this rainbow a shot (minus the Gold Vinyl 1/1, of course) once prices cool off.


11. 1999 Upper Deck MVP Game Used Souvenirs Bat Relic #GU-KGj

'90's relics are few and far-between in general (last year one of them even took the top spot in this list) with the vast, VAST majority of Griffey relics coming from the Reds era. So when I find a Mariners relic, I pounce.

These fell 1:144 which makes it one of the most attainable '90's relic cards there is. There is also an autographed version numbered out of only 24, but you should just forget about it. Peep that bangin' design, too. The pixel effect on the right should have made it onto more cards. And Upper Deck are masters of lines-for-the-sake-of-lines in their designs, but circles-for-the-sake-of-circles? Way to mix it up. Sweet relic, bro.

Okay, Top 10 comin' up. 22 relics in 10 cards - how we gonna do it??

Last year I made up some nonsense about these Top Acquisitions of the Year lists each having a “magic number,” that being the number of cards at the top that all would have made a perfectly reasonable #1. This year, that magic number is 1. The card in the top spot and that card alone deserves that top spot all by its lonesome. The last time that happened the top card was the '93 Finest refractor. This year's is not as famous, but it is certainly more rare.

And yes, we are going to cram 22 relics into the next ten cards. If you're any kind of collector, you probably have a good idea what is coming up.


10. 1992 Lime Rock Griffey Family Hologram Set Autographed (autographed set of all three Griffeys)

The pre-2000 autograph elevator is in full effect here, rocketing these not-terribly-uncommon, back-of-the-card beauties into the Top 10. Despite the drawbacks here, these are on-card, super early, and from that very short time when all three Griffeys were Mariners. The last time all three Griffey signatures made this Top 30, they took the top spot. These are just a little less glamorous than that. Still pretty baddass, though.


9. 2001 Donruss #13 Chicago National Convention #/5

I’ve made blog posts before wherein a base set will have an insanely low-numbered stamped card show variation that I usually lump with the 1/1’s as ungettables. I mean, they were issued at shows which means some of the folks who ended up with one didn’t realize what they had or didn’t collect Griffey (or even baseball), and a lot of them were probably thrown in with the rest of their freebies from the show, never to be seen again. This is the only one of these I’ve ever actually owned, and I even paid a reasonably healthy sum to get it. Real-deal National stamps just don’t come up a lot. The fact that this is also a pretty cool Donruss design only increases the appeal here.


8. 2016 Panini Pantheon Rudiarius Patch Relic #R-KG Bronze #/10

Far too many relics these days are parallels of existing inserts. On the surface that doesn’t sound like a big deal, but the result is that when you are lucky enough to finally pull a relic, it looks exactly like an insert you probably already pulled a few dozen of only thicker and with a little piece of the player’s alleged pants glued to it. Panini, on the other hand, dresses them up and gives them fun themes and crazy colors and designs that scream “Relics are still cool, and you just got one you lucky bastard!” This is the case EVEN IN THE FLAGSHIP SET, not just their premium stuff. Panini is my relic spirit animal.


7. 2017 Topps Museum Collection Primary Pieces Single Player Legends Quad Relics Bat/Jersey/Patch Relics #SPQ-KG Gold #/10

That said, check this mother out. I’ve got to hand it to Topps – they are trying to up their relic game. It’s still not on the creative level of Panini, but it’s better than it was.


6. 2017 Topps Transcendent MLB Moment Reproductions #MLBR-KG, #MLBR-KGR both #/87

It’s hard enough to get your hands on Transcendent cards (a box is like 5 G’s, bro), let alone some gorgeous, perfectly-executed art Griffeys. The metal frame thing that seemed gimmicky when they introduced it in 2014 absolutely SLAPS here. I’m pretty excited to have matching numbers, as well, which was not exactly by design.


5. 2017 Panini National Treasures 16-Player Materials Booklet Jersey Relic #PMB1-16 #/99 (w/ Barry Larkin, Cal Ripken, Frank Thomas, George Brett, Greg Maddux, Kirby Puckett, Manny Ramirez, Mariano Rivera, Mike Piazza, Ozzie Smith, Paul Molitor, Roberto Alomar, Ryne Sandberg, Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs)

So I do try to keep the lens of a Griffey collector, and I bought this card anyway knowing full-well that at heart this is just a humble jersey relic. BUT this “card” is all about those 15 other guys. They are a veritable who’s-who of ‘90’s All-Stars. The wow-factor here is off the charts, even when showing it off to people who have never collected a baseball card. Teenage me reels at this thing.

Can you pick out all the guys who AREN’T in the Hall of Fame?


4. 1996 Upper Deck National Heroes 3 x 5 Jumbo #NH1 #/5000 Autograph #/250 (w/ UDA COA)

Is it just me or do jumbos carry a certain stigma? Actually, I’ll just come out and admit that no, it’s not just me. Jumbos are definitely not as revered as standard 2.5 x 3.5 baseball cards. It probably has something to do with the fact that you don’t (typically) pull them from packs, so you are not (usually) dealing with sky-high insertion ratios. If a hand-numbered /250, on-card autograph existed way back in 1996 on a standard, pack-pullable Upper Deck card, I imagine it would cost fortune. But, being that this is a jumbo, even with a COA I think I paid right around $100 for it. And it’s not like the auction ended at 7:45am on a Monday morning. I don’t know how it happened. More on undervalued autographs later.


3. 2015 Upper Deck Employee Exclusive Autograph #UD-KG (w/ Wood Display Box)

This autograph is not rare or particularly expensive (assuming a reasonable seller). But that box – THAT BOX is freaking magical, guys. Solid wood top and bottom, beautifully etched logo, shiny gold hinges, plush velveteen lining, and it closes with a mighty CLACK. If I live long enough to create a death plan and it comes time to pick out my coffin, I’m simply going to hand this box to the coffin guy with a post-it note on the inside that says, “THIS.”

One more shot of that box:


Oh, yeah.

2. 1997 SPX Bound For Glory Autograph #/250

I apologize in advance, but I have strong feelings towards this card; so I wrote a short (well, long) dramatic scene to express them. Feel free to skip to the TL:DR at the end.

Interior: Card show, Route 29 Holiday Inn, Conference Room B, Spring 2018, late morning

A card collector enters the conference room, pays his two dollar entrance fee, and surveys the tables from the door. He has only been collecting again for a short time, having left the hobby behind in his youth and rediscovered it just a couple of years ago when his childhood hero was inducted into the Hall of Fame. He has fire in his eyes and cash in his pocket, and today he intends to walk out of here with some sweet new Griffeys.

Our hero ambles through the aisles, perusing the tables one-by-one and trying not to betray his almost total lack of experience with the latest players and brands. He is a child of the ‘90’s, after all. The most recent Beckett he owns is from June of 1995, and to him Panini is merely a type of delicious sandwich. That 1989 Upper Deck rookie must sell for far more than the $75 it did back then. Would he be able to find a deal here?

He is out of his comfort zone today.

He finally comes to a promising table, loaded with inserts from long-dead brands he is relieved to recognize. The friendly-looking dealer gives him a moment to peruse his wares then offers a greeting:

Dealer: “Good morning! Anything I can help you find?”

Hero, a little overwhelmed by all the colorful inserts and crazy relics on the table: “Um, I’m just looking.”

Dealer, who gets this all the time: “Anyone in particular?”

Hero: “I collect Griffey, mostly.”

Dealer: “You’re in luck! I’m the only dealer with Griffeys today. I only have two to choose from, but they are really nice cards, and even from the same set. Take a look.”

The dealer reaches into a box behind him and lays two Griffeys on the table, both with a distinctive die-cut design and holograms. This is the kind of stuff that was just beginning to come out when our hero quit the hobby in the 90’s. HOLY BUTT one of them is autographed! It must cost a small fortune…

Dealer: “So, we’ve got two of the greatest cards from 1997 SPx: the Bound for Glory Autograph and the Grand Finale parallel.”

Our hero looks closely at each card, trying not to show his excitement of holding a real Griffey autograph in his hands. The Grand Finale is extremely shiny and cool, but there is just no comparison here. He wants that Bound for Glory autograph. He attempts to throw the dealer off his desire to buy the autograph by paying more attention to the Grand Finale which happens to be exactly what the dealer would expect any seasoned collector to do.

Dealer: “You have a keen eye. The Grand Finale parallel is incredibly rare with only 50 copies produced. As you can see the hologram is gold which is what differentiates it from the regular gold parallel. The last one sold on eBay for fifteen. I’m only asking twelve.”

The dealer is proud of his use of the word “differentiates.”

Hero: “Twelve bucks? For a base parallel?” Wow, Griffey cards HAD gone up in price. In his collecting days most base cards were three bucks, and most parallels were only a little more than that. This one was pretty nice, though.

Dealer, realizing that this is not the seasoned collector he’d thought: “No, no. Twelve HUNDRED. The hologram is gold. See?” He points. “GOLD.”

Our hero nearly drops the screw case on the table. Maybe this hobby was no longer for him. It slowly creeps into his mind that he hadn’t even asked about the autograph yet.

Hero: “Nice card. What about the autograph?” he asks, expecting some astronomical number. It must be thousands. This is a waste of time. He tries to keep his cool, though. He doesn’t want to look like a noob.

The dealer knows he is dealing with a noob. The last Bound for Glory autograph sold for less than $200 on eBay, but he figures he can get a few extra bucks out of this guy if he sells it right.

Dealer: “The Bound for Glory insert is numbered out of 250 and features an on-card autograph, hand-signed by the Kid himself. Pre-2000 autographs tend to carry a hefty premium, too, as the vast majority of autographs came out after his trade to the Reds. I’m asking three hundred.”

Hero, his eyes widening: “Dollars?”

Dealer: “Yep.”

Hero, incredulously: “Lemme get this straight: this un-autographed, unnumbered card that looks almost exactly like another parallel is $1200, and this numbered, on-card, pre-Reds autograph is $300??”

Dealer: “Yeah…”

Hero: “Are…you sure?”

Dealer, quizzically: “Yeahhh….?”

Our hero promptly takes three $100 bills from his pocket, snaps up his new Griffey and leaves. Both men feel like they got the deal of the century.

Sorry – that was really long. It’s a total fabrication, of course, but I hope you see my point. Bound for Glory is the bitch’s bastard. Get yours before everyone else wises up!

TL:DR – Bound for Glory Autograph = good. Grand Finale parallel = kinda $illy.

Okay, here comes the big one - number one with a bullet. If you read the blog or see me around the Griffey-collecting Facebook groups, this should come as no surprise:


1. 1996 Pinnacle Zenith Diamond Club #3 Real Diamond Parallel

Yes, that is a diamond. It is real…and it is spectacular.

When I first heard of this card in 1996 my response was something along the lines of, “Psh. Okay.” I mean, cool? But what do you want me to do with this information? Buy a thousand packs just to pull the Gary Sheffield? No thanks. I actually did buy a couple packs of this stuff back in the day because I still have a few of the diamond protector cards that came in them; but none of them protected any diamonds, I can tell you that.


This card was always kind of abstract to me. It’s hard to explain. You hear about certain cards in this hobby that you simply never see. You may see a photo of one in a full-page ad in a card magazine or hear whispers about it among collectors, but it’s not like they pop up at the occasional card show or on eBay with some astronomical BIN or in the “mail day” posts of the Griffey Facebook groups. It’s hard to even acknowledge their existence at this level because how can you be sure they really even got made? And 22 years ago, no less. This is the hallmark of the dreaded Gimmick.

I like to classify cards (whales, grails, you’ve heard them all), but this one kind of defies classification; so what to do? Why, create a new classification system, of course!

So, there are chase cards, quest cards, and gimmicks. Chase cards can be easy or tough. They are your mid-90’s Collector’s Choice gold signatures or your standard refractors. Quest cards are significantly tougher and can take years to acquire if you can even find one at all. These are often things like sub-100 numbered parallels, the scarciest of 90’s inserts, and most cripplingly expensive cards in general.

Gimmicks are a different animal, a type that might as well not even exist. The original Ultra Masterpiece 1-of-1’s are gimmicks (though I know where some of them are). On that note nearly every legitimate 1-of-1 ever made is a gimmick. Those boxes of commons they sell at Target that advertise that *someone* is going to pull a T206 Honus Wagner or ’52 Mantle out of them are gimmicks, too. No one is going to pull those things. You might as well buy lottery tickets.


So back to the card at hand: Pinnacle putting real, actual diamonds onto a handful of cards and building a whole brand around it is a gimmick. They do it to excite collectors and move product, not to give out diamonds.

And yet here it is. Now that I know gimmicks actually exist, I want to chase them all down; but knowing what I know, specifically of the incredible luck it took for me to end up with this one without a second mortgage, I feel blessed to have gotten to own just the one. This card made my whole collecting year.

As for this year, it's already off to a decent start, with a nice selection of 90's inserts and early relics making their way to Junkietown just in these first few weeks. At the same time it's already evident that this year is going to be relatively lean in terms of acquisition numbers. I continue to cherry-pick whatever Griffeys come along that excite me, but fewer cards are doing that for me nowadays.

But this is not me throwing in the towel - not yet. I still plan on surprising you with a few posts this year like I did at the end of 2018.

Thanks for reading!