My Collection Guidelines

With my stated goal being to collect at least one card of every man to play for the Cubs, even so little as a 1/3 of an inning, optimal specimens simply aren't going to exist or be prohibitively expensive.  Thus, I have developed the following system that details where various cards would rate in my collection.  With #1 being the most optimal, #2 the next most and so on and so on, here are my grades:



#1 - Player pictured and listed as a Cub on the front
       Card printed when player was active:





#2 - Player pictured and listed as a Cub on the front
       Card printed after player's career ended (including reprints):





#3 - Player listed as a Cub on the front but pictured in another uniform, or vice versa
       Card printed when player was active:





#4 - Players listed as a member of a Cubs minor league affiliate
        Card printed before or after a player's career ended:





#5 - Player pictured and listed with another team (at any level) on the front.
       Card printed when player was active:





#6 - Player pictured and listed with another team (at any level) on the front.
       Card printed after a player's career ended (including reprints):




There you have it.  The long and short of it is that I prefer my cards to depict the players as Cubs, but that's simply not possible for many guys.  In addition, I prefer cards that were printed in the time that the player was active because it feels more like an historical artifact and my collection more like an anthology than a book of cardboard. 

The actual condition of the card comes into play too, but I have no clear ranking for that and I go based on what I like best at that moment. That is, unless the card has been put through a paper shredder or something ridiculous.

4 comments:

  1. I was interested in your quest to get a card of every player that ever suited up for the Cubs. It parallels my past quest to obtain a copy of every Cubs card ever printed. It seemed a possible (tho daunting) endeavor until the mid 90's came around and every printer in the world seemed to be printing baseball cards. With that task abandoned I moved onto something else. My favorite Cubs team was the Cubs from 1969 since I was a child at that time. So the new collection would be to acquire every Topps card that any of the 41 rostered players and coaches had appeared on throughout their career..... autographed. Another daunting task, but seemingly doable. There are some obvious examples that would be tough to get while some seem near impossible. I too wanted to have the players pictured as a Cub if at all possible. So I needed to create a few custom cards to fulfill my needs. As far as I knew, Johnny Hairston had never had a card printed in any set anywhere so I created one for him. I did just that and actually had the chance to meet him at a public signing and have him sign one of my custom cards. That brings me to my question. I see in your list of acquisitions that you have John listed as a player you have obtained a card of and that he's pictured in a Cubs uniform. Is that indeed true and if so what and where was the card issued? Please let me know where I be able to get this card if it exists. Thanks Mark

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  2. Here's a link to the signed card on a website I keep of the collection if you'd care to see it.

    http://letsplaytwo.weebly.com/johnny-hairston.html

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  3. Great website!

    I would like to contact you through email. My e address is 938@yahoo.com

    Thank you

    Carl Aldana

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    Replies
    1. Check the email address you gave me. I tried to send you a reply and it came back 938@yahoo.com is an unknown address.

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