Does Anyone Make Collecting Goals for the Year?

 I enjoy reading goals that collectors have for next year on the collecting boards.  Sure, lots of the sites focus on cards that are not in my price range.  Heck, lots of Kellogg's cards that I need are not in my price range.  

One of my goals is to finish some Kellogg's sets in their individual wrappers.  I will probably never get close to 1970, 1971 or 1975, but I think I will make an effort on the rest of them.

For 1979 I will try for variations, but for now any version will do fine.  

Football sets will have to wait as well.  The 1970 set might be possible someday, but the 1971 Football set will not be on my radar at current prices.

I still haven't seen any of the the 1970 Rold Gold cards in individual packs, so that won't be on my list.

1981 - 83 don't seem to be possible either.  

That leaves the following - 

1972

1973

1974

1976

1977

1978

1979

1980

I completed the sets from 1978 and 1980.

I would like to finish the ones that I am close to completing.  

1979 - I have at least one variation of every player except for Ross Grimsley.  I didn't know that or I would have probably looked for that card.  I will start looking for this one today.  

1977 - I only need five - Bostock, Cey, Fidrych, Lezcano, Koosman.  That should be possible.

1976 - I only need five - Washington, Carroll, Luzinski, Carew, Simmons.  Getting the Claudell Washington will probably be a challenge.

1974 - I still need more than half of this set.  I have 24 and I need 30 including most of the big names.  This is one of my favorite sets, but getting these packs can't be a priority since I think that the big stars will be out of my price range, if I even find them anywhere.

1973 - I only need five - Ryan, Palmer, Hunter, G. Perry, Seaver.  How do I keep needing five from these sets?  This one might be difficult since I need all stars.

1972 - I only need four - Seaver, Rose, Gibson, Mays.  Ouch.  Another small number, but another one that might be out of my price range.

#10 on My List of Favorite Kellogg's Sets

 Everyone seems to know the story now about how the 1971 Kellogg's Football and Baseball cards were only found in cereal boxes.  There was no offer on the box to buy a factory set.  That has made them a challenge to find in nice condition but that is not why they show up here on my list.

Constantly seeing cards like the three 1971s shown on the top of the picture below has soured me on this set even though it is the most valuable one.  I have the football set in nice condition, but I haven't been seeking the 1971 baseball set in top condition yet. I am focusing on the variations in any condition I can get.  

The Killebrew and Brock pictured are better to look at, but they still have condition issues.

I am not much of a graded-card collector, but when I saw this Rick Monday, I had to buy it so that I could compare other 1971s to it.  It was refreshing to get a clean, colorful version of a 1971 Kellogg's card.  I'll have to check, but I've probably gotten about 10-20 nice ones, but the graded ones come by accident when I've bought a lot of cards.

Flat cards also seem to be a rarity with the 1971s.  

There are so many errors and variations in this set.  The backs look nice when clean, but mostly I find old, faded backs.  It seems like 90% of all of these cards have been in toy boxes for years.

At card shows, dealers rarely have many of these in nice condition.  Only 1971s and 1975s seem to be difficult to find in nice condition at larger card shows.

#11 on My List of Favorite Kellogg's Baseball Card Sets

 I spent a lot of time with the 1979 Kellogg's variations because it is a fun, cheap thing to do.  I am still not done with it.  That was not enough to move this set up higher on my list of favorite Kellogg's sets.

I like the color of the cards that have a bright, white border and a bold, red Kellogg's name.  Yaz shows those colors.  

There was another printing that looked like a completely different set.  The bright white is now an off white and the Kellogg's name and stars are now in a dull orange. 

The Sutter card with the orange coloring is also quite thicker card stock than the red version, which seems to be the thinnest card stock to date (1981 will match it).  

This orange/off-white version of the Kellogg's cards is found in the factory sets.  I don't know if any of those found their way into cereal boxes.  None of my unopened packs show the orange coloring.  Can anyone confirm this?

This orange coloring and card thickness is quite similar to the 1979 Stop N Go football set  In both instances it is difficult to imagine that the designer wanted the names to look like that in orange.

1979 Kellogg's also began the demise of the sealed pack.  As shown by the photo below, the 1979 and 1980 packs didn't have the same sealing used in prior sets.  These two pieces were cheaply glued together and they separated easily.  I guess they didn't plan on people keeping them unopened.  They were correct in my case - I didn't keep any of my Kellogg's cards unopened.

I am guessing that there are less unopened packs from 1979 because the wrappers separated naturally.  Even if you planned on keeping them unopened, the cards decided otherwise.

The variations exist with the color scheme, the registered symbol (in a few different places), statistical differences, logo differences and text differences.  Ugh.  

Not only did the seals easily separate, the material used must have changed because they were easily discolored too.  The two shown below look better than most that I see.

Even with all of that, I am still chasing the variations, and unopened pack variations. 

#12 On My List of Favorite Kellogg's Sets

 It might surprise some that the 1975 Kellogg's baseball sets is not one of my favorites.  Why?  I didn't get a lot of these as a kid for some reason.  The ones I did keep didn't maintain their color as well as Kellogg's cards from other years.  That can't even make up for a nice selection of players in the 1975 set.

I think that a nice, colorful, uncracked 1975 Kellogg's card is one of the most amazing cards that they've created.  I've seen far too few 1975s that look like that.  Instead, I tend to see the cards shown below about 90% of the time. 

Not only do these cards seem cracked, discolored borders are common.  The cards also seem to lose that shine easily.

Matlack, Bench and White are challenging to find without cracks.  

Sure, nice 1975s are expensive.  It makes sense because both at big shows and online most of the ones for sale don't look that good.  It is easy to find nice Kellogg's cards from every other year except for 1971.

Factory sets don't seem to be around much for 1975s.  That's not a surprise, because in years when dealers had access to factory sets, cards in nice condition survived in large quantities.

Is this anyone's favorite set?  Why?

#13 on My List of Favorite Kellogg's Sets - Missing Memories

I like the 1982 set for its pictures.  I don't see as much cracking or curling in this set either.  My favorite memory of this set is the Bob Knepper card that someone at home put behind a magnet on the refrigerator - it stayed there for almost a full year.  Maybe I will stick one on the refrigerator at my mother's house today and see if I get any comments.

So, why is it so far down on my list?  I was collecting cards a bit during this time.  I don't have any other attachment to this set since I was in college at the time.  For a long time I got the 1982 and 1983 sets confused.  No one has ever confused the 1981 Kellogg's set with any other one.

I actually opened more boxes of Kellogg's cereal than anyone I know in 1982, but I got no cards to show for it.  How?  In exchange for meals in college, I worked the breakfast shift in a cafeteria that served about 300 - 400 people per day.  When I started I was told that my looks were better suited for the backroom than the serving line.  So, I ended up working on the dirty dishes as well as restocking the popular cereal containers.  I can still smell the Cap'n Crunch, the most popular cereal at the time.  Did any of you have similar jobs?

Ten years later in graduate school one of the administrative assistants told me she was having a garage sale and that her son had some cards to sell.  I bought Kellogg's sets from 1979 - 1983 I think.  That was good because most of my collection at the time ended at 1980.  Before COVID I was able to pick up factory sets from 1979 - 1983 without paying too much.  

Does anyone collect factory sets?

#14 on My List of Favorite Kellogg's Sets - Everything is Too Small

 When I was younger I didn't like this version of Kellogg's cards because the card size was smaller than most years.  Now I dislike it because the font on the back is too small.  I like to read the card backs, but these are getting more difficult each year for me.  Ugh, don't get old.

Those are my first thoughts about the 1980 Kellogg's set.  

Other negatives for me include the poor process of putting the cards in the packs.  Not only did the seal on the two-piece pack not work well, it also caused lots of the cards to discolor on one side of the back.  You might want to check your cards to see about this.  The left edge of the Fisk card has a bit of discoloring, but many are far worse.  

Some packs look okay, like the three below, but most that I've seen are not up to par with the other years.

This video shows how some of the packs look.  

Player selection is okay.  20 Hall of Famers.  It looks like there were 38 HOF players in the 1980 Topps sets, not counting league leaders, record breakers, etc.

I seem to see less cracks in these cards.  Maybe the smaller size helps.

There are More 2011 Topps Lineage 3-D Cards?

I am home this week.  When looking through my miscellaneous cards I found this 3-D card.  I didn't realize that it was a 2011 Lineage 3-D card until I checked out the back.

It looks like the other cards from the set, but it is missing name on the front.  

I found out that these were a special numbered parallel set called Lineagraph- numbered to 99.  The backs mimic the 1968 3-D set put out by Topps.  There are also 1 of 1 red back parallels - I wouldn't mind finding one of those, but that will never be a big deal to me.  

Time to see if these numbered to 99 are affordable.  

More Topps 3-D Cards - Topps Lineage 3-D

 I picked up a what was described as a 25-card lot on 2011 Topps Lineage 3-D cards recently.  I was quite surprised to find that there were 25 different cards - the entire set actually.  I think that I already had most of the cards, but this was a nice way to complete the set.

I do like the Topps cards that are based on the 1968 Topps 3-D set.  I will need to do more research into what other sets include some of these cards.   

I have the 2012 insert set that was a Topps Archives insert.  This is the 15-card set with Ruth, Mays, Clemente, etc.

I don't have any of the 2017 Topps Heritage inserts.  These were the ones that were inserted two per hobby box.  They started out expensive and I don't think that has changed much.   Here is the checklist for that one.

Rizzo, Harper, Posey, Correa, Kershaw, C. Seager, Ortiz, Stanton, Arietta, Donaldson, Bryant, Bumgarner, Machado, Trout, Syndergaard,  

Has anyone ever seen any of these at a decent price?  I'd like to get one, but is it possible to get one for $20?

Are there other Topps cards based on the 1968 Topps 3-D cards?

#15 on My List of Favorite Kellogg's Baseball Card Sets

 Okay, I guess this would be my least favorite set at this point - 1983.

The color scheme doesn't work great, especially when looking at a bunch of them together.

There are a few other reasons that I put this set 15th.  I don't have memories of finding them in cereal boxes because I was in college.  Second, they must have been placed in cereal boxes without a wrapper since they I haven't seen one offered in the wrapper ever.

Based on the 1982 Rookie of the Year voting, Kellogg's didn't do a good job with their selection of younger players.  Cap Ripken and Wade Boggs finished 1-3 but Kent Hrbek (2nd) is in the set.  Steve Sax won in the NL and Ryne Sandberg finished mid-pack, but runner-up Johnny Ray got into the set.  

Tony Gwynn played in 54 games and hit .289, but he didn't receive any ROY votes or a Kellogg's card.  Garry Templeton was the Padre in this set.  

Kellogg's did a good job showing colorful uniforms.  I am wondering though if a lot of the players are shown with practice jerseys.

1983 was another year without an Andre Dawson Kellogg's card.  1983's Cy Young Award winners were surprises and neither had appeared on a Kellogg's card - John Denny and Lamar Hoyt.

Is This Kid You?

 Some kids in 1975 were probably quite disappointed to pull a Jon Matlack card from a cereal box.  Why?  They probably wanted a player from their team or maybe a big star like Reggie Jackson, Rod Carew, Pete Rose, Johnny Bench, Steve Garvey, Tom Seaver, etc.  

No disrespect is intended toward Matlack who had a great career and four different Kellogg's cards.  He was Rookie if the Year, an all-star more than once and he shared an All-Star Game MVP award in his 13-year career.

I still need Matlack and Bench without cracks.  If you want them with a crack I can certain trade those guys, but I need some nice ones for my sets.

No, I am not trying to pump up the price on this card.  I don't have a box full of them waiting for the right time.  If 1983 Fernando Valenzuela Kellogg's cards ever get popular I'd be set for life.

Stay tuned tomorrow to see where 1975s fit in among my favorite Kellogg's sets.

Cards Shows Are the Same Everywhere?

I visited my daughter yesterday and made a stop at a card show in Green Bay.  Other than a bunch of tables that focused on Packers stuff, it was just like the shows I see around Chicago - lots of new auto/patch/relic/??? cards that I know little about.  5000-count boxes with new cards were prevalent as well.  I don't go for those either.

I didn't see many Kellogg's cards, but I did get these two, which look a lot better in person.  Sorry, I was too lazy to scan them today.

I rarely purchase graded cards, but if 1971s or 1975s look great and are affordable, I might be interested.  I have no plan to collect graded sets, but maybe someday I will change my tune.

I spent another dollar on a Dan Hampton rookie card that was quite off-center.

I went to a show today near Chicago.  I go to this site frequently, maybe five times a year.  I was surprised to see about 10 empty tables.  Most of the other tables had displays that seemed the same as the last time I was at the show.  

I spent $2 on some Sports Illustrated for Kids cards, mostly depicting track and field athletes.

I assume that there will be more shows next weekend and then after that not much for a while.

Finally Making a Dent in an Unopened Kellogg's Set

The 1976 Kellogg's set has always been one of my favorites since those came out when I was pulling them from cereal boxes before doing my paper route.  I finally made a dent in my unopened set with a purchase of the 16 cards shown below.

It also was my first significant purchase in a long time.  I found a few other things recently, so maybe things are looking up.

With that purchase, I now only need six cards for the set.  Here is the list.

When I started this set I was going with the assumption that cards 1-3 (Hargan, Washington, Gullett) could not be found in packs.  I even posted about it  (Fake 1976 Unopened Packs).  Since that time I've probably seen Gullett's available in the package about five times, Hargan maybe three times and Washington once. 

I remember the Washington auction because it was a lot of maybe 15-20 unopened packs from 1976 and there were two Washingtons.  I bid aggressively, but didn't win.  If you did win and want to trade the extra one, I now have extras of both Hargan and Gullett. 

Does anyone remember ever getting one of these cards in a cereal box in 1976?  I have no memory of that and I don't remember anyone trying to complete a set that year.