BUT…the program also gives BACK to their members! Just taking the membership at the “Individual” support level brings to the member the following goodies with their membership:

•     Personalized membership card
•     Subscription to Memories and Dreams magazine
•     Hall of Fame Yearbook
•     Complimentary admission to the Hall of Fame for one full year
•     Member lapel pin (as pictured below)
•     10% discount and FREE shipping on purchases from the Museum Store, catalog, and Web site

The membership pins are a favorite item among members and collectors. As you will note in the gallery below, the last decade or so has displayed a couple of basic design styles. A few years featured silhouettes of certain players who were the “spokesman” for the Hall’s Friends program that year (Bob Feller is easily seen in the 2007 pin). The last couple of years have changed so that the names of the players inducted are now part of the pin given to the Friends of the Hall. We are glad to show you a run of the pins beginning 2004 and going through this season.

Enjoy!

BUT…the program also gives BACK to their members! Just taking the membership at the “Individual” support level brings to the member the following goodies with their membership:

• Personalized membership card
• Subscription to Memories and Dreams magazine
• Hall of Fame Yearbook
• Complimentary admission to the Hall of Fame for one full year
• Member lapel pin
• 10% discount and FREE shipping on purchases from the Museum Store, catalog, and Web site

The magazine subscription is well worth it! It comes quarterly at this point in time, and it takes the reader behind the scenes at the Hall of Fame in many different ways. The photography of players, events and memorabilia is not found anywhere else, and the magazine covers the game from its beginnings to the most recent of games.

The gallery below is just a few of the covers from recent issues. Oh, and one back cover shows a great aerial view of Cooperstown.

Enjoy!

It is easily the most exclusive of the major sports Hall of Fames in the US, and no event exemplifies that any better than the fact that this summer Ron Santo will “finally” be inducted into the Hall as a result of a special era committee’s work. He will go in with Barry Larkin, the Cincinnati Reds great who is being inducted in his third year of eligibility.

2012 Hall of Fame Yearbook

Most of us will never know what it is like to be inducted into those hallowed halls. However, for many years now the Baseball Hall of Fame has had a terrific program called “Friends of the Hall of Fame” where fans may “belong” to the Hall in a way that is fun, shows support, and most importantly, makes a difference. (If you click within this parenthesis it will take you to a page explaining the membership program.)

When we say it makes a difference, what we mean is that membership fees paid to belong to the Friends program allows the Hall to pursue its goals of “Preserving History…Honoring Excellence…Connecting Generations.” Those noble intentions align perfectly with what we at MLB Memories desire with regard to the grand old game!

BUT…the program also gives BACK to their members! Just taking the membership at the “Individual” support level brings to the member the following:

• Personalized membership card
• Subscription to Memories and Dreams magazine
• Hall of Fame Yearbook (this year’s is depicted in this post)
• Complimentary admission to the Hall of Fame for one full year
• Member lapel pin
• 10% discount and FREE shipping on purchases from the Museum Store, catalog, and Web site

As you can probably tell, we at MLB Memories think this is a GREAT program, and we encourage you to belong. We have been members for several years, and love the small tokens that come with the program. In fact, we are glad to share with you over the next week or so a few depictions of some of the great items the “Friends” of the Hall receive.

Enjoy!

In honor of those players, and for fun, we are glad to bring you this quote:

It was all about doing things right. If you played the game the right way, played the game for the team, good things would happen. That’s what I loved most about the game, how a ground out to second with a man on second and nobody out was a great thing. In my day, if a guy came to spring training 20 pounds heavier than what he left, he was considered out of shape and was probably in trouble. He’d be under a microscope and the first time he couldn’t beat out a base hit or missed a fly ball, he was probably shipped out. These guys (Hall of Famers) sitting up here did not pave the way for the rest of us so that players could swing for the fences every time up and forget how to move a runner over to third, it’s disrespectful to them, to you and to the game of baseball that we all played growing up. Respect.

Ryne Sandberg, from his Hall of Fame induction speech, July 24, 2005

In honor of those players, and for fun, we are glad to bring you this quote:

We know we are better than this, but we can’t prove it.

Tony Gwynn, on a Padres losing streak, quoted in USA Today, July 26, 1989

In honor of those players, and for fun, we are glad to bring you this quote:

Everyone asks me “why” about everything. I have no idea. I see it. I swing. I hit it.

Wade Boggs, on his superior eyesight, in the Washington Post, July 26, 1987

It happens so often you almost want to have a pre-recorded response explaining how those cards were mass produced by the bazillions, and what little market there is for the items is already flooded with available product. You hate to crush the caller’s hopes, but there is really little else you can say. Sometimes it helps to explain the Scouts have a collecting merit badge and some local troops may be thrilled to received the cardboard hoard. And more than a few are at least satisfied to hear that thrift stores will take them in return for a tax donation receipt.

MLB Memories probably averages 12-15 calls like that a week.

However, that does NOT mean that all the cards from that era are total junk! Rookie cards of great players such as Ken Griffey Jr., Randy Johnson, Craig Biggio and more can be found in those hoards. Plus, a great deal of the innovations and artistic ideas on sports cards we take for granted today were pioneered in the late 80s and early 90s.

One such “new idea” was the Baseball Heroes set Upper Deck used as in pack inserts during the period. Hall of Fame players such as Reggie Jackson, Nolan Ryan, Hank Aaron and others were featured on these short sets. Recently, while re-organizing our “IN” piles, we came across one of the Ryan sets.

This nine-card standard-size set was included in first series 1991 Upper Deck packs. The set honors Nolan Ryan and is numbered as a continuation of the Baseball Heroes set which began with Reggie Jackson in 1990. This set honors Ryan’s long career and his place in baseball history. Card number 18 features artwork while the other cards are photos. A complete set does not have to include the signed Ryan card of which only 2500 were made. These Ryan cards were apparently issued on 100-card sheets with the following configuration of other shorter-printed UD cards that year: ten each of the nine Ryan Baseball Heroes cards, five Michael Jordan cards and five Baseball Heroes header cards. The Baseball Heroes header card is a standard size card which explains the continuation of the Baseball Heroes series on the back while the front just says Baseball Heroes.

It occurred to us that some have never seen this complete “old” set, and so we are glad to provide the retro gallery below. Enjoy!

Later we hope to write a full review of this fine baseball release, but for today we wanted to share with you the results of our first box break from this product. Each box is said to contain seven (7) cards, with at least three (3) memorabilia and/or autograph cards. In fact, the boxes promise at least two autos per box!

As you will see in the gallery below, we actually scored eight (8) cards in the first box with three (3) autographs…even if one was a redemption. The BEST pull, though, was the Josh Hamilton Silver Slugger card. It contained Josh’s autograph AND a silver bar embedded with his name engraved! Very nice.

As with so many others our age, the following of baseball was close to an obsession, and one way that practice manifested itself was in the collecting of Topps baseball cards. Truth be told, we knew nothing of the fledgling ecology movement or even the rightness of litter laws. BUT, what we did know was a couple of found pop bottles could be traded in at the corner store for a pack of new cards with a stick of gum. What a deal! You are right if you think our neighborhood stayed litter-free (well, at least of glass bottles).

When 1969 Topps Baseball was originally released the set’s 664 card checklist earned it the distinction of being the largest baseball card set ever. The set boasted some great players (40+ Hall of Famers are represented within it). And accompanying this sizable set were two of the most popular insert sets ever released – Deckle Edge and Decals.

Both of these insert sets were loved by the guys in my circle. The smaller, black and white deckle edge were cool because of the weird scallop cut on the edges AND the inclusion of some great players. We were thrilled that THREE of our Tigers were in the set (Horton, Freehan and McLain), and we could not understand why Lolich and Kaline and Cash were snubbed.

But the real love of inserts came from the 1969 Topps Decals. Bright, colorful and very cool because they looked like the baseball cards…but you could rub them off on stuff! In my mind’s eye, in fact, I can still see my pasteboard notebook, at the end of the summer, with a COMPLETE set of the decals rubbed off on to it. Sure, I cringe now, but at the time I thought it was the best!

The decals were very similar in design to the 1969 base set. Of course, the decals were much smaller at 1 3/4″ x 2 1/8″ Second, the color of the inside of the circle housing the player’s name was different from the regular card. Most importantly, however, for most of the players Topps used a picture that was different from the base card picture. As kids we loved that because it was like being able to get two cards of the players instead of one!
The small size of the decals and the fact that they were designed to perish during “normal” use (like my long ago lost notebook) conspired against their long-term survival. It is really unfortunate in consideration of the fact that the issue contains a Reggie Jackson “rookie”, a last-year piece of Mickey Mantle, and Hall of Famers in abundance among its 48 players. Perhaps that is why I decided a while back to make this set one of the few graded card sets that I would put together.

Finding graded examples of most of the decals has not been too hard. However, I still lack several high grades of certain players. But, as I find the ones I want I am able to sell to others the duplicates I obtain or the Grade 8s or 9s that I replace. The decals in the gallery below, in fact, are all available and you may check their availability by clicking HERE.

Enjoy!

MLB Monthly 5-2012