1983 Topps parallels – Gary Carter

1983 Topps

Card I selected:  #370 – Gary Carter

There is basically only 1 parallel card for the ’83 Topps set.  There were no Coke or Burger King sets, so it’s just O-Pee-Chee.  That means there’s a lot I can pick from.  My “best card” from my completed set post was Carl Yastrzemski’s last Topps card.  I already did a card of Yaz in 1981 for this parallel project, so I’m going with my second favorite card, that of Gary Carter.  This set probably has the best photography of any Topps set in the 1980’s, so winning 1983 is saying something!

# of cards (including the Topps card):  2

The parallel sets in 1983 include:

• O-Pee-Chee

Scans:

1983 Topps #370

1983 O-Pee-Chee #370

The Canadian version of the Topps set.  At 396 cards, the OPC set was exactly half the size of the Topps set.  This particular card was given the same number as the Topps Carter card.  I think that, if the player got a OPC card but his Topps card was in the second half (#397-792) of the set, he’d have a different card number. Makes sense.

Here are the differences for this card:

• The “O-Pee-Chee” logo on the front replaces the Topps logo in the top right.
• The position on the front is spelled out in both English and French .
• On some of the cards (not this one), the card number is different.
• The copyright on the bottom of the back says O-Pee-Chee and notes the card was printed in Canada.
• The card is printed on white card stock and tends to be poorly cut as cards from the early 80’s were for OPC.
• Any wording on the back is in both English and French.
• It says O-Pee-Chee on the back instead of “Topps”.

The “Rainbow”:

Any sets I didn’t get:  None in 1983.

Other cards I would have liked to do:

• As I mentioned, I would have gone with Yaz if he didn’t already have an entry into this endeavor from 1981.  Chris Speier and Tom Seaver were others I considered.

1983 Topps Leader Sheet

I’ve got an update from a post from a Topps set I covered a really long time ago!  I kind of missed this collector sheet back when I was going through 1983 Topps because I didn’t realize what it actually was.  But a little while ago, I found this sheet on eBay and bought it.

Each wax pack from 1983 contained a “Winning Lineup” scratch-off game card that could net collectors various prizes.

The grand prize, was a trip with tickets to the World Series for scratching off 4 Home runs.  For scratching off 4 singles, collectors could send in for a 7.5″ x 10.5″ League Leaders sheet of 9 cards depicting NL/AL Leaders from the previous (1982) season in homers, batting average, wins and saves.  The sheet is blank backed – each card has the same photo as the players’ regular card.  The Jackson/Thomas AL home run card is obviously a cropped version of their cards.

I’ve updated a few of my older 1983 posts to point this out.

Completed set & master set – one last look at 1983 Topps

On a happy birthday for me – a good present to myself was getting one more set from the 80’s finished!  The 1983 Topps and Traded set is my seventh set completed!  I’ve also completed my “personal master set” for this year as well – which I’m defining as the base set, the traded set, and any regular inserts.  Here’s the “look back” I do for each completed set.  I must say – I think the ’83 set is right up there for me as the best set of the 1980’s.  It’s got the best photography of the decade, hands down.  And if I took out the nostalgia factor I have for the 1987 and 1988 sets, I really think this one would win.

Info about my set:

How I put the set together:

• 449 cards from the wax box
• 155 cards from a vending box
• 2 cards from “Michigan” foil test pack
• 181 cards from trades
• 4 cards purchased from Sportlots
• 1 card purchased from Check Out My Cards

Card that completed my set: #163 – Cal Ripken, Jr. (purchased from COMC – Ripken’s RC will also be my last card from the ’82 set – but that one will run me back a lot more)

’90 Reds Catchup Post – 1983 Topps + Traded

The same 3 guys from the year before are back as the only 3 from the ’90 Reds team in the 1983 Topps set.

1983 – Lou Piniella, Ron Oester, Rick Mahler

Bill Doran has his extended rookie card in the 1983 Topps Traded set.

1983T – Bill Doran XRC

1983 Topps All-Star Glossy Send-In

I decided to purchase the 1983 Topps Glossy Send-Ins – I got them on the cheap on eBay. This set primarily depicts All-Stars from the previous year (1982), though this isn’t true in every case. Judging by the time-frame when this was issued, it had to be either ’82 or ’83 All-Stars, so I did some searching on various players and found there are some players, like Ruppert Jones and Toby Harrah, who made the AS game in ’82 but not ’83. However, there were also some guys, like Jim Palmer and Richie Zisk, who had not made it in either years but had been All-Stars in the past. I’m going to collect some of these insert/send-in sets as I go, just depends on if I like the sets. Most of these can be found for pretty cheap, so I bet I’ll usually get these. This one’s a pretty good set.

40 cards (you could send in for 5 at a time)

16 Hall of Famers:     C. Yastrzemski, R. Yount, D. Winfield, M. Schmidt, G. Gossage, C. Fisk, J. Palmer, G. Carter, N. Ryan, R. Carew, G. Brett, R. Henderson, S. Carlton, E. Murray, R. Jackson, B. Sutter

2 Big Red Machiners:     P. Rose, D. Concepcion

I also bought the Steve Carlton 1983 Bronze card. I’ll post a scan of that when it arrives.

1983 Topps Traded

Topps again issued a 132-card factory “Traded” set in 1983. The set was again numbered separately from the base set with a “T” suffix as #1-132. Though the design was the same as the base set, the cards were printed in Ireland on white cardstock, which is different from the cardboard-ish looking backs that the ’83 base set and Traded sets from previous years were printed on. The cards are again organized in alphabetical order. This time, the rookies of the set were more frequently “extended” rookie cards (XRC’s) of players who didn’t have a RC in the current year set. This year, in addition to the players who switched teams via trades or free agency, the set also included managers who were hired in the pre-1983 offseason.

Dealers who ordered cases of the Topps Traded set also received a Steve Carlton Bronze Card. This card was a miniature bronze version of Carlton’s 1983 base set Topps card.

Two Big Red Machiners were in the set – both Tony Perez and Joe Morgan re-joined former BRM teammate Pete Rose with the Phillies in the offseason. Morgan was traded by the Giants in December, while Perez was released by the Red Sox and signed as a free agent.

There are 3 Hall of Famers in this set.

• Morgan & Perez, as noted above
• Tom Seaver, who was traded by the Reds back to the Mets

Seaver is the only player from the set featured with the team whose cap he’d wear on his HOF plaque. Interesting that this was his 2nd stint with that team. Perez would get the same chance next year.

The set is best known for a Darryl Strawberry XRC, and Julio Franco’s XRC is the other key Rookie card in the set.

Some other notorious players moved teams prior to 1983 to make this set. Mike Scott was traded from the Mets to the Astros after failing to show his promise in New York – a trade Houston certainly got the better of. Former batting champ Carney Lansford was traded to Oakland (primarily for Tony Armas, who was also in the set) to make room for a future batting champ at 3rd base in Boston (Wade Boggs). Keith Hernandez was traded to the Mets in the middle of the ’83 season – this move was one the Mets got the better of. Former MVP Steve Garvey moved an hour from LA to sign as a free agent with San Diego. Though on the downside of his career, he would still go on to help the Padres make the World Series two years later.

As mentioned, the set also had newly hired managers. This included Billy Martin, who was on his 3rd stint of 5 with the Yankees, as well as Frank “Hondo” Howard, who served  as an interim manager for the last two-thirds of the 1983 season. Joe Altobelli replaced Hall of Famer Earl Weaver in Baltimore. He led the O’s to the World Series title, with plenty of help from the emergence of Cal Ripken.

1983 Topps Michigan Test Packs

As I described in an earlier post, Topps tried a test in 1983 of putting their cards in “tamper-evident” packs made of cellophane as opposed to wax. This is definitely something I wasn’t aware of in the past. It’s pretty forward thinking – except for the fact they didn’t produce it nationally later. I bought one pack from BBXC, just to see what it was like, and I think it’s actually better even than Upper Deck’s packs in 1989 seemed to be. It’s basically about as good as the packs that card companies were making in 1993.

The packs did come with a stick of gum and the “Winning Lineup” game card, so they were basically the exact same thing as the wax packs except for the packaging. Also, out of the 15 cards I got, none of them were stained by the gum, and obviously none were stained by wax! I know the Michigan test generally can be had for about 10 or 2o bucks more than the wax box; from my experience that would mean you’d get  up to 72 non-damaged cards that were damaged in the wax pack. That’s definitely worth it in my mind, for all of those out you pondering buying and opening a 1983 Topps box!

Now, unfortunately, out of the 15 cards, I only got 2 new cards, in other words 13 doubles.  But, for $4 for the pack, it was worth it to see what this was about.

1983 Topps scans

Rickey was my favorite player growing, before ED44 or KG24. Rickey had 5 cards in the 83 Topps set. 4 of the 6 subsets. Rickey was a bad mutha in 1983. But Rickey wasn’t a manager or a veteran yet, but that’s not Rickey’s fault. Rickey’s Manager was a pretty bad mutha too. Can you guess who’s reflecting in his glasses? Rickey knows, but Rickey ain’t telling.

Yaz is a good card to show for the super-veteran, as he retired the next year. This was the last Topps set where he had a non-subset base card. The Rickey record breaker is great, because it’s an actual record, not a catcher throwing out 3 guys trying to steal in the All-Star game. Gotta love getting a Hall-of-Famer as a manager. Interestingly, Robinson was the manager for the Giants in 1982, which was the same year he was inducted in the hall of fame. I wonder – how did that work? I assume the Giants had a game the induction Sunday – so what did he do? Does anyone know? Could he be the only manager who faced this situation?

Back to Billy Martin – does he warrant some Hall of Fame consideration? I haven’t put him on my yearly list of “guys who could make the Hall”. But he had a .553 win percentage, going 1253-1013. The 1253 wins puts him in 31st place, right behind… Whitey Herzog! Who just got elected.

Martin has to have  the weirdest managerial stats ever. In 1973, he managed the Detroit Tigers and the Texas Rangers. He won a pennant and a World Series, got fired as the manager of the eventual champ Yankees in 1978 with a 52-42 record… then got re-hired for the same job the next year. He managed the Yankees 5 different times, and made the playoffs a couple of additional times. He only had 2 losing seasons, and 1 of those was a partial season. Add to that, he was a decent player who made an All-Star game and won 4 World Championships with the Yankees in the 1950s.

Speaking of managers. One of these guys is currently the other guy’s boss. And they seem to be doing quite well.

Here are the 4 biggest RC’s from the set (that I pulled). Obviously missing the Gwynn, but I added that for reference below. The cards of the Hall-of-Famers below are some pretty good ones. Great shot of a classic Jackson follow-through swing. He might have hit a homer or struck out there; you never know but there was always a good chance of one of the two with Mr. October! Dawson again with a good pose of his intense-ness. And gotta love the Carew headband. Good thing he wasn’t wearing it upside down, or David Stern would have been displeased. Finally, Brett…. with a chaw… after scoring a run… and congratulating… Yes, I think… we have… a very random Big Red Machine member siting! Baseball Almanac confirms the uniform number – that is Cesar Geronimo!!!!!

Here’s 4 HOF-ers, 2 guys who should be in the Hall, and… Mookie Wilson. Who was a good player, and seems to usually have some pretty good photos. I picked these cards, because each photo is unique, and it really showcased how Topps stepped its game up in this area for the ’83 set. These are all great shots. Also, the Yaz & Perry are each player’s last individual base card set. They were featured together with Johnny Bench in the ’84 set.

And here’s some more good pictures. See below for my thoughts on these pictures:

Tekulve: here’s a guy who looks the same as a rookie as he does as a “Super-Vet”

Fingers: here’s a “Super-Vet” who looks nothing like he did as a rookie

Quisenberry: Should have been the ’83 Cy Young winner. This is him showing off his trademark submarine delivery, which would net him a then-record 45 saves in 1983.

Welsh: On Reds broadcasts, they always talk about when Welsh played the game. I honestly doubted if he really did. I had no recollection of him as an MLB pitcher. He’s not my favorite or least favorite announcer (the post-game guys on Fox Sports Ohio are the real terrible TV personalities). But I guess this is living proof he “played the game”. And he also looks about the same now as he did then!

Balboni: Great shot of Yankee Stadium in the background.

Denny: The NL Cy Young winner in 1983. Two things I noticed. First, his close-up was taken at the same time as the main picture – look at the sky. Second, don’t both photos look like oil paintings or something – not like real photos?

Porter: Chris Sabo goggles before Chris Sabo! At this point in time, this guy was the reigning WS MVP.

Piniella: That shot is awesome. So is Sweet Lou.

1983 Topps cards – Big Red Machine

I didn’t get Geronimo or Bench regular card, or the Concepcion All-Star card (which commemorates the year he won the AS MVP, in his 9th straight All-Star appearance.

Yet again, these guys are popular subset options. Concepcion and Bench are the only guys still on the Reds, though Perez, Rose and Griffey would all come back to the team later.

Also, Concepcion was an All-Star and was thus featured in the Topps Glossy send-in set:

1983 Topps vending box break

I’m surprised, but I might actually be able to say I’m more disappointed with the 1983 vending box than the ’82 one. I didn’t get the Ripken RC in the ’82 one, which is probably the biggest RC in this 30 year project. However, I had good collation with that one (though the wax box for that year was pretty bad for that). Well, this year it’s the opposite. Good collation in the wax box, awful collation in the vending box. I didn’t get a Tony Gwynn RC, which was the one of the big 3 that I didn’t get in the wax box. I did however, pull 2 MORE Ryno RC’s, so I now have 3 extras. Anyone have an extra Gwynn for trade?

Anyways, one thing that is completely random is how the 2 boxes (wax & vending) cross over each other, and I just didn’t do well here. Some of that has to do with how good the wax box was, but I only got 84 new cards out of the 500 card vending box. I guess I view it as interesting more than anything – in hindsight, I don’t know if I’d do the vending boxes. Actually, if I was completely cost conscious on this, I would do the vending but not the wax. About the same # of cards, the collation has been about the same (I think if I did the math, I have around 250 doubles each if I add up the doubles in vending boxes from 80-83, and the wax total is within 10 of that). But the premise of what I’m doing is to buy wax packs / boxes, so I’m definitely sticking with the wax.

This “500 card box” had 524 cards. As before, numbers below don’t include the wax box. Also, as I alluded to above, this year the wax box actually gave me a closer chance to complete the set than the vending box, which was a complete reversal of last year and ’81:

113 doubles, 0 triples

376 of the 792 card set. (47.5% set completion)

I’ve now not gotten the Raines RC in ’81 and the Ripken RC in ’82 and the Gwynn RC in ’83 – so my luck isn’t so great! I guess that’s supposed to be some of the fun.

The crossover between the wax and vending boxes was again terrible this year. I’m 188 cards short out of the 792 after opening both boxes. What I should expect – and in some ways it will be fun collecting the rest of the set (just wish it was a few less to put together!). As usual, I’ll post some pictures in a later post this week.