Upper Deck Decade 1970s Cubs

I had a couple brain cramps with my Cubs from Upper Deck's Decade 1970s set, released in 2001.  First, I put this set together a couple summers ago, and thought I had a post about it then.  I didn't--brain cramp #1.

Then, a couple weeks ago I realized I didn't have the set completely finished when I saw a card from an insert set on ebay---brain cramp #2.

The set is now complete and the post is going up today; my cramps are gone.

First, a little about the set.  The 180 cards feature all the big stars from the 70s.  The first 90 cards were the base cards of the players.  The other 90 were various subsets (Rookie Flashbacks, Decade Dateline, and Award Winners).

The design of the base card is a ripoff of Topps 1975.  Interesting that Upper Deck decided to celebrate the 70s by giving Topps a nod of their cap---or else by blatantly ripping them off.

Four Cubs were in the first 90 cards...

 

 

 

The Madlock card is my favorite--it looks like the 70's.  The Santo card is my least favorite since it's got a picture from the late '60s on it (not something I want to see in a 70s set!).

As far as the subsets go, a few more Cubs showed up.

 

Fergie Jenkins and Bruce Sutter were Award Winners, both winning Cy Young Awards.  These cards borrow the Topps '74 design.

Three Cubs made the Decade Datelines.  These cards have a Topps '72 feel to them.

 

   

Billy made it twice (1,117 consecutive games streak and first batting title).  Madlock's card was for his first batting title in 1975 and Dave Kingman was included for hitting three homer in my all-time favorite game.

In addition to the base set, there were also several insert sets and two Cubs were included.

Dave Kingman was a bellbottomed basher.

This card is the one I just recently found, Fergie's Arms Race card.  Upper Deck really liked this picture since they used it...

  

...on three different cards in the set.

Tile Tuesday: Flair Cubs

In the early '90s all of the card companies were putting out high end sets.  Fleer jumped on the bandwagon in 1993 with its Flair brand.  They would continue to put out a Flair set until 2006, though the brand was passed over in 2000 and 2001.

Early sets had between 300 and 450 cards.  Later releases stayed under the 200 card mark.  There were a total of 95 Cubs over the 12 years.

You can see on the tile a couple of fairly consistent design elements...most of the cards were borderless and most featured two pictures of the player on the front.  In fact, the only years with a single picture on the front were 2003 - 2005  The double pictures returned for Flairs swan song in 2006.

2009 SP Legendary Cuts Cubs...The End

The craziness the was 2008 Legendary Cuts continued the final year of 2009.  The set size remained the same: 100 cards of current players and 100 more cards, short prints, of actually Legendary players plus some historical figures.  Bummed that Martin Van Buren didn't make the 2008 checklist?  Be bummed no more--he made the cut in 2009.

The cards feature a postage stamp design.  It was fine, I suppose.  But they also have a variety of color shades; not fine.  Ever wonder what Derrek Lee would look like if he played for the Reds?

Here you go.

What about Geovany Soto on the Rockies?

Would have looked like this.

 

 

 

There were six other active Cubs in the set.

The Cubs got gypped on the legends list, with only two.  For the only time in the brand's run, Ernie Banks was left out.  The short-printed legends were numbered to 550 (which is an unusual number).

 

The set in this form ended when Upper Deck lost it's MLB license after the 2009 season.  It has come back as a high-priced set .  The cards have no picture but a large cut signature.  Who wants to drop $175 for a one card box?  Not me.

So I guess I'm done with SP Legendary Cuts.

Feeling A Little Guilty With This One

I've added another Billy Williams card to the collection, and I added alittle guilt, too.

First, the card...

 

 

...this big beauty is from the 1967 Dexter Press set. These cards are big, 5 1/2" by 7" big. And they're full color and glossy--really nice cards. The cards were part of a giveaway sponsored by Coke. If you collected enough Coke bottle caps that had baseball players' pictures, you could redeem them for a team set of 12 cards. The Fleer Sticker Project has detailed posts about the cards here and one of the photographers here.

The backs are pretty plain--just the basic player information and no stats.

So that's the card...now the guilt.

Usually these cards, especially for a Hall of Famer like Billy, will run $10-$20. For $1.99 I got this card plus five other Cubs. That gives me half the team set for a mere two bucks. Why such a good deal? Because the ebay seller didn't really know what he had.

The cards were listed as "Chicago Cubs 1967 5x7.5 Inch Photo Cards". "Dexter Press" was missing from the entire listing, which means that anyone with a saved search for these wouldn't have found out about them. Plus the size was listed incorrectly.

I was the only bidder, and I got a deal...and some guilt. I kinda feel like I took advantage of the seller. I knew what he had, but he didn't. Should I have sent him a message and told him about the Dexter Press label? Anyone else get themselves into the same type of situation, where you knew that you were getting a good deal due to the seller's lack of knowledge? Feel guilty about it?

I never messaged the seller and I'll have to live with the guilt of that and with six cards for two bucks.

Now that I've got half the set, I'll be slowly chasing the other six. I doubt I'll get the same bargain.

 

Added A Jacque Jones Jersey Card*

Notice the asterisk in the title?  Here is why it's there:

My goal with the relics is to add a card for each Cub player that had one issued during his time with the Cubs.  I'm getting close to being finished, and I saw that Jacque Jones had an Upper Deck jersey card in 2008.

Then I looked at the card---and faced a decision...

....Even though he already had two years in Chicago under his belt, Upper Deck decided to ignore that and pretend he still played for the Twins.  The two pictures on the front show his in a Twins uniform.  The jersey piece is from a Twins uniform.  But he was now on the Cubs, hence the Cubs logo.

What a mish-mashed mess.

I dug around some more and found a few jersey cards from 2006-his first year with the Cubs...and

...same thing.  Both Upper Deck and Fleer had the Cubs name or logo on the card, but showed him as a Twin.

So what do I do?  Four different relics from his time with the Cubs, featuring a Cubs logo/name, but Twins pictures and pieces?

I bought the cheapest one I could get...$3.40 delivered...

....Jacque Jones* of the Minnesotago Cubwins.

2008 SP Legendary Cuts Cubs

The first Legendary Cuts set was released in 2001.  For seven years the set was made up of hall of famers and other great retired players.  That makes sense in a set called Legendary Cuts; you know, legendary players.

In 2008 the set Jumped the Shark.

For the first time, the set included active players.  Sorry, but Carlos Zambrano is not legendary. Psycho, yes; legendary, no.  And even worse, the active players made up the 100 card base set while the actual legendary players were short-printed.  Jumping the shark even more, Upper Deck went all Allen and Gintery by making the first 46 short prints non-baseball players.  You want a Claude Monet or Richard Nixon--then we've got the set for you.

The sad part is I really like the design of the cards.  Too bad I end up with Alfonso Soriano along side Billy Williams.

Four Cubs were included in the active player base set:

Four more Legendary Cuts regulars were in the SPs, actual Legendary players

Topps 1969 - 2012 Complete Set Prices

Here is my monthly looks at Topps set prices for all of the sets that I own.  Usually I get the prices on the first of the month, but these are from January 2nd.

The prices were generally lower--I suppose not too many people were buying big ticket items the past few days, leaving bargains for those who had some cash left over after Christmas.

To buy one of each will set you back $6,345.08, which is down $167 from December.

Here's an odd fact: I've been collecting this data for three and a half years now and the average price for all the sets over that time is $6,376.51--only a $31 difference from this month's average.

YEAR	Jan. 2	Dec. 1	Nov. 1	12 Mo. Avg.
1969	$1,044.78	$1,083.19	$1,056.38	$1,183.48
1970	$995.20	$1,134.00	$918.80	$958.12
1971	$717.40	$968.30	$836.87	$772.97
1972	$930.60	$842.52	$1,023.22	$1,016.60
1973	$414.50	$522.99	$278.91	$398.25
1974	$177.20	$185.70	$337.40	$238.73
1975	$291.95	$364.71	$328.01	$326.87
1976	$416.28	$175.57	$164.81	$191.40
1977	$143.00	$104.53	$174.38	$136.03
1978	$109.49	$84.05	$79.40	$97.26
1979	$79.60	$84.88	$68.60	$85.93
1980	$61.39	$58.15	$61.40	$65.90
1981	$33.79	$32.56	$29.67	$33.10
1982	$48.18	$28.89	$34.89	$41.65
1983	$30.79	$27.80	$44.56	$33.36
1984	$18.18	$17.14	$14.30	$25.03
1985	$28.79	$23.32	$34.52	$29.98
1986	$21.80	$9.50	$21.93	$17.10
1987	$14.88	$4.54	$5.74	$9.19
1988	$9.37	$5.30	$11.70	$9.44
1989	$10.98	$8.58	$9.10	$8.22
1990	$12.59	$11.24	$8.20	$9.93
1991	$21.09	$9.53	$10.60	$11.74
1992	$6.59	$27.58	$20.99	$12.37
1993	$25.99	$22.60	$32.88	$25.23
1994	$23.08	$21.29	$19.65	$21.98
1995	$44.95	$27.76	$34.12	$38.72
1996	$26.01	$24.81	$17.91	$21.71
1997	$51.28	$44.40	$42.01	$45.62
1998	$44.94	$30.69	$57.19	$42.32
1999	$25.81	$40.00	$25.99	$26.41
2000	$23.11	$19.99	$21.99	$20.99
2001	$48.59	$59.49	$55.30	$56.04
2002	$48.39	$45.91	$45.78	$38.40
2003	$42.80	$38.38	$35.02	$37.26
2004	$22.00	$27.88	$27.78	$28.40
2005	$33.08	$40.18	$24.14	$31.05
2006	$24.03	$33.14	$22.93	$26.01
2007	$22.49	$25.07	$23.26	$22.24
2008	$34.19	$48.17	$25.49	$30.15
2009	$57.35	$34.02	$46.82	$48.29
2010	$37.43	$27.45	$21.69	$30.09
2011	$28.10	$36.29	$32.09	$32.96
2012	$43.08	$50.80	$49.12	$39.96