2024 Series Two vs. Factory Set

 There were six players that have cards in the 2024 factory team set but not in series one.  The assumption is that they will have a cards in series two.  Did  they?  Are the cards from the two sets identical?

Let's find out...

 

 

 

 

Series two is on the left and the factory set is on the right.  The pictures are identical.  Oddly though, the Topps logo is in a different place on the two Madrigal and Tauchman cards.

 

These two cards were in the factory set but not in series two.  It makes sense for Mervis but not Leiter.  He's been in 32 games this season out of the bullpen.  I wonder why he was considered team set worthy but not good enough for series two?

2024 Series Two Cubs

 I picked up the series two Cubs last week and the seller shipped them promptly.  I bought the set on the 15th and it arrived on the 18th.  That's pretty quick to go from South Carolina to Michigan, so kudos to the USPS for that.

There are 16 Cubs cards, 15 players and one combo checklist card.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Among them we have...

• 12 cards with home uniforms, though three of the twelve are the ugly City Connection version
• Four with road uniforms, split two and two between the grey and blue tops
• Only two with a horizontal orientation
• All of the players included are still in the Cubs organization, though Madrigal and Canario are in AAA and Tauchman is on the IL

Five Random Cubs Cards

 I've got 21,806 Cubs cards from 317 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades.

1900s - 1970s: 1978 O-Pee-Chee #56 Rick Reuschel  The RNG starts with an appropriate pick, Big Daddy on Father's Day.

1980s: 1986 Sportflics Decade's Greatest #13 Gabby Hartnett  This card is actually a 3 in 1.  The other two players are Mickey Cochrane and Bill Dickey.  

1990s: 1994 Score #96 Mike Harkey Looks like a nice sunny day in April or early May as the ivy is still brown.

2000s: 2005 Bowman's Best #131 Brandon Sing This card was considered part of the base set.  That is the only reason for me to have Brandon Sing's autograph

2010s: 2015 Topps Traded #79 Rookies Rising  Who would have thought that nine years later, one is just a shell of what he once was while the other is playing in the Mexican League.

Eighties Alphabetically - Fantastic Sam's

 Today's set is another one and done and comes from the haircutting chain Fantastic Sam's.  They issued a 20 disc set in 1988.  The set lacked a license from MLB and the workaround was some tight cropping.

Andre Dawson was the only Cub among the 20 players included.

Also attached to the disc is a second disc, which could win you a prize.   I've not yet succumbed to the temptation to see if my disc was a winner.

Another Crossed Off the Most Wanted List

 After a slow start, I picked up my second card off of the most wanted list in the past month.

It comes from 2003 Skybox E-X.  It's one of those clear plastic cards.  All of the white background you see in the scan is actually the top of the scanner because that section is clear.

Prior's card was a SP, which is why it was hard to find.  The card was scare enough that it didn't have an image on the TCDB.  Now it does!

As soon as I saw the email that one was listed as a Buy It Now, I grabbed the card.  It was only $3, which is also a great deal.   Its a huge win when I can picked up a most wanted at that low price.

Players With Both a South Bend Cubs and Topps Cubs Card

 There are 30 players with a South Bend Cubs card that have made it to the majors with the Cubs.  While they did make the majors, did they really make it by having a card in the Topps flagship set?

That was the next question I looked to answer.  How many players have both a South Bend and Topps Cubs card?

Not as many as you'd think.  Of the 30, just an even dozen have a card in the Topps set.  Several others had a card in Heritage, but that isn't the flagship.  So here are the twelve players with both cards.