Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Cards That Never Were

I interrupt my usual ramblings about the celebrities I have met to present something cool from another blogger, Steve over at White Sox Cards. Steve is a Chicago White Sox fan who produces a blog about his favorite team.
Recently, Steve started making graphic images of baseball cards that were never issued, but would be interesting to see. For instance, he put Harold Baines on a 1980 Topps card, usurping the 1981 Topps card as the Baines rookie card. Steve is a maestro.
Back in the day (meaning pre-pc's), I was a master of the 'cut and paste', but that meant actual 'cutting' and actual 'pasting'. It was a long and tedious process, but I became darn good at it. Unfortunately for me, as I reached my apex, computers and graphic programs made my skills obsolete. Over the years, I have learned enough to be able to do the basics with Photoshop, but I cannot come anywhere near Steve (and others, I suppose), when it comes to creating something like a card that never was.
For me, these 'cards' are so cool. I grew up with mainly one baseball card company, Topps. That meant one baseball card of each player every year. Some less accomplished players didn't even have a card every year (or ever, in some cases).
As a baseball
fan and card collector, this annoyed me. I wanted to see Mike Squires in the old red and blue White Sox uni on a 1976 card. I wanted a 1979 'rookie' card of Harry Chappas, the diminutive but highly-touted shortstop. I was disappointed that Ricky Seilheimer never appeared on any card.
Thanks to Steve, my Seilheimer angst has subsided. As soon as Steve learned of my quest, Steve created a 1981 Seilheimer card, adding it to his CTNW collection of Baines '80, Carlton Fisk '70 and Frank Thomas Upper Deck '90.
Seilheimer seems out of place in the company of those other great players. I might have been the only person desiring a Seilheimer card. So, I really appreciate Steve's effort. Now, if I could just find an old picture of Squires circa 1975, I would really be content!

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