Nothing unusual there. My post was going to revolve around the fact that the Pilots never took the field as the 'Pilots' in 1970. As we all know they became the Brewers shortly before opening day and Topps never acknowledged that fact in the set, not even in their late series which was compiled after the season started.
I was also going to explore the variety of uniforms that appear on the Pilots in the set. I loved their look and always thought that their unis were terrific.
But as I put these cards face down on my scanner's platen something odd jumped out at me. Take a look:
Yup, the Buzz Stephen card isn't a 1970 Topps card at all. It's an O-Pee-Chee! And that isn't the only one I have in my '70 "Topps" binder. Turns out nearly 20 on the cards in my original lot purchase are O-Pee-Chees. Yikes.
Hard to believe that it took me this long to see it. In my defense I have been working off a checklist and putting my newly acquired cards for this set in a storage box. I really hadn't flipped through it very much. When it was offered to me the possibility of there being OPCs in the mix never occurred to me.
It came already in the binder in pages so it isn't a matter of me not noticing when I paged it up. I flipped thru the cards that were there, saw the nice condition they were in, figured out that the cost was under 50 cents a card said 'OK'. And let me say right now that I'm sure my dealer friend who sold it to me was unaware of this as well. I guess we both share some responsibility here.
It's disappointing for sure. I thought I was less than 25 cards from completing the set but now it is close to 45. Now I face a quandary.
Do I just finish off the cards I need and call it a day? After all, the fronts are identical. It 'looks' like the 1970 Topps set. I won't ever be selling it so it really has no effect on 'value'. When it's finished I can page thru the binder and enjoy the set just as much, including the cartoons. And the final entry in the 'fuhgeddaboudit' column is added expense. While none of the Canadian interlopers are high numbers I figure it'll cost me $50 to $75 to replace them with their Topps equivalent. That includes the one star card involved, Bob Gibson.
OTOH...I suspect knowing that my binder contains a 'hybrid' set will bug me. The first thing I did when I discovered the Stephen card was run to eBay to find a Topps replacement. 'Fixing the problem' was my gut reaction. Even before I thought to check the rest of the cards.
In the grand scheme of things (and even my hobby enjoyment) this is small potatoes. "First World problem" as they like to say in FB comments. Right now my plan is to finish the cards I need and then assess where I am as far as 'repeal and replace'. :-/ Stay tuned for that.
And today more than most days your comments/thoughts are very much welcome.
---------EDIT-------
In response to one of the comments I thought looking at the two different backs of the same player would be interesting. I threw this together in a hurry but it serves the purpose:
I failed to mention earlier what is pretty obvious in both scans of the backs...OPC was printed on a different, darker cardboard.
I would finish off the set like you originally planned with the additional 25 cards. Then go back and eventually swap out the OPC. It would bug me. And reading between the lines you too.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure that's what I'll do. I'm going to talk to my friend next Saturday at his next show. We may work something out which would effect what I do.
DeleteIt would be interesting to see how the backs of the O-Pee-Chees compare with their Topps equivalents. The O-Pee-Chees had to have double the amount of text due to the bilingualism. Did they just leave off some additional text, or did the Topps use a larger font?
ReplyDeleteTopps-larger font plus OPC reduced the size of the cartoons a touch.
DeleteSpeaking of 1970 Pilots/Brewers, there's also all these you need to still collect:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thecowboysguide.com/RetroCards-1970T-Brewers_2.html
Those are pretty cool! I like to add this sort of supplemental stuff to my set binders. Like Bob Lemke's cards. But this one may be just a bit costly for the sake of just having it...if that makes any sense.
DeleteI'm OCD so I can understand your desire to replace them. Either way though you're close to a fantastic set there!
ReplyDeleteThanks...It's been fun.
DeleteAll I can do is look at Buzz Stephen's card and think: "Plots?"
ReplyDeleteLOL...that was one of the things I was going to mention before the Canadians hijacked my post.
DeleteWithout question, I would get the regular Topps versions. The same thing happened to me when I was trying to complete the '75 set. I got a lot of the cards at a coin/pawn shop from one dealer who had OPC's mixed in with the regular cards. I didn't find out until I got them home that they were OPC, and OPC to someone with OCD is not OK! Fortunately there were only about 10 of them.
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking I can probably sell the OPCs as a cheap lot and get back a few bucks. Anything I get would be a bonus
DeleteI just added a Buzz Stephen from 1970 Topps - I made sure it's monolingual - to the cards I'm getting ready to send you. If you want to shoot me a list, or update your 1970 Topps wantlist page with the cards you're looking to un-O-Pee-Chee, I can see if there are any others I can help with.
ReplyDelete...And then I re-read what you wrote and realized you already bought a Buzz off of eBay. Oops. Well, the offer still stands. I can't help with Bob Gibson, though.
DeleteJoe...give me a day or so and I'm going to do just that. I guess 'replace' is the term. Was going to say 'upgrade' but that's not quite true. ;-O Sidegrade?
DeleteAnd thanks for always having my back.
I would have made the same decision. Having a hybrid set would have bothered me too. It's interesting that the OPC was printed on darker card stock. For some reason, I always though they used a lighter card stock than Topps. It feels good to learn something new about vintage cards today.
ReplyDelete