Weird Card Wednesday: Why Aren't You Blogging!

Hi everyone,

I know it's been several weeks since I've posted anything significant, and I hope my fellow bloggers won't kick me off their blogrolls for inactivity. I'm trying to put parts of my life together--more on that later--and I just haven't had time to think about my card collection in a while. Thank you so much to my 26 loyal followers and I promise to start posting again soon.

Meanwhile, since I missed last week's Weird Card Wednesday segment, I thought I'd pull another card from my childhood E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial collection for your amusement: #26 "Time for a Snack." (I feel like this card looks lately!)

Speaking of my E.T. cards, I really should sort through them and see which ones I'm missing, just to have a complete set. I remember when it was a big deal for me to walk a few miles to the local convenience store (Q-Mart or Smith's Grocery) with a handful of quarters and buy several packs at once. That was a big deal for me to buy more than one at a time! Ah, childhood memories.

Weird Card Wednesday: The Tipsy Alien #32

OK, this one's not a baseball card, but it's still weird all the same.

Before I collected baseball cards, I saved my quarters and bought packs of Star Wars, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial cards at Smith's Grocery on North Royal in Jackson, Tennessee in the early 80s. (Sometime I need to complete some of those sets.)

This week, while looking for some cards to trade, I came across one of the E.T. cards (#32) and thought it would be an excellent candidate for Weird Card Wednesday honors.

Weird Card Wednesday: Bernie Carbo

In this installment of Weird Card Wednesday, we look at Bernie Carbo's 1973 Topps #171 card.

It looks like the Topps photographer failed to take a photo of Carbo down in Florida during spring training. So he shows up at Busch Stadium, walks into the Cardinals clubhouse, and asks Carbo if he would pose for a quick picture. Not having time to tuck his shirt into his pants, Carbo strikes a menacing batting pose beside the dugout. Surely the graphic designer back at Topps corporate will crop the photo above the waist, he thinks.

Nope.

Weird Card Wednesday: Bob Forsch

Every Wednesday, I'll feature a card from my collection that has something unusual or weird about it.

This week's Weird Card Wednesday candidate is 1981 Fleer #537 Bob Forsch.

The Fleer Corporation of Dubble Bubble gum fame broke Topp's monopoly of the baseball card industry and produced its own set of cards in 1981. Among them was #537, which shows Forsch sporting a perm. Up to this time, his Topps cards always showed him with straight, longish hair. It's weird because I'm not used to seeing him look that way!

Apparently at some point during the season, Bob abandoned the curly look and went back to his natural look as his 1981 Donruss #69 card shows.

One of the all-time great Cardinals pitchers, Forsch passed away suddenly on November 3, 2011.

Weird Card Wednesday: 1970 Topps Carl Taylor

Every Wednesday, I'll feature a card from my collection that has something unusual or weird about it.

This week's Weird Card Wednesday candidate is the 1970 Topps #76 Carl Taylor.

Two bad things happened to Carl on this card:

First, because he was traded by Pittsburgh after the 1969 season, he was relegated to a hatless head shot the following year while clearly wearing his Pirates jersey.

Second, on the day the Topps photographer came to spring training, Carl had the misfortune of a bad fever blister on his bottom lip.

It makes you wonder whether Topps ever gave a second glance to the photos they selected?

Weird Card Wednesday: 1966 Topps Mike Shannon

Welcome to the debut of Weird Card Wednesday!

Every Wednesday, I'll feature a card from my collection that has something unusual or weird about it. The inaugural card is Mike Shannon's 1966 Topps #293.

Mike Shannon was an outfielder, third baseman, and emergency catcher for the Cardinals from 1962 to 1970. Today's fans know him more for his unique play-by-play style of broadcasting Cardinals games on KMOX, for which he was nominated in 2011 for the Ford C. Frick Award for Broadcasters given by the Baseball Hall of Fame. (Former teammate Tim McCarver won the award.)

This has to be a very unflattering card for Shannon. Who wants to have their armpit hair immortalized on a bubble gum card for kids across the country?