Wednesday, April 17, 2013

From the Pedro Binder




2000 Topps Combos

Stars drive baseball card sets. Well, maybe stars and rookies. But, the more big names you can get into a set, the better. Companies have known this for years. That’s why all-stars started having their own cards. If one card of Carlton Fisk was good, a second card was even better. Right? The inclusions of insert sets gave another boost to this theory. Suddenly you could have a set that included all the players on the rosters, for a complete record, and have the insert sets there to add in extra stars. What could be better? Yup. Having two stars on the one card.

Which brings us to this “mound marksmen” card. I don’t know how much thought went into the pairing, but they did a really good job. (Even down to the fact that they both wore number 45.) I never got to see Bob Gibson pitch, but I get the feeling it was a lot like Pedro. Both were dominant right-handers, who weren’t afraid to let the batter know who owned the plate.

What about the card itself? It’s obviously a created shot. Pedro didn’t travel back in time to pose with Gibson. But, it’s done well. The “painting” of the photo lets it look more natural. I’m not sure if the background is supposed to reflect an actual spot, or not, but it adds a quaintness to the image. All the important information is tucked onto the bottom of the card, which is nice. A lot of insert cards seem to think that the most important part of the card is the name of the insert set. This card doesn’t fall into that trap. Name, team logo, simple text. It works nicely as a package.

A very nice card.

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