It's not often I pickup these police sets. More often then not, the cards are usually beat up and the paper stock on which they are printed is weak. Not only that but the print quality is usually horrid and the cards are typically larger than your standard 2.5" x 3.5" cards, which makes them hard to store. However I remember collecting these as a kid so when I see these cards it brings on the nostalgia. Being the card collector I was back then, me and some of the other neighborhood kids would actually flag down a cop car just to ask if they had cards. Can you imagine that happening today?
Every now and then I'll find a set that is in pristine condition and piques my interest. The 1987 Astros police set I found recently at my LCS is just that - pristine and for $3 the price was right.
The photo quality of this set is actually better then I'm use to seeing. Our local police sets that were issued back in the 80's were printed on a sturdier card stock but the photo/print quality is lacking.
The Astros team back then lacked a bit of star power but those uniforms were something special. When I see those multiple colored lines on the uniforms, it reminds me of the Atari game called Breakout.
Ok, so that team had a star. In 1987 Nolan Ryan actually hit a home run and he recorded strikeout number 4500. It's too bad a better photo wasn't used for this card.
Donut alert!
I don't why but it's always hard for me to imagine Davey Lopes on any other team but the Dodgers.
This is the card that caught my attention. You get 5 coaches - Gene Tenace, Les Moss, Denis Menke, Matt Galante and Yogi Berra! Any Yogi collector needs this card!
This isn't the kind of set I'd spend time chasing but it is interesting to find police sets from different markets. The bonus here is that you get two hall of famers but the set doesn't offer much else after that. Nevertheless I don't mind adding a cheap set like this to the collection.
UPDATE: I've got a ton a cards heading out in the mail this week. And I'll announce the winner of my anniversary drawing in my next post.
Really nice looking cards. I agree with you about the storage of odd-sized cards. Stay warm!
ReplyDeleteRyan wins it.
ReplyDeleteI don't remember any A's or Giants police sets, but we did have a 49ers police set one year. About 90 - 100 miles from the Bay Area.
The Coaching Staff card is also a must have for all Gene Tenace collectors :)
ReplyDeleteThese are neat, I've seen a few Police team sets but not this one. Nolan Ryan looks a lot younger than 40 on his card.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I loved Breakout. That was probably my favorite Atari game as a 7-8 year old.
That's pretty cool that police officers carried these in their cars back in the 80's. I had no idea how these were distributed (since most of the time I've only seen them sold as complete sets), but handed out by cops wasn't even on my radar.
ReplyDeleteP.S. Nice find for $3... and great analogy with Breakout.
I don't know if whole sets were given out at some point. But I do remember MPLS cops carried these in their cars. We had both Vikings/North Stars cards given out for a few years.
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