If I Made A Commemorative Set

 Hello friends!

After the massive disappointment that was the 50th Anniversary Commemorative Box I purchased, I got to thinking. 

"What If I made a set, or more to the point, if I was in charge of making a set, what would I want as a Blue Jays Fan?"

So I think I'd make it a 50-60 card set.. No parallels or other shiny crap. It would have Greatest Moments in Franchise History, Greatest Players in Franchise History, cards of each Manager, and of the Mascots. I would also ensure there were cards of both the Ex and of the Dome. 

I grabbed some cards and kind of thre together an idea. I just grabbed cards of who would be in the set and the moments. I don't have the time or energy right now to actually design this set... 

Moments

The second Series Winning Walkoff. Obviously that would be here. I'd also put on the back the iconic call of Tom Cheek 

The 1985 AL East Win. The most wins in franchise history and of course, the beginning of one of the winningest times. 

I'd put George Bell's 3 Opening Day homers. 

Dave Stieb's long-elusive no hitter. 

The Catch.... 

The first World Series win. 

Jose Bautista's batflip. 

I'd also put the first game in Exhibition Stadium and the first game in the SkyDome. 

The cycles by Kelly Gruber and by Jeff Frye would also be in here. 

The Players

I think it's fairly self explanatory why he's here. The Ace of the franchise in its formative years

Can't really make a list without Whitt.. 

The Outfield of the 80s. 

One of the best shortstops in the 80s. 

Early power hitter

Lefty Ace

I could argue that Buck would have a moment as well, with the Double Play at Home Plate with a broken leg... He's been synonymous with the Jays basically since 1981 until his retirement from broadcasting last year. 

The Terminator

Freddie McGriff.. 

This one may be unpopular since he's basically persona non grata, but in a list of greatest Blue Jays, you can't really leave him off... 

Joltin' Joe.. Jumpin' Joe. And the dude can sing!

A One and Done for Cooperstown, but should have had more... Carlos Delgado

Winfield wanted noise.. He got noise... He also had an incident at the Ex where he killed a seagull.. 

Wardo

Shannon Stewart

Roy Halladay took up the mantle of Franchise Ace and ran with it

He was popular with the fans.. Many Zaunbies in the stands.. 

The first pick in the Expansion Draft.. 

Joey Bats.. 

Price and Estrada both played their part to get the Jays to the postseason in 2014

Vlad Jr!

Stroman, though he seems to put his foot in his mouth everywhere he goes.. 

MVP. 

Molitor

Edwing!!

Managers and Others 

I'd also have cards of the managers over the course of the franchise. The mascots. So BJ Birdy, Ace, Diamond... Junior.. 

I'd also want to put something in for the iconic radio voices of so many summers for Jays fans all over Southern Ontario: Tom Cheek and Jerry Howarth.

Exhibition Stadium and SkyDome/Rogers Centre. 

Each card would have an individual back. The moments would have a blurb on the moment the card commemorates. The Players cards would either have their full stats or their Jays stats. I know there are other things I'd do but I can't honestly think of them right now.. 

But, that's what my Commemorative Set would contain... 

Blue Jays 50th Anniversary Cards

 Hello Friends!

I mentioned it a few posts ago and here it is finally. I photographed most of the cards I got. 

First off.. As I showed before, the box I received looks different than the box shown on the websites. I haven't been able to find any copyright information aside from two cards mentioning Topps in their logo in the upper left corner. Nothing else mentions Topps, Fanatics, or any other manufacturing entity. 

So first off.. This is the back of Every... Single... Card.. 

It's like they would do with Topps Now sets. 

Now the fronts. The majority of the cards I received were in this style. Some players have multiple cards

As you can see Varsh has three. 

Cavan has one. 

This one just looks off.. I don't know if that's actually Davis Schneider or not. 

Matt Chapman with a star on his jersey where a number should be.. Another fishy aspect.. 

Why do we have a Jay and a Red Sox player both fielding? 

I apologize for the quality of the pictures.. Once I get a chance to either get my scanner working, or replace the one I have I'll finally be able to take better pics. 

I do like this Springer design. 

This isn't Springer. And it looks like we have another case of an opponent fielding... This honestly looks more like Gausman

This is one of the two cards that reference Topps and I actually really like the design of.. 

Here is the other 

Again, cool card.. I'm interested to see if someone else bought this if they also got "1/100" 

The two cards above were shown in the ads as well. 

Finally, there are a group of cards that look like a Bowman style card.. 

The cards themselves are well made. I like the cards, but there's too much weirdness about them to really be recommendable. 

1: It's all players from recent times. If you're going to have a commemorative set for the 50th Anniversary, show players and moments from the history of the team. Have a card of the first game with the snow on the ground. First pennant. World Series. 4 homer games. No Hitter.. Cy Youngs.. 

Besides, who wouldn't want another Dave Stieb card, or Tom Henke, or Otto Velez? '

2: Some of the images used are just off enough to make you wonder if they're real or crapped out by AI.. 

3: The lack of any copyright information or manufacture information makes me wonder about the validity of them. If it was a True Topps/Fanatics product, they would plaster that shit all over it.. Plus, there would be a checklist available somewhere.. The only information I can find on this, is how to buy it.. 

4: The only thing that makes me think it could be a Topps-Not-Topps product is the fact that, in 80 cards, half were duplicates. 

If I was producing this set, I would have made it just that... A set.. Have a commemorative boxed set of the history of the Jays.. Don't be lazy. Make real backs of the cards. Go through the history of the franchise. 

As excited as I was when I first saw the thing online, I feel like this was a waste of $60US...