All-Star Managers and Coaches

I haven't really been making post with regular themes lately, other than cards I have added to my collection, and although I did get a few hanging boxes lately ('19 Topps and '19 Heritage), they didn't contain anything special, and I didn't really want to waste a post on a random hanging box just for the sake of posting.
With that being said, the idea popped into my head last night to post all of the All-Star Manager and Coach cards I have made. I am coming up on the All-Star Manager and Coach cards in the 1993 Topps set, so that's where I got the idea from.

Let's start in 1983. This is the first set I really started making them in, although I had definitely added them to the checklists of earlier sets.  There isn't really that many places to search for All-Star coaches. Wikipedia and BB Reference do tell us the managers, though. For the '82 game, it was Billy Martin and Bob Lemon for the AL, and Tony LaRussa for the NL. Bob Lemon was fired after the '81 season, so in a normal year, the managers from the previous seasons' World Series game would be the All-Star managers. For the '82 game, Billy Martin was chosen to be the replacement in the AL. Here are their '83 Topps All-Star cards.

 I just finished making these cards a few weeks ago, and I really wish Topps would've given us All-Star manager and coach cards in all of their sets, but especially the '84 set.

 I haven't done '85, but here are the '86 Topps AS MGR cards, as well as one for Bobby Cox, the only coach I could find in the '85 game.

 In 1987, they didn't have the positions on the front, but the Managers were Howser and Herzog, and the coaches McNamara, Johnson, and Lasorda, each of whom would be All-Star managers in following years (McNamara and Johnson in the '87 game, and Lasorda in the '89 game.

 I haven't toyed with the '88 set, so here are the '89 cards, again with coaches.

 1990 didn't have positions listed again. Tommy Lasorda and Tony LaRussa managed the '89 game for leading their clubs to the '88 World Series.

 1991 didn't have positions listed again, but it was LaRussa and Roger Craig as the managers. I haven't got around to making the Craig, so the one you see down below Tony is a Joe Morgan coach card.

 I pulled out all of the stops in 1992, making backs to the entire set, something I will probably never do again. The Managers were Lou Piniella and LaRussa (again), and you can tell with the first few cards that I was just starting out, and that the last ones I was definitely getting better. I chose random stats and standings to put on the back of each one.

 There were a number of coaches in the '93 All-Star game, as you can see here. The managers were Bobby Cox and Cito Gaston.

After the '94 set, Topps put All-Stars in the 1995 set, and they were left out of the set until 2003, when they put in (guess what??) Managers!!!  I still will add coaches to the 2003-present sets.

As soon as I finish the coach cards in the 1993 Topps set, I will work on the All-Star manager and coach cards, with Bobby Cox and Tom Kelly being the managers for the '92 game.

I have finished the '84 set recently, have been making headway in the '93 set, and am 3 teams done from finishing the '81 Topps checklist. With all that being done, I am thinking about adding another thing to my plate by creating a Twitter account, mainly to post alot of the customs I make. I just don't want to mess up if I do create the account and I want to do everything professionally and not appear like a noob. So, a few questions...

First, what should I post? A random card? Groups of cards? A card of the day? What would attract people to follow my account?

Second, I notice there are a number of baseball players who I have made customs of that own Twitter accounts. Should I try to add them as followers first, and them post customs of them and tag them? Should I just post, and see if I can get the players as followers if these customs spread by word of mouth?

Third, should I add all of the MLB team accounts? Would Topps kill me if I added them and they saw that I was making customs using their designs?

I'm probably forgetting a few other questions, but these were the main ones. I don't even know if anyone would want to follow a Topps Cards that Never Were Twitter page, but if there is enough interest, I could create one. #ToppsCardsthatNeverWere.

Thanks for checking out my latest post.
-Jeremy

Completed 1984 Topps set

I start this post off with a note of sadness today. Back in 2002 or 2003, I used to go to Spring Training games in Lakeland, Florida, trying to get autographs from whomever I could. It was there that I met a kid named Zach, who was only 7 years younger than me. He lived in Michigan, and would come down every spring with his mom to go to games and get autographs. I saw Zach just about every year, and we had tons of fun getting signatures every year. Zach was always kind, once trading me an '02 Upper Deck 40-Man card of Steve Colyer so I could get it signed since I didn't have one. Another time, we were at some practice fields, and Matt Anderson gave him a bat and a ball, and Zach was nice enough to let me have the ball since I didn't quite get to Matt before he was finished giving things away. My favorite memory of Zach, though, was seeing the joy on his face when I gave him a '95 Topps card. We were talking about players with funny names, and I mentioned how I had a card of Bucky Buckles (a guy who I actually collect). He thought I was crazy, and I promised him I had a card of Bucky, and I looked through a box of duplicates I had, which I thought would have an extra Bucky card, and sure enough, it did. I came to a Tigers practice the next day with a Bucky Buckles '95 Topps card for Zach, and he started cracking up.
So while getting on SportsCollectors.net today, I came across a post stating that Zach had passed away due to a car crash a few days ago. I will always remember all of the fun we had graphing, but most of all, your kindness, Zach. RIP.
Here is a photo his mother took of us one spring.


I finally finished the '84 Topps set, and if I never have to do another custom with 2 photos on the same card, it will be too soon. '84 was the biggest pain in the butt set I have ever done, but it is now finished. I hope to get back to the '93 set pretty soon, and that should be easy as pie compared to '84.
With the '84 set now finished, I have completed the 1983 Topps, 1983 Topps Traded, 1984 Topps, 1984 Topps Traded, 1992 Topps, 1994 Topps, and 1998 Topps sets. The links to the completed sets are at the right side of my blog if you want to look at them (as well as the checklists of other in-progress sets). Many thanks to Marc Weiss, who helped with many of these, and to anyone else who helped add cards to the set for me. Without further delay, the 1984 Topps and 1984 Topps Traded sets: