A little help from my friends

Recently, a fan of my blog, Richard, emailed me with some customs that he made off of my list of cards that never were.  Included were the '08 Topps cards, '13 Topps cards, and a 2016 Topps card. I must say that I like what Richard has done, and I am happy to get help on any of the cards that I have on my list. The list is ever-growing, and I'd be happy even to just get help on names of players/cards to put on the list. Eventually I want to just list every player needed to complete the set (like I have with the 1992 Topps set), but let me tell you, when I did it for the '92 set, it took probably close to a month, and I knew that set inside and out, so it was easier to know who was in it and who wasn't. Maybe it's a pipe dream, but I do think that I can get the list updated, at least maybe from the '89 set up through the 2000's at least at some point.

I would like to thank Richard for his work. If anyone else wants to help make cards off of my list, I'll be happy to add them and post them. Every card made gets us a little closer to having a Topps set be officially complete.

Things are changing in my life right now. My wife and I are expecting our first child in mid-late November, we are (hopefully) moving into (and owning) a new house in the next month or so, and I don't know if I'll be able to update this blog as much as I have in the past. That isn't to say that I won't add new cards. Lately I have been updating my 2 blogs (I have another blog called Completing the 1992 Topps Set if you didn't know) during my lunch breaks at work, and I can usually get a post up during my lunch as long as the wifi is good. The making of new cards might just be slow, because I'm sure it's going to take a while to unpack everything in the new place, and I don't have any clue as to what things will be like with a baby, but I am excited. I will still be here making my '90's through the present Topps cards, and hopefully with friend like Richard and other custom card makers out there, every Topps set will be as complete as it can be.  Thanks for checking out the latest post.

-Jeremy

'98 Devil Rays Set apart 1: 1999 Topps Larry Rothschild Manager

1998 was a big year for me. I was 15 then, I was getting a ton of baseball cards since I started getting 20 bucks a week to mow my grandpas yard, and there was finally a Major League Baseball team near me as the Tampa Bay Devil Rays started playing that year. I got a few Rays cards from packs in 1998, and in 1999 as the year went by I got even more, and this time with stats on the back for their first season. Topps probably left off a good 2/3rds of the team in their '99 set, so I am out to rectify that and give all of the '98 Rays team a '99 Topps card.

The first card I made for the set is one of Rays manager Larry Rothschild. Larry skippered the team until 2001. He didn't have much of a chance with the team as they only signed 2 really big free agents, Jose Canseco and Vinny Castilla, and one of them (Castilla) was injured for most of his tenure as a Ray. Perhaps if they would've got some pitching and signed a few big time hitters like Arizona, we wouldn't have had to wait until 2008 for our first playoff appearance and Larry could've stuck around a little longer.

Larry only has 1 Topps card, in the 2001 set. Had Topps put managers in their sets from '94 to '00, he would've been in probably 3 more sets as I suspect they would've included him in the '98 set. This is the first manager card I've made in the '99 set and I did it basically the same as I did for my 1999 Topps Dick Pole coach card, putting his Manager title in a box at the top of the card and his name underneath that. I'm going to try to make a page for my '99 Rays project with pictures to each card I have done. I'm probably about 1/5th of the way done so far.

I am also working on making 1992 Topps cards for every player/manager/coach who played in 1991 and wasn't in the original '92 Topps or Traded (rookies, not traded players) set. Larry was a coach for the Reds in '91, so I made his card in the set. It's just the front for now, but it is another card that Larry doesn't have.

I hope you enjoyed the 2 Cards that Never Were.  Thanks for checking out my latest custom.
-Jeremy