Current cards in the Collection: 33,147
Cards acquired in 2023: 1,457
Collection grew by: 4.6%
Top Fifteen Most Abundant Cards in the Collection
1.(tie) 1982 Topps .................................. 1,269
1.(tie) 1984 Topps ...................................1,269
3. 1988 Donruss ......................................1,120
4. 1987 Topps ..........................................1,080
5. 1983 Fleer ............................................1,063
6. 1989 Topps ................................. 1,000
7. 1988 Topps All-Star .............................. 953
8. 1988 Topps .................................... 938
9. 1986 Topps All-Star .............................. 790
10. 1990 Topps .......................................... 743
11. 1990 Fleer ............................................ 662
12. 1990 Donruss ...................................... 592
13. 1989 Donruss ...................................... 589
14. 1986 Topps .......................................... 574
15. 1989 Fleer ............................................ 546
For the first time since I started posting this list on annual basis back in 2015, there is a tie at the #1 spot. I don't know what the odds of that are, but they have to be small. 1989 Topps landed on exactly 1,000 copies, making it the 6th member of the the 1,000 card club. I'll probably never do it, but I like the idea of filling empty factory set boxes from a given year with 792 copies of the Wallach from the set.
Top 10 most added cards in 2023
1. 1990 Fleer ..................................... 113
2. 1989 Score ..................................... 69
3. 1988 Topps ..................................... 63
4. 1989 Fleer ....................................... 56
5. 1988 Fleer ....................................... 53
6. 1991 Fleer ....................................... 52
7. 1988 Donruss ................................. 46
8. (tie) 1989 Donruss .......................... 40
8. (tie) 1989 Topps .............................. 40
10. (tie) 1991 Score ............................. 39
10. (tie) 1990 Topps ............................ 39
1990 Fleer ran away with this category this past year. It's the first time it's topped this list. A few ff the usual suspects, notably 1987 Topps and both 1986 Topps didn't show up in the numbers they usually do. Perhaps I've started to exhaust the supply?
Notable No-Shows, zero acquired
For the 2nd year in a row, I'm ranking 1987 Leaf (with 58 copies in my collection) as the most notable no-show. It's now been over two years since I've added a copy of that card. Other "notable" no-shows include 1992 Topps Kids (50 copies), 1985 Leaf (50), 1993 Pinnacle (49), 1994 Leaf (48), and 1995 Upper Deck (46). Oddly enough, I often end up receiving a few of these cards days after this post goes up, and theres been a few instances where I've already received cards on this list in early January before I even get a chance to post it. Tune in to see if that trend continues.
Welcome Back
Most of the cards on this list were sent by a very generous reader. Dave from Williamsburg sent me one of the more unique packages I've ever received, loaded with rarely seen cards, including the '93 Refractor, a pair of Desert Shield Topps, and others. A lot of the cards listed below are the first one's I've received since their initial post in the early days of this blog. I started this blog in 2011, and it took about two years for me to work my way down to the more obscure cards.
1st since 2012
1991 Topps Desert Shield
1st since 2013
1989 O-Pee-Chee Stickers
1990 Bowman Tiffany
1993 Topps Finest Refractor
1995 Topps Finest Refractor
1st since 2014
2014 Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame Induction Card
Top Card Added Each Year
This is a new list I decided to add this year. Below is the card I added the most copies of each year since I started tracking in 2015. I think of it as sort of a list of World Series Winners.
2023: 1990 Fleer (113 copies added)
2022: 1983 Fleer (832)
2021: 1985 Topps (92)
2020: 1987 Indiana Blue Sox (325)
2019: 1982 Fleer (134)
2018: 1987 Topps (100)
2017: 1982 Topps (163)
2015: 1982 Topps (407)
2014: 1986 Topps All-Star (97)
Top 15 All-Time Most Sent Cards
Finally, my favorite list of all the numbers I track. The all-time tally for copies of cards that have been sent to me by generous readers. I mention this every year, but I feel like this list offers the best insights into the junk wax era and what people were buying, and to some extant the production numbers. It's obviously not perfect, or all that scientific (as evidenced by the 1987 Blue Sox card that a reader was nice enough to send me 325 copies of a few years ago), but I still find it to be a useful tool, or at least, an interesting list to track.
1. 1989 Topps .................................. 451
2. 1987 Topps .................................. 445
3. 1988 Donruss............................... 427
4. 1988 Topps All-Star .................... 404
5. 1988 Topps .................................. 392
6. 1990 Fleer ...…….....................… 375
7. 1990 Topps .................................. 344
8. 1990 Donruss .............................. 341
9. 1991 Upper Deck ......................... 326
10. 1987 Indiana Blue Sox .............. 325
11. 1986 Topps All-Star ................... 321
12. 1986 Topps ................................ 293
13. 1989 Donruss............................. 279
14. 1991 Donurss MVP ................... 273
15. 1991 Donruss............................. 267
Finally, thank you to everyone who continues to send cards, or even just continues to occasionally check in on this blog. It's now been up for over a decade, which really blows my mind.