1984 Topps - Don Mattingly

In the mid and late '80s, when I was a youngster, Don Mattingly was the guy. And the 1984 Topps card was the card. Back in the day we would get price guides to keep abreast of the market. Various publications would issue yearly or monthly guides. The monthly guides were the best because, of course, the market constantly changed. But $5 for a guide each month was $5 you weren't spending on cards. Beckett baseball Card Monthly was the best, but then Tuff Stuff came on the scene, and they had four sports in one, so even though it was a little more expensive, you had all your sports cards covered. Where I am going with this is that Don Mattingly cards were always the highest non-rookie cards in any set. And his '84 rookie cards were $20 for most of that time. This was was 10+ times the value of most of the other star rookies from the era. When McGwire came along in '87, his cards joined Mattingly's as the premier cards of the day (especially the '85 Olympic card). Other stars would have there RCs spike in value from time to time (Eric Davis, Dwight Gooden, Bo Jackson), but all Mattingly's cards remained steady. If you got a Mattingly in a pack you felt like you just hit the jackpot - that pack just paid for itself.

Mattingly was a great player, until injuries derailed his career. I got this card years after its heyday when it was no longer $20. I picked up two more for virtually nothing a few years ago (as part of the whole 1984 set). The card is a sort of symbol of the hobby in the 80s. It shined brightly, and then burned out.

The 1984 design is a favorite of my good friend Eric. I remember him drawing out a prototype of a horse racing card using the '84 design (where the jockey's photo was in the square) and sending it in to Topps, which was a good idea. Eric is a year older and his wide range of interests, general knowledge, and competence was what I assumed was the natural order of things. In that way, he was a big brother to me, casting a vision of what reality was. I can't put my finger on each one, because it was not a conscious move, but there are many things that I readily adopted as things one should be interested in and an expert on because I saw it in Eric, baseball cards, sports in general, and current events being among them. Anyway, he thought the vertical block team name and the inset portrait were about as good as it gets back then. I definitely think they got the inset photo right (they also did it less successfully the previous year with a larger round portrait). I usually have a problem with too much white border space, but this one was okay (similar to the 1977s).