The Best Granderson Card You've Never Seen

Last year, UD Ballpark Collection offered a handful of Granderson relic cards that put him toe to toe with some other fine players in the game. Perhaps you've heard about these cards? Sure, they were nothing special--seemed a bit like a throwaway set at the time, but they had their relative merits. What was lost on everyone was the fact that there were actually non-relic base cards thrown in there, somewhere. With all the cards numbered consecutively (what? I don't get a UDBC-GRGTBW for my numbering?), it went rather unnoticed that card #38, was just a good ol' fashioned base card. That fact went further unnoticed when the base card couldn't be found anywhere.

I'm serious. I saw the card one time--the day that Ballpark Collection hit eBay via the people who break open cases of the stuff, before it was widely available to us lay people. I never once saw the card again. I've seen a million of the Granderson/Upton cards, plenty of the Quad Relics and a handful of the 6x cards, but I've never seen the base card since.

So that's it. I just wanted to let you know that it exists, but that I haven't seen it save for one day.




Ok, fine.

2008 UD Ballpark Collection #38 Curtis Granderson

Are you kidding me?! There were cards like that in Ballpark Collection? Maybe I'm totally off-base here, but that is a fantastic looking card. It blows all of the relics etc. out of the water. Explain to me, then, why the whole set wasn't like this? It has that "Artifacts" vibe to it, but the wood sets it apart. The gold foil and "Ballpark Collection" logo looks sharp and they've used an outstanding picture of Curtis Granderson that hasn't been used in any other card. Spring Training (notice the away jersey, home helmet), with a huge smile. Fantastic.

The fact that more cards aren't like this is sad. Mostly, it is sad because it shows you that the companies are capable of producing good looking cards but seem to lose their way somewhere along the line. It boggles my mind that it has taken me a year to track this card down, and now that I have it, I'm happy to share it with all of you. So there it was, the best Curtis Granderson card that you've never seen, now available for all to see (On Zistle too!).

Ultimate Checklist: 2008 UD Ballpark Collection

When I first saw UD Ballpark Collection on eBay, it was Curtis Granderson's base card, #38. I didn't put in a bid--buying base cards on eBay is extremely foolhardy when you take shipping costs into consideration--but I actually liked the way the card looked. Little did I know that I would almost never run across card #38 again. Strange, isn't it? That the regular card in a set is the hardest to find? In the meantime, I did manage to nab three of the four other cards in the set, all of them Game Used.

#166 B.J. Upton/Curtis Granderson Dual Swatch

#228 Granderson/Furcal/Jeter/Weeks Quad Swatch

#252 Guerrero/Ramirez/Granderson/Teahen/Baldelli/Weeks 6x

I find it very strange that these relic cards are essentially numbered alongside non-game used cards. As another blogger (and I'm sorry, I can't remember who-if it was you let me know) said, constantly pulling quad and 6x game used cards out of packs of Ballpark Collection really eliminates the excitement that should accompany a card that, for all intents and purposes, should be a special pull.

I neither love nor hate the design of this set, but I want to point out one thing that Upper Deck did very, very right. The double, quad and 6x swatch cards all have a fundamentally different design--not just more swatches. More importantly, they use a DIFFERENT PICTURE of Granderson for each card. That is huge--it really helps keep these cards from looking like cheap knock-offs of one another. My personal favorite is the six swatch card--with the in-game shot. Why only three swatches you might ask? The other three are on the back, including a very nice bright blue swatch of Mark Teahen. I will say, I'm glad that Granderson was given the upper-echelon treatment on that card. It is much nicer to see him along Vlad and Manny than it would be with the rest of the gang.

The only other card that I don't have is an autographed variation of #166--the Upton/Granderson card. I have never seen the variation and have no information at all about its print run, although I'm under the impression that it is not serial numbered. So, that is it for UD Ballpark Collection, 5 Granderson cards, including 1 base, 3 Game Used and 1 Game Used/Autographed. While certainly not the highlight of the year, I tend to think that it is just fine.