1967 Topps Venezuelan--Pirated Issue?
 

Was the 1967 Topps Venezuelan set a pirated issue that was unlicensed or unaffiliated with the actual company?

1.) Starting in 1960, the Venezuelan issue was skip released in 1960, 1962, 1964, 1966 and 1968. A 1967 release would break this pattern.

2.) While the 1959, 1960, 1962, 1964, 1966 and 1968 have back designs copied patterned after the American issue, the Venezuelan cards are completely different with totally Spanish text.

3.) The 1967 Topps Venezuelan issue is "all series." For instance, the parallels in the 1967 Topps U.S. issue of #100 Frank Robinson and #600 Brooks Robinson are in the issue. That is not the case with any other Venezuelan set which checklisted up to a certain series in the American issue. This set had to be retailed during 1968.

4.) The Retirado players (vastly overrated in my opinion) were not in any Topps issue (a first) along with the foreign Winter League players.

Absent of any confirming wrappers or albums released by Topps, my thought is this issue was pirated by Sport Grafico.

I agree. Compared to other 1960s work, it's logical that the 1967 "Topps" series cards were unlicensed copies of the USA issue. Once the Topps cards were on the street, a Venezuelan printer could've copied enough fronts to fill out a MLB series to combine with their Retirado and local series. All three could've been sold during the 1967-68 winter league, since a number of MLB players spent the offseason there.

It all makes sense. I would also add that all the other Venz issues have fronts that match their American counterparts, but the 67's are borderless.

Wait, so Topps doesn't recognize the 1967 VZ set as Topps official?

1967
 

Doubt if there is anyone left at Topps that would have the slightest idea or way to find out

I have wondered the same thing before.
I agree wholeheartedly on the "Retirado" cards. Non-contemporary, aside from the very occasional condition anomaly - not much to see there.
Pirated or not, there are a few interesting cards like the Bobby Cox card.

http://i152.photobucket.com/albums/s...67tvenBCox.jpg

People who were in their 20s and 30s could easily still be alive, but equally importantly, isn't it likely that over the years we would have heard something about this?

Trust me, Topps would have no idea about these

Even if they did remember they would not care. I have several friend/relatives that worked in the industry and I never ask about cards because they didn't care because it was just a job.

I'm not sure why the producer would be named on a bootleg though. Any thoughts?

Not an expert by any means but have been buying a lot of Venezuelans lately. All the red flags are there stated in the original post. To add the first two series aren't topps products which to me is odd the trend was promoting their products. Then in 68 went back to the trend of 60-62-64-66. My vote would be topps didn't have as much to do with the 67's as the other years. Rick

Surely, Topps has a Master list of every set list they've ever officially made, but maybe that's being naive.

Scd
 

The SCD Standard Catalog still seems to me the best comprehensive resource for Topps pre 1980 sets, inserts and test sets, including Venezualans, which are in a separate section. It is a great resource for anything baseball that Topps turned out

They have stopped listing post 80 stuff, but their older catalogs are good for 80s and 90s. Less so after 2000

If Topps has a master list, Dave would have unearthed it by now :-)

In case there’s interest, I wrote a lengthy article for the SABR Baseball Cards blog on the 1967 issue. Much will be old hat to readers of this thread but perhaps you’ll find at least something new and interesting in the write-up.

https://sabrbaseballcards.blog/2020/...the-caribbean/

Jason

Quite a good read, thanks for posting-the 67 set fascinates me. Those VWL cards are unique with the mountain shots and oddball stadiums.

Thank you, Dave!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thought
 

What if it wasn't "bootlegged"? What if Topps licensed it or gave their permission for it to be produced even if they didn't produce it? That would explain no issue with Sport Grafico printing their name on it.

I have about 20 cards from the local teams, including the Cox rookie. Pretty neat set...

Right. That’s something I don’t think we can rule out. Though just a crumb, one more small thing that suggests the whole set was unauthorized is the DiMaggio card in the Retirado subset. Joe D didn’t say yes to much back then.

The Retirados may be unrelated in terms of licensed/unlicensed where the Topps cards could have been and the VWL cards were fair game. For all we know, Topps was onboard with the idea of co-mingling all three as a test to see if it stimulated sales. Or not. It's a great set (all three subsets I mean) either way, certainly the most interesting one out of Venezuela in my book.

Fully Agree
 

Kind of funny one of the things that makes it that for me is the fact that it is uniquely "not Topps" but features all of the great US players! The scarcity of some of the cards is a challenge not for the faint of heart or impatient too!