Good topic and the Dean book is a good resource ( hope this does not cause rants about his pricing again). There is a prior thread on this. I will try to find it.
I did not start collecting until 57, but did all the Topps sets originally and Bowman later. As I recall in the prior thread folks discussed design, price , number of cards and size as factors.
In 51 Topps had 5 sets. Agree the red and blue backs are not great, but the Team cards and Current and Connie Macks are very nice from my stand point
The 55 TV set was a novel idea but a bust in the market, maybe because of all those umpires or maybe because so few households actually had a color TV in 1955
Here are threads on 1953
http://www.net54baseball.com/showthr...pack+which+buy
http://net54baseball.com/showthread....+bowman+nickle