My Ty Cobb RC?

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by smtjoy

Runscott would you consider exhibits not to be cards because a few series have post card backs? Then you have the 1931-32 that even state on the back its a card, and no way it could be considered a postcard with no room to mail because of the ad on the back. IMO in some case they can be both but they are cards along the same lines as Calvindog listed.

You said "cards", not "baseball cards" (I was looking for that when I came back to check out this thread)

An 'exhibit card' is an 'exhibit card', just as a 'postcard' is a 'postcard', a 'supplement' is a 'supplement', etc. But of course, it's a 'baseball exhibit card', just as you have 'baseball postcards', 'baseball team postcards', etc. I wouldn't consider a postcard to be a 'baseball card', just because it is part of a series (not a 1-off). Where you should go with this is to argue that the caramel and tobacco series cards are 'advertising cards', not 'baseball cards'. Then you would have me backed into a corner! Same thing, I guess, with the example you gave above.

Originally Posted by bcbgcbrcb

In order to simplify things, maybe we should just call the item a Rookie, i.e.- Ty Cobb Rookie and leave off the "card" part of it. In that way, it could be a card, postcard, premium, pinback, etc., whatever his first Major League collectible would be. At least for Rookie identification purposes, that would eliminate the never ending argument about what constitutes a "card". Then we would only have to deal with whether a team item would count (my personal opinion is no).

I think when we've had these discussions before, they generally never got resolved, and everyone ended up just saying that the 'rookie' designation can mean whatever it means to each person. When I saw my first t206, I thought, "that's just a tobacco advertising card - who cares if it has a baseball player on the front? Why would anyone collect them? There's no stats!!!" Then, of course, I fell in love with them.

I don't consider 'team' cards to be player cards - to me they could never be considered a 'rookie card'. Also, I wouldn't consider a pennant or pin with a player image to be a 'rookie card', but certainly it could be a 'rookie item'. I also don't consider strip cards, box cut-outs, or stand-ups to be cards (as long as we're baring our souls). I once bought a strip card, just to come face-to-face with the damned thing and pass final judgement - I scowled and sentenced him to ebay.

To be fair, if I collected 'rookie cards' and a super-cool postcard or pennant of a player I needed became available, and it was older than the card I sought, I would say "what the hell, I'm now collecting rookie things."