How About Some Love for 1974's?

[ALR-bishop]

I like the 74 set. It was an historic set in that it was the first one where Topps eliminated series distribution and published all of the set at once. The Washington/San Diego twist was also cool.

Up until 1994, in addition to the regular Topps sets, I also collected all Topps test or insert sets for each year, and 1974 was a good one for extras.

Admittedly there was that ugly Traded set. But the 1974 Deckle set was nice, and I collected that 3 ways, white back, gray back and undeckled proofs. I also have the Action Emblem Stickers set in cloth and cardboard form.. And I have a set of the 12 Puzzles and a set of the 74 Stamps...and the Team Checklists. Topps test and insert sets , which were magnificent during the 60s and early 70s, dropped off quite a bit after 74

[SPMIDD]

Whenever I get tired of collecting Mantle's (maybe never) the 1974 set is my next one to buy. You can get a nice '74 set for a very reasonable price in my opinion.

[71buc]

The 74 set was the first one I completed buying pack after pack as an 11 year old. The Garvey, Robinson(s), Rose, Reggie, and Ryan are beautiful. However, I always loved the Ralph Garr.

[Northviewcats]

1. Not to difficult to get NM cards, especially when compared to the 1973s
2. Winfield rookie
3. Washington variations
4. First traded set?
5. Hank Aaron specials
6. Lots of great action shots of Hall of Famers: Ryan already mentioned, but I love the Reggie Jackson, Cepeda & the Killebrew card
7. Attractive framing with the adjacent banners top and bottom
8. Red border autographed team cards (a parallel subset before its time)
9. Jesus Alou error
10. I say Apadaco; you say Apadaca

Fun set to collect.

Best regards,

Joe

[ALR-bishop]

Good list Joe

[darkhorse9]

Don't forget the three Dave Freisleben variations.

This set was always special to me, but can someone tell me what was up with the background color on the Billy Williams card. It's got a weird yellow thing going on there.

[ALR-bishop]

Dark---I had just assumed it was a group of the Low Men in Yellow Coats from Hearts in Atlantis taking in a game

[novakjr]

Originally Posted by Northviewcats

1. Not to difficult to get NM cards, especially when compared to the 1973s
2. Winfield rookie
3. Washington variations
4. First traded set?
5. Hank Aaron specials
6. Lots of great action shots of Hall of Famers: Ryan already mentioned, but I love the Reggie Jackson, Cepeda & the Killebrew card
7. Attractive framing with the adjacent banners top and bottom
8. Red border autographed team cards (a parallel subset before its time)
9. Jesus Alou error
10. I say Apadaco; you say Apadaca

Fun set to collect.

Best regards,

Joe

All of these factors are what led me making '74 the first set I decided to put together(master). Definitely one of the most interesting sets that Topps ever made, in terms of variations and subsets..

As far as the traded set thing. Yes, it was the first stand-alone traded set. I find it interesting because of the way they numbered them as sort of a counterpart to the standard card.. Off the top of my head '59 might've been the first year that they fooled around with traded/optioned variations. I think '54 Bowman had a coupla traded variations as well..

[Rickyy]

Originally Posted by 71buc

The 74 set was the first one I completed buying pack after pack as an 11 year old. The Garvey, Robinson(s), Rose, Reggie, and Ryan are beautiful. However, I always loved the Ralph Garr.

I was just like Mike...this was the first one I attempted to complete pack by pack... last regular card was Dave Sells that I actually had to trade a friend for...it was conducted on the porch of his grandma's mobile home park... on a nice summer afternoon nice memories! Later on...went to complete the master set by getting a 1974 Washington Nationals Dave Roberts at a card show some 20 years later...

Ricky Y

[Rich Klein]

but one of the checklist cards (263, 273?) was really tough to find and I never had any stock of that card and always was being asked for that card back in the day.

And in NJ, the Randy Jones WNL Card was for some reason much tougher than the other cards -- now the cards in the 300's are tough as well

Rich