Biggest years in the hobby- Modern

[Big67]

2001 - Ichiro and Albert Pujols rookie craze.

[bauce]

1995 - Hideo Nomo: The beginning of the Tsunami that hit American Baseball. It was believed he was the first Japanese player to make the majors. However....

(Forgive them, for new collectors do not know what they say)

Thanks to the Boyd & Harris book Baseball Card Flipping, Trading and Bubblegum Book (1973) that proved this a tenant false and brought the 1965 Topps card #282 from a $5 common to a $40 semi-star status.

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

Nothing in 1983 and 1984 was short-printed. Production numbers increased every year that period for all three companies.

Arthur

[bigfanNY]

Post 1980..
1981 I agree absolutely 3 sets!!! It was a big deal
1984 Donruss and Fleer were both tough to buy at local shop
1989 Upper Deck... All the early boxes I opened had 2 or 3 Griffey's
1994. Baseball Strike ... for a time America's least favorite pastime... the following years saw real reduction in card production.
1995 Upper Deck Be A player Hockey..An Auto in Every Pack!!
2009 The Mike Trout high value Rookie card era we still live in.
2016 Topps Now cards produced like social media snapshots..And Topps Transcendent 26k set????
All of it was fun to collect
Jonathan

[rats60]

1984 Fleer and Donruss were easy to find early in the year. Our local candy wholesaler had plenty of Donruss. Demand driven by Mattingly and Strawberry caused the product to dry up. Topps printed cards all year long, Fleer and Donruss didn't, so there was a perception that they were short printed. They were not, it was just that Topps was still delivering Topps to wholesalers into September/October.